This is the 25th year of the first public release of the kernel of the Linux operating system. Readers of this list may be interested in two articles we put together for the occasion at IEEE Spectrum. The first is by Christopher Tozzi, titled "Linux at 25: Why It Flourished While Others Fizzled" and can be found at: http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/software/linux-at-25-why-it-flourished-wh... The second is a Q&A with Torvalds himself, written by yours truly. It can be found at: http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/software/linux-at-25-qa-with-linus-torval... One of the most notable things about the Q&A is that Torvalds runs counter to a significant element typical in "Great (Wo)Man" narratives: He explicitly rejects the virtue of possesing some great personal vision in his explanation for the success of Linux: "...The lack of understanding about the eventual scope of the project helped, but so did getting into it without a lot of preconceived notions of where it should go. The fact that I didn’t really know where it would end up meant that I was perhaps more open to outside suggestions and influence than I would have been if I had a very good idea of what I wanted to accomplish. That openness to outside influences I think made it much easier, and much more interesting, for others to join the project. People didn’t have to sign on to somebody else’s vision, but could join with their own vision of where things should go. I think that helped motivate lots of people." We would of course be interested in any feedback you might have on these articles! Cheers, Stephen