9 ms·

∑ Xah Code

166 points by tsujp 5y ago

carapace 5y ago
I'm glad Xah Lee is still around, and seems to be doing well. (Protip: his Unicode search pages are very useful, I use them all the time: http://xahlee.info/comp/unicode_index.html http://xahlee.info/comp/unicode_index.html)
math-dev 5y ago
Xah Lee’s tips on elisp were super useful to me. A relic of the usenet era (an infamous troll on comp.lang.lisp), but someone who has added a lot of value to a lot of lives Long love ergomacs!
- zasdffaa 5y ago
  > an infamous troll on comp.lang.lisp Are you perhaps confusing him with Erik Naggum, cos there just happens to be a post on HN about Erik right now. And Erik could be something special when a fuse blew!
  - ori_b 5y ago
    Erik was also a famous troll on comp.lang.lisp. There were multiple famous trolls on usenet.
  - twic 5y ago
    No, Xah was a troll. He trolled on groups i read, too - comp.lang.java.programmer or comp.lang.python, or both.
    - tzot 5y ago
      I remember him in comp.lang.python (IIRC for a couple of years after 2000).
- kleiba 5y ago
  http://xahlee.info/emacs/emacs/_p/KickbanXahLeeFromEmacsChannel.htm http://xahlee.info/emacs/emacs/_p/KickbanXahLeeFromEmacsChan...
  - xoa 5y ago
    He was banned from HN long ago too. Random long-ass thread he started on the Python un back in 2009 about this stuff I had saved an archive of for some reason: https://www.mail-archive.com/python-list@python.org/msg236031.html https://www.mail-archive.com/python-list@python.org/msg23603... He even replies for once further down in typical style complete with a classic Also, thanks to many supporters over the past years. Truly Your Superior, Xah Like, yeah he is likely somewhere on the spectrum and he has some useful insights and material. But he's also kind of a raging asshole with a chip on his shoulder the size of mountain who would pop into technical groups and dump monologues out of nowhere then vanish, or at most deign to maybe add a bit more odd responses loaded with condescension and victimhood. I'm not sorry there are some colorful people like that around for a variety of reasons. That kind of personality can do neat stuff sometimes, and that he can have his own long running site and put up all his thoughts and opinions and then have entire new generations see and reconsider them down the road regardless of any bans from anywhere else is itself a testament to the promise of the internet and speech. And something I'm happy to point to by people who go ballistic about moderation on social media or the like. You don't have to be trapped by that. At the same time I completely understand all the bans because holy crap. That kind of rant is enjoyed in strict moderation. Though that so many of us would respond seriously in retrospect is kind of nice too even if the banhammer came down afterwards when it got repetitive. Anyway, random anecdote! On reflection that too is itself part of the fascination around people like this, so many of the rest of us end up with shared recollections and stories to pass down. They become some part of the common lore of communities, the mad sorcerer/wiseman living in the cave up the mountain from the village of old. Often expelled from regular society for good reason, yet still subjects of interest and in some societies even a certain sort of respect.
    - sva_ 5y ago
      > He was banned from HN long ago too. https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xahlee https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xahlee Does not appear to be banned, just inactive?
- devnonymous 5y ago
  > an infamous troll on comp.lang.lisp And on the python mailing lists. The last I recall seeing that name was in context of crowd funding after going through some tough times. It was quite sad. Hope things are better now.
- dvdkhlng 5y ago
  > Long love ergomacs! I recently stumbled over, and started using (and modifying) Xah's "xah-fly-keys" emacs bindings, which are a somewhat more radical implementation of the ideas behind ergoemacs (e.g. use Emacs without any "chording", i.e. without ever having to press two keys at once apart from shift+letter). [1] https://github.com/xahlee/xah-fly-keys https://github.com/xahlee/xah-fly-keys
  - dotancohen 5y ago
    Why not just use Evil, the VIM emulation layer.
    - dvdkhlng 5y ago
      > Why not just use Evil, the VIM emulation layer. To cite Xah [1]: "xah-fly-keys.el is a modal editing mode for emacs, like vi, but the design of key/command choice is based on command frequency statistics and ease-of-key score. Most frequently used commands have most easy keys." I can confirm, that the amount of work on the hands is extremely reduced with xah-fly-keys vs. vanilla emacs (depending on where you put the command mode switch), though I have no experience with evil or vi to compare against. [1] http://xahlee.info/emacs/misc/ergoemacs_vi_mode.html http://xahlee.info/emacs/misc/ergoemacs_vi_mode.html
