Thief open-sources Richard Stallman’s laptop, passport, visa

Richard Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation, was distressed to find his personal belongings had been liberally distributed sans GPL - his prized laptop, wallet and passport were nicked at a conference in Argentina.

The snatch happened as fans of the Emacs author shouted over each other in an attempt to talk to him after he gave a talk at the University of Buenos Aires on Friday, reports an eyewitness and various Spanish-speaking bloggers.

The thief, who had presumably sat through the lecture, was looking for more than a FSF-themed fridge magnet - and instead made off with Stallman's bag while the bearded GNU Public Licence (GPL) mastermind was handing out stickers, chatting and flogging merchandise.

The bag taken also contained the GCC granddaddy's medicine and money. An audience member claimed that a tearful RMS was clearly cheesed off: Read more...