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Linus Torvalds for the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize!!!
Since the Nobel Peace Prize is often given to politicians, some
disagree with the choices. But it is often given to non-politicians
who create international efforts to change the world for the better.
The free software movement has been with us since the beginning of
programming. The movement was defined and elaborated by Richard
Stallman, who inspired many programmers. However, the effort broke
into the mainstream, and became a huge international effort, because
of the work of a 21yo Finnish college student named after 1962 Nobel
Peace Prize winner Linus Pauling. It would be fitting to honor this
world-changing process by giving a Peace Prize to Linus Torvalds,
perhaps in 2011 on the 20th anniversary of the August 1991 Linux
announcement, or in 2012 on the 50th anniversary of Pauling's award.
Linux is one of the largest cooperative international efforts ever
undertaken. It inspired Ubuntu, One Laptop Per Child, and many
other global projects. Linux conquered the supercomputer space,
the server space, the embedded computer space - by peaceful means!
Linux helped sequence the human genome, helps protect the world
computer infrastructure from viral attack, and is now the pathway
for millions to learn computer programming and participate in new
international efforts.
While I imagine Linus Torvalds would be embarrassed by the attention,
it would sure make his parents happy. And it would mean one less
Peace Prize for a politician. :-)
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Why not share the award with other major contributors?
When thinking about projects like securing the Nobel Peace Prize,
think in terms of optimizing for a successful outcome rather than
optimizing for proper distribution of credit.
Right now, there is a controversy in the electronics community
about which individuals should have gotten the Nobel Physics
Prize for the CCD imager. There was a cast of thousands.
Where do you stop?
If we include the deserving Mark Shuttleworth and Richard Stallman
and Jimmy Wales, shouldn't we include Ward Cunningham, for example?
How about Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson? Kirk McCusick? Tim
Behrners-Lee? Bob Metcalfe? Vint Cerf? Lawrence Lessig? Bill
Gates (gasp)??? The list is endless - and that is our most
powerful selling point.
Would you demand Richard Stallman if the result was the inclusion
of Bill Gates as well? Remember, we can suggest (indirectly),
but we CANNOT CHOOSE. It is a committee of 5 Norwegian
politicians who make the choice. Think about their decision
making process, and the pressures they must respond to.
The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to communities, usually in the
form of their most visible and least controversial leader. Study
the history of the prize recipients. Yes, there are some flavors
of the month, and there are plenty of individuals who later proved
unworthy of the prize, but across the broad sweep of history, the
movements they represented mattered, and still affect us today.
For example, the award to the Current Occupant is not for the
particular accomplishments of that person, but to the American
election process. Amid much contention, we still did something
that would be impossible in most of the rest of the racist world.
If the result of that is more free and open elections in the
rest of the world, it takes away some of the sting for those of
us who preferred different candidates. Many may not agree with
the particular result, and we may all regret our votes before
the 2012 election, but this is the kind of process that the
Prize committee rewards. We need to match their expectations.
I suggest we focus our efforts on a single well known, long
established, and relatively uncontroversial candidate, because
we can succeed best that way. Linus Torvalds is eloquent,
engaging, and ... Scandanavian. We make it clear that by honoring
Linus Torvalds, we are honoring the open content creative
community of the entire world. We honor all the other
contributors by proxy. Almost all will be thrilled to see L.T.
get the Nobel Peace Prize (except Bill Gates). We also honor
the work of the 1962 Nobel Prize committee, whose award to Linus
Pauling had a direct effect on the production of Linux and of its
principal author. We draw support from every country in the world.
We open the door for other twentieth anniversary prizes, such
as the 2021 peace prize for Wikipedia to Jimmy Wales and Ward
Cunningham, the 2021 literature prize to Lawrence Lessig for
Creative Commons, and the 2024 peace prize for Ubuntu to Mark
Shuttleworth. This is our first opportunity; if we do it
right, it is by no means our last.
That is how we sell the idea to Linus Torvalds: He will be
helping establish the Nobel Hackers Club, which will eventually
include computational physicists and chemists and physicians,
collaborative literature groups, perhaps someday an A.I. entity
or two. It is time to leave the machine closet and take our
place in the sun ( the bright thing in the big blue room )!
Finally, framed in those terms and establishing those precedents,
does anyone here think Steve Ballmer will EVER get a Nobel Prize
for the monkey boy dance?
Next steps
Nobel Peace Prize candidates can be nominated by academics in political
science, law, history, and other social science disciplines.
Perhaps Lawrence Lessig could get the ball rolling.
According to the list on Wikipedia, the five people to convince are
Thorbjørn Jagland (chair), Kaci Kullmann Five (deputy chair), Sissel
Rønbeck, Inger-Marie Ytterhorn, and Ågot Valle. These are Norwegian
politicians in Oslo. Perhaps we can send them Norsk language Ubuntu
disks, and the many Norwegian Linux users can help them. If Linux
becomes a big part of their world, Linus Torvalds becomes more
visible.
Again, this is not about who deserves the Nobel Peace Prize
the most. This is a matter of who among our community is most likely
to be the first among many to receive the award. Think outside your
world. Try to think like a Norwegian politician, perhaps a little
left of center, committed to the kinds of community that Norwegians
favor. Who among us most resembles a Norwegian politician? Sorry,
Linus, but the rest of us fit the mold even more poorly than you do!
For more information, email to ltnpp (at) keithl (dot) com .
This email address is NOT to be used for unsolicited commercial email.
last revision November 20, 2009