      - justinhj 5y ago
        This really disregards the compositional aspect of vims commands
- seanw444 5y ago
  His Elisp tutorials were (and still are) invaluable to me for familiarizing myself with Emacs.
- hatmatrix 5y ago
  I learned emacs lisp around 15 years ago - his tutorials were essential. The way he remains prolific is amazing.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Tomte 5y ago
Oh, is he better now? (I don't see the plea for help on his home page) If so, good to hear!
prionassembly 5y ago
By all appearances Xah is such an extreme personality. It's this (and websites like this) which made the internet awesome.
qualudeheart 5y ago
Xah deserves more attention and help. Is he still unemployed? Someone should help him find a job if possible.
- HarryHirsch 5y ago
  People like him need basic income, the rent paid and a social worker. Nothing else works.
- stevespang 5y ago
marvel_boy 5y ago
I did not know about how terribly is that: Famous Programers with Repetitive Strain Injury http://xahlee.info/emacs/emacs/emacs_hand_pain_celebrity.html http://xahlee.info/emacs/emacs/emacs_hand_pain_celebrity.htm... Seems that Emacs is no good in excess!
- NeutralForest 5y ago
  The risk is overstated, many people have used without any issue and there is no control group as well, those programmers might have issues either way, Emacs or not.
  - dotancohen 5y ago
    > there is no control group as well VIM users?
    - NeutralForest 5y ago
      Maybe, now there needs a case for significant differences in pain levels among Emacs vs Vim users.
      - dotancohen 5y ago
        To be fair, the pain that VIM users feel is not in their digits or wrists! :wq
    - deltille 5y ago
      VIM started flirting with giving me RSI issues (mostly : and esc keys; yes, even on capslock. I have small hands) after some years. It's a comparison certainly but not a control.
      - sva_ 5y ago
        > esc key You may use Ctrl-[ instead. What do you mean about capslock? Mapping capslock to esc?
kache_ 5y ago
This guy is unhinged in like the best of ways. First found out about him on /g/
- bmn__ 5y ago
  http://xahlee.org/PageTwo_dir/Personal_dir/mi_pixra/mi_lunbe_las_vegas_2003-10.jpg http://xahlee.org/PageTwo_dir/Personal_dir/mi_pixra/mi_lunbe...
  - kache_ 5y ago
    A NSFW flag would have been nice :P
isoprophlex 5y ago
Not related to this, but since we're talking trolls... I noticed that n-gate.com hasn't been updated in more than half a year. I always enjoyed reading their over the top critiques of HN posts... anyone know if they're okay and maybe just burnt out -- or that something else is going on?
- executesorder66 5y ago
  Apparently they are not dead.[0] They posted this a bit after their last update on their website. But yeah, probably got tired of doing an update every week. [0]https://twitter.com/webshitweekly/status/1450563491069247489 https://twitter.com/webshitweekly/status/1450563491069247489
  - isoprophlex 5y ago
    Great! And understandable... it's a miracle the site kept going as long as it did.
- jandrese 5y ago
  I think he just got bored with saying the same things over and over again. The point was made, and so on.
- eckza 5y ago
  Perhaps now that you've violated the Prime Directive, he'll re-appear.
323 5y ago
His political views are, how to say it politely, interesting.
kebman 5y ago
POV-Ray <3 Been a while since I used that. I think it's a shame that they stopped developing it. They say things are better, but are they really? The scripting language for it is really cool IMHO.
- dTal 5y ago
  POV-Ray has a special place in my heart. For the vast majority of artistic tasks, Blender is a hugely superior environment that will produce better images, faster. And you can generate meshes to import into Blender with OpenSCAD if you really like CSG. It doesn't have the precision of raytracing the mathematical specification directly, but you don't really need that ever. However, for certain very narrow categories of things, it's probably still the lowest-impedance tool for the job. Want to make a website that shows a static image of the current cloud cover + illumination of the Earth, updated every minute? Want to make some geometrical visualizations for a math textbook? Want to experiment with extremely weird and exotic camera projections? POV-Ray!
  - kebman 5y ago
    I really like the scattering media, and the mathematical figures you can do with it, such as 3D Julia fractals and noise patters to model really rough "stony" surfaces that aren't just bump maps. On top of that I don't think I've found a better way to generate various patterns and textures, even for simple 2D work. It's just such a versatile set of tools you almost wouldn't believe it's free! And the fact that it's entirely scripted (unless wysiwyg megapov etc) just makes it better IMHO. It's a scripting-first modelling language, and I really, really like that. With that comes things such as inverse kinematics and gravity (for animations) without having to learn specialized GUIs or buy expensive software.
