Interaction with RMS

It was on 9th of September 2010. I was anxiously waiting for this day to attend the function in which Richard Matthew Stallman delivering a speech at St. Joseph's College of Engineering and Technology, Palai. The speech was great. I Started from home very early along with my friends at ILUG Cochin. We reached there some hours before the speech. The function was organized amazingly by the Computer Engineering Students. The students started a FSUG (Free Software User Group) in their college and they named it as Swathanthra.in
RMS explained concepts and philosophy of the revolutionary os GNU/Linux. His two hour lecture was really great. He talked about Free-software. He talked about freedom. The ceremonial funny drama had taken place here too, RMS wore a black gown and an old CD as cap and said “I am St. Ignucius of the Church of Emacs and I bless your computer, my child. Long may you run.” In the Q&A session, I wrote a question to him and he answered it very passionately. The question was this -" you totally against to Open Source initiatives and FOSS. The question is asked in the background of a project like OPEN DRM". He answered that he is not AGAINST. Whatever the term may be, the core issue is FREEDOM. After answering the question, he added that "This is a good question". And I did know that he may comment something good to that question, because I have read there were a project like "Open DRM" was in serious consideration in some open source communities, which RMS clearly expressed his strong disapproval against such stupid projects. Even there were some Open Malwares! That question can be extended to such distros like Damn Vulnerable Linux (DVL).

After the speech, ILUG Cochin got a chance to meet RMS in person. We took some photographs with him. Anyway, it was my first experience with such an eminent person in the Free Software Community, and the experience was great.