This past Wednesday was our screening of “Revolution OS.”  To be honest, I was a little worried. I wasn’t getting a whole lot of feedback, and was concerned that I’d be a lonely geek watching a movie (that I already own) in a rented theatre by myself. Turns out my worries were unfounded. Our user’s group, and the local community came out in droves! We had about 4 dozen people in the Darress theatre, with only one walk out. Considering the depth of the movie, I’d say that was a great success. Many people stuck around to ask questions, which I did my best to answer. We then went over to the Boonton Avenue Grille for good food and more good conversation. Overall, it was a great night, a great opportunity to share information about GNU, Linux, Free and Open Source Software.

I have many people to thank,

  • J.T.S. Moore, who allowed us to show his documentary without charge
  • All the local businesses that allowed me to put up flyers advertising the event
  • The Neighbor News, who ran our announcement in the local paper
  • Jay Sulzberger, for running our announcement on the NYLX mailing list
  • Threethirty and the Fedora team, and the Ubuntu Shipit team who combined sent out three dozen nicely printed distributions to give out to interested movie watchers
  • Tom and the crew at the Darress Theatre, for the great venue
  • The user’s group members that supported my crazy idea
  • And above all, all of the folks who participated, donated and spent some time learning about Free and Open Source Software like Linux. (If I’ve forgotten anyone, and I almost certainly have,  just let me know, I’ll update!)

We raised enough to cover the cost of the theatre, with $101 left over, which will go to the Free Software Foundation, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Stay tuned to the blog, some of the members took pictures, and we’ll update for upcoming events and meetings.

Also, I’ll be running an “Introduction to Free software and Linux” at the Boonton library at 6:30 on April 20th, for anyone who is local and interested. I’ll be showing some current software, and some explanation of what it does, and how you can use it.  Details will be posted here soon.

Again, thanks to all of you, and please let me know what was good, what was bad, and if you’d be interested in more events like this, or if you’d be interested in joining us at the North Jersey Linux User’s Group at njlinux.org.  I can be reached at linux @ murph.info.