deltille 5y ago
Xah writes some of the most readable guides and doc I've found anywhere. Specifically, readable in the sense that meaning is efficiently conveyed. In technical contexts it's clear nothing else matters to him. He also isn't reluctant to speak his mind about ... well, just about anything, for better or worse. Usually better, I think, even when it's wordvomit, seeing someone else willing to talk about or criticize something reinforces it however subtly as 'something some people do' and something you may in turn be more likely to do yourself. Which is a net good. I refer to him regularly, especially when translating ideas to people who aren't in the computer jargon 'orbit'. The extremes his opinions (and overall style) sit at also force or at least nudge others to think about and elucidate their own positions, if only to themselves. I think it's intentional, and eat it up. I've noticed a lot of people can't stand him for the exact same reasons which suggests it's working.
- indrora 5y ago
  As a fair warning to folks who go reading Xah's work: His style can be somewhat... Esoteric and while not abrasive, controversial in tone on occasion. He can occasionally sound rather creepy, especially in his occasional discussions of his personal life and/or relationships with others. Nothing terrible, and remember: he's a human like the rest of us.
  - gaws 5y ago
    > he's a human like the rest of us. Goes on racist rants while on livestream, publishes creepy AF posts about dating, women and sex. Ah, yes. A human. Just like the rest of us.
femiagbabiaka 5y ago
Xah has contributed more to my workday well being than almost any other blogger. Love his tutorials.
seanw444 5y ago
On http://xahlee.info/UnixResource_dir/freebooks.html http://xahlee.info/UnixResource_dir/freebooks.html a little over halfway down the page, it says: > OpenBSD is famous for its extra concern on “security”. (the entire “security” problems in today's computing industry is a egregious insult to how things should be. Security problems are in fact created and fermented by the unix community. If unix did not exist, the computing world would harbor a lot less of hackers.) That's a bold claim. That can't be factually true. Can it?
- moonchild 5y ago
  Unix propagates memory-unsafe languages (c), as well as inefficient and inexpressive IPC mechanisms (pipes or shmem) which lead to monolithic programs where there is only one key to the whole kingdom.
DiabloD3 5y ago
Xah Lee always has really cool stuff on their blog. One of those rare Internet gold mines.
DonHopkins 5y ago
He's an eccentric antisocial gadfly who write lots of interesting opinionated stuff about esoteric philosophical, technical, political, and emacsual topics that I enjoy reading about, can't find any where else, and a lot of which I agree with. I'm fond and respectful of his work, but he will never convince me that Emacs Visual Line Mode a not an Evil Tool of Satan sent to suck our Precious Bodily Fluids by breaking our Beloved Keyboard Macros and Trusty Type-Ahead. But I do love it that he cares so much, no matter that he's on the side of Evil. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28187525 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28187525
DonHopkins 5y ago
I can't comment on Xah's web page so I'll comment here about this photo of Richard Stallman at MIT dancing: http://xahlee.info/emacs/misc/Richard_Stallman_at_MIT_dancing.html http://xahlee.info/emacs/misc/Richard_Stallman_at_MIT_dancin... Xah asked: is this image fake? ErgoEmacs asked: it'd be interesting to know what he's holding. That's definitely real! It's RMS, distinctly recognizable by his prancing pose. He tends to just prance in place like that all the time, while swirling his hair with his fingers. It looks like he's in Building NE43 (545 tech square) probably on the 9th floor in the machine room of the MIT AI Lab where he slept, holding the hand of Rodney Brooks' robot "COG" in his right hand. MIT Robot Cog Moving Its Arms https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWjWzDzfLBo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWjWzDzfLBo MIT's Cog (1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbZ9_rUZZMA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbZ9_rUZZMA Here is RMS a few years later, with a little more beard, holding a gerbil wrapped in duct tape: https://www.donhopkins.com/home/catalog/images/jsol-rms-gerbil-liz-mg.jpg https://www.donhopkins.com/home/catalog/images/jsol-rms-gerb... From COG's point of view, here's a photo of Henry Minsky taken from COG's video camera, with a look of trepidation about sacrificing his Dakin Bear to make s "plush" robot: https://imgur.com/gallery/Rt43H https://imgur.com/gallery/Rt43H

166 points by tsujp 5y ago

I'm glad Xah Lee is still around, and seems to be doing well. (Protip: his Unicode search pages are very useful, I use them all the time: http://xahlee.info/comp/unicode_index.html http://xahlee.info/comp/unicode_index.html)

math-dev 5y ago

Xah Lee’s tips on elisp were super useful to me. A relic of the usenet era (an infamous troll on comp.lang.lisp), but someone who has added a lot of value to a lot of lives Long love ergomacs!

zasdffaa 5y ago
> an infamous troll on comp.lang.lisp Are you perhaps confusing him with Erik Naggum, cos there just happens to be a post on HN about Erik right now. And Erik could be something special when a fuse blew!
- ori_b 5y ago
  Erik was also a famous troll on comp.lang.lisp. There were multiple famous trolls on usenet.
- twic 5y ago
  No, Xah was a troll. He trolled on groups i read, too - comp.lang.java.programmer or comp.lang.python, or both.
  - tzot 5y ago
    I remember him in comp.lang.python (IIRC for a couple of years after 2000).
kleiba 5y ago
http://xahlee.info/emacs/emacs/_p/KickbanXahLeeFromEmacsChannel.htm http://xahlee.info/emacs/emacs/_p/KickbanXahLeeFromEmacsChan...
- xoa 5y ago
  He was banned from HN long ago too. Random long-ass thread he started on the Python un back in 2009 about this stuff I had saved an archive of for some reason: https://www.mail-archive.com/python-list@python.org/msg236031.html https://www.mail-archive.com/python-list@python.org/msg23603... He even replies for once further down in typical style complete with a classic Also, thanks to many supporters over the past years. Truly Your Superior, Xah Like, yeah he is likely somewhere on the spectrum and he has some useful insights and material. But he's also kind of a raging asshole with a chip on his shoulder the size of mountain who would pop into technical groups and dump monologues out of nowhere then vanish, or at most deign to maybe add a bit more odd responses loaded with condescension and victimhood. I'm not sorry there are some colorful people like that around for a variety of reasons. That kind of personality can do neat stuff sometimes, and that he can have his own long running site and put up all his thoughts and opinions and then have entire new generations see and reconsider them down the road regardless of any bans from anywhere else is itself a testament to the promise of the internet and speech. And something I'm happy to point to by people who go ballistic about moderation on social media or the like. You don't have to be trapped by that. At the same time I completely understand all the bans because holy crap. That kind of rant is enjoyed in strict moderation. Though that so many of us would respond seriously in retrospect is kind of nice too even if the banhammer came down afterwards when it got repetitive. Anyway, random anecdote! On reflection that too is itself part of the fascination around people like this, so many of the rest of us end up with shared recollections and stories to pass down. They become some part of the common lore of communities, the mad sorcerer/wiseman living in the cave up the mountain from the village of old. Often expelled from regular society for good reason, yet still subjects of interest and in some societies even a certain sort of respect.
  - sva_ 5y ago
    > He was banned from HN long ago too. https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xahlee https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xahlee Does not appear to be banned, just inactive?
devnonymous 5y ago
> an infamous troll on comp.lang.lisp And on the python mailing lists. The last I recall seeing that name was in context of crowd funding after going through some tough times. It was quite sad. Hope things are better now.
dvdkhlng 5y ago
> Long love ergomacs! I recently stumbled over, and started using (and modifying) Xah's "xah-fly-keys" emacs bindings, which are a somewhat more radical implementation of the ideas behind ergoemacs (e.g. use Emacs without any "chording", i.e. without ever having to press two keys at once apart from shift+letter). [1] https://github.com/xahlee/xah-fly-keys https://github.com/xahlee/xah-fly-keys
- dotancohen 5y ago
  Why not just use Evil, the VIM emulation layer.
  - dvdkhlng 5y ago
    > Why not just use Evil, the VIM emulation layer. To cite Xah [1]: "xah-fly-keys.el is a modal editing mode for emacs, like vi, but the design of key/command choice is based on command frequency statistics and ease-of-key score. Most frequently used commands have most easy keys." I can confirm, that the amount of work on the hands is extremely reduced with xah-fly-keys vs. vanilla emacs (depending on where you put the command mode switch), though I have no experience with evil or vi to compare against. [1] http://xahlee.info/emacs/misc/ergoemacs_vi_mode.html http://xahlee.info/emacs/misc/ergoemacs_vi_mode.html
    - justinhj 5y ago
      This really disregards the compositional aspect of vims commands
seanw444 5y ago
His Elisp tutorials were (and still are) invaluable to me for familiarizing myself with Emacs.
hatmatrix 5y ago
I learned emacs lisp around 15 years ago - his tutorials were essential. The way he remains prolific is amazing.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Tomte 5y ago

Oh, is he better now? (I don't see the plea for help on his home page) If so, good to hear!

prionassembly 5y ago

By all appearances Xah is such an extreme personality. It's this (and websites like this) which made the internet awesome.

qualudeheart 5y ago

Xah deserves more attention and help. Is he still unemployed? Someone should help him find a job if possible.

HarryHirsch 5y ago
People like him need basic income, the rent paid and a social worker. Nothing else works.
stevespang 5y ago

marvel_boy 5y ago

I did not know about how terribly is that: Famous Programers with Repetitive Strain Injury http://xahlee.info/emacs/emacs/emacs_hand_pain_celebrity.html http://xahlee.info/emacs/emacs/emacs_hand_pain_celebrity.htm... Seems that Emacs is no good in excess!

NeutralForest 5y ago
The risk is overstated, many people have used without any issue and there is no control group as well, those programmers might have issues either way, Emacs or not.
- dotancohen 5y ago
  > there is no control group as well VIM users?
  - NeutralForest 5y ago
    Maybe, now there needs a case for significant differences in pain levels among Emacs vs Vim users.
    - dotancohen 5y ago
      To be fair, the pain that VIM users feel is not in their digits or wrists! :wq
  - deltille 5y ago
    VIM started flirting with giving me RSI issues (mostly : and esc keys; yes, even on capslock. I have small hands) after some years. It's a comparison certainly but not a control.
    - sva_ 5y ago
      > esc key You may use Ctrl-[ instead. What do you mean about capslock? Mapping capslock to esc?

kache_ 5y ago

This guy is unhinged in like the best of ways. First found out about him on /g/

bmn__ 5y ago
http://xahlee.org/PageTwo_dir/Personal_dir/mi_pixra/mi_lunbe_las_vegas_2003-10.jpg http://xahlee.org/PageTwo_dir/Personal_dir/mi_pixra/mi_lunbe...
- kache_ 5y ago
  A NSFW flag would have been nice :P

isoprophlex 5y ago

Not related to this, but since we're talking trolls... I noticed that n-gate.com hasn't been updated in more than half a year. I always enjoyed reading their over the top critiques of HN posts... anyone know if they're okay and maybe just burnt out -- or that something else is going on?

executesorder66 5y ago
Apparently they are not dead.[0] They posted this a bit after their last update on their website. But yeah, probably got tired of doing an update every week. [0]https://twitter.com/webshitweekly/status/1450563491069247489 https://twitter.com/webshitweekly/status/1450563491069247489
- isoprophlex 5y ago
  Great! And understandable... it's a miracle the site kept going as long as it did.
jandrese 5y ago
I think he just got bored with saying the same things over and over again. The point was made, and so on.
eckza 5y ago
Perhaps now that you've violated the Prime Directive, he'll re-appear.

323 5y ago

His political views are, how to say it politely, interesting.

kebman 5y ago

POV-Ray <3 Been a while since I used that. I think it's a shame that they stopped developing it. They say things are better, but are they really? The scripting language for it is really cool IMHO.

dTal 5y ago
POV-Ray has a special place in my heart. For the vast majority of artistic tasks, Blender is a hugely superior environment that will produce better images, faster. And you can generate meshes to import into Blender with OpenSCAD if you really like CSG. It doesn't have the precision of raytracing the mathematical specification directly, but you don't really need that ever. However, for certain very narrow categories of things, it's probably still the lowest-impedance tool for the job. Want to make a website that shows a static image of the current cloud cover + illumination of the Earth, updated every minute? Want to make some geometrical visualizations for a math textbook? Want to experiment with extremely weird and exotic camera projections? POV-Ray!
- kebman 5y ago
  I really like the scattering media, and the mathematical figures you can do with it, such as 3D Julia fractals and noise patters to model really rough "stony" surfaces that aren't just bump maps. On top of that I don't think I've found a better way to generate various patterns and textures, even for simple 2D work. It's just such a versatile set of tools you almost wouldn't believe it's free! And the fact that it's entirely scripted (unless wysiwyg megapov etc) just makes it better IMHO. It's a scripting-first modelling language, and I really, really like that. With that comes things such as inverse kinematics and gravity (for animations) without having to learn specialized GUIs or buy expensive software.

deltille 5y ago

Xah writes some of the most readable guides and doc I've found anywhere. Specifically, readable in the sense that meaning is efficiently conveyed. In technical contexts it's clear nothing else matters to him. He also isn't reluctant to speak his mind about ... well, just about anything, for better or worse. Usually better, I think, even when it's wordvomit, seeing someone else willing to talk about or criticize something reinforces it however subtly as 'something some people do' and something you may in turn be more likely to do yourself. Which is a net good. I refer to him regularly, especially when translating ideas to people who aren't in the computer jargon 'orbit'. The extremes his opinions (and overall style) sit at also force or at least nudge others to think about and elucidate their own positions, if only to themselves. I think it's intentional, and eat it up. I've noticed a lot of people can't stand him for the exact same reasons which suggests it's working.

indrora 5y ago
As a fair warning to folks who go reading Xah's work: His style can be somewhat... Esoteric and while not abrasive, controversial in tone on occasion. He can occasionally sound rather creepy, especially in his occasional discussions of his personal life and/or relationships with others. Nothing terrible, and remember: he's a human like the rest of us.
- gaws 5y ago
  > he's a human like the rest of us. Goes on racist rants while on livestream, publishes creepy AF posts about dating, women and sex. Ah, yes. A human. Just like the rest of us.

femiagbabiaka 5y ago

Xah has contributed more to my workday well being than almost any other blogger. Love his tutorials.

seanw444 5y ago

On http://xahlee.info/UnixResource_dir/freebooks.html http://xahlee.info/UnixResource_dir/freebooks.html a little over halfway down the page, it says: > OpenBSD is famous for its extra concern on “security”. (the entire “security” problems in today's computing industry is a egregious insult to how things should be. Security problems are in fact created and fermented by the unix community. If unix did not exist, the computing world would harbor a lot less of hackers.) That's a bold claim. That can't be factually true. Can it?

moonchild 5y ago
Unix propagates memory-unsafe languages (c), as well as inefficient and inexpressive IPC mechanisms (pipes or shmem) which lead to monolithic programs where there is only one key to the whole kingdom.

DiabloD3 5y ago

Xah Lee always has really cool stuff on their blog. One of those rare Internet gold mines.

DonHopkins 5y ago

He's an eccentric antisocial gadfly who write lots of interesting opinionated stuff about esoteric philosophical, technical, political, and emacsual topics that I enjoy reading about, can't find any where else, and a lot of which I agree with. I'm fond and respectful of his work, but he will never convince me that Emacs Visual Line Mode a not an Evil Tool of Satan sent to suck our Precious Bodily Fluids by breaking our Beloved Keyboard Macros and Trusty Type-Ahead. But I do love it that he cares so much, no matter that he's on the side of Evil. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28187525 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28187525

DonHopkins 5y ago

I can't comment on Xah's web page so I'll comment here about this photo of Richard Stallman at MIT dancing: http://xahlee.info/emacs/misc/Richard_Stallman_at_MIT_dancing.html http://xahlee.info/emacs/misc/Richard_Stallman_at_MIT_dancin... Xah asked: is this image fake? ErgoEmacs asked: it'd be interesting to know what he's holding. That's definitely real! It's RMS, distinctly recognizable by his prancing pose. He tends to just prance in place like that all the time, while swirling his hair with his fingers. It looks like he's in Building NE43 (545 tech square) probably on the 9th floor in the machine room of the MIT AI Lab where he slept, holding the hand of Rodney Brooks' robot "COG" in his right hand. MIT Robot Cog Moving Its Arms https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWjWzDzfLBo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWjWzDzfLBo MIT's Cog (1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbZ9_rUZZMA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbZ9_rUZZMA Here is RMS a few years later, with a little more beard, holding a gerbil wrapped in duct tape: https://www.donhopkins.com/home/catalog/images/jsol-rms-gerbil-liz-mg.jpg https://www.donhopkins.com/home/catalog/images/jsol-rms-gerb... From COG's point of view, here's a photo of Henry Minsky taken from COG's video camera, with a look of trepidation about sacrificing his Dakin Bear to make s "plush" robot: https://imgur.com/gallery/Rt43H https://imgur.com/gallery/Rt43H