This open source amp modeler may change the guitar world...
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 12 сен 2024
- Can this open source Amp Modeler change the guitar world? We will certainly find out but the story here is fascinating, an open source plug in driven by a passionate community of contributors and programmers all birthed from one mans hobby project. What does this mean for the future of guitar plugin development?
Check out our Amp Models for NAM: tonejunkiestor...
Download NAM: github.com/sda...
Nam FB Group: / 5669559883092788
Thanks for plugging NAM, it's going to take off like a Rocket! The community has the right heart and spirit. The capturing process will become more streamlined and easier to use as time goes on.
It sounds great. I'm thinking about how to use this as part of my rig when playing a gig. Would I have to bring a computer, is there a pedal or another solution?
As a cloud engineer AND guitar player I’m really interested in this. Hopefully will give me an excuse to do guitar things at work lol
NAM kicks ass. It just sounds and feels right when you play it.
I just installed and tried NAM last night. I'm blown away. You have an incredible amp collection and I have no problem compensating you for your investment and time for the priveledge of playing them.
I think the most major thing that could happen here is that the big modelling companies implement this in their products and provide support to its development. Think similar to how microsoft and apple are on the Linux foundation board because they were finding use for it at their companies for specific things.
They find use for Linux for them not us they like to bury this kind of stuff and charge us an arm and a leg for inferior products that they can resell to us over an over
These are my exact thoughts. There will also be companies who will steal the code and release as updated firmware for their platform.
Exactly. As for stealing the code, there’s no point in doing it. You’d be just missing out on developments done by other people. This is why nobody “steals” Linux’s code. It’s more useful to just hang around, help where you can and profit from the concerted effort. The closest to stealing would be to simply use and not contribute, but to use and not give credit is (1) enforceable by law and (2) not interesting from the moment NAM becomes something famous as sort of a brand. Think about it: if everybody praises NAM, to have your product associated with it is a good thing. You’d be profiting from its clout.
Neural Amp Modeler is under the MIT licensing meaning the code can be commercially used, modified and redistributed.
This is great. Being able to buy high quality models and IRs from real pros like you for a free / open source plugin is great. Looking forward for the bright future of this tech.
no its not. the whole point is open source and free. and thats how its going to be. people who sell will not do well in this community or monetarily
@@JayOneAlumni I am developing some open source codes so I fully agree that the whole point is that the software stack for training and playing is free and developped as a community. Also, free profiles are already shared by many users (and I am trying to build my own too) but high end amps recorded in a high end environment is also an added value that some could consider worth paying for. Open source / free software does not means no one can provide paid services / support or content. Indeed most of Linux and other big open source projects are actually sponsored by companies that provide services around that code base and many people make a living from the development of open source software. To have a durable development, there is sometimes the need to make some money... It can be through donation, through a premium service or maybe through a marketplace were a small commission can be taken when buying some paid for content (but keeping open the free exchange of free content). As someone who has to deal with hosting and distribute open source software, I can tell you that download bandwith is actually quite expensive if you have many users worldwide.. And someone has to pay the bills (=me in my case) for this. So to make opensource software sustainable beyond a hobby project it is important to find also a way to support the costs...
@@jcugnoni /wooooooosh
I'm pretty sure NAM profile player devices will be available sooner or later. And no, it does not mean modelers are dead - Helix, Fractal, Neural and others can add a NAM player block and then we have best of both worlds comming together. Wouldn't it be great?
Glad to see you embrace it and speak about it on your channel. Very exciting stuff and who knows what it will lead to.
For anyone insterested in learning how to run the capture training algorithms, I have videos on my channel that show how to use Google Collabs and how to set up NAM training locally on your PC! I kept things as simple as possible and I include documentation so folks who arent super techy nerdy types can easily follow the instructions and get into it!
Your videos have helped me a ton, Jason. Thanks!
Jason is THE man! His videos are great, super concise and he is very well spoken and a great presenter.
Go check his videos out! They allowed me to discover NAM, made me do a video, made others do a video, etc.
He is the OG avalanche starter!
Yup highly recommend.
@@PippPriss Thanks, man! Your videos are also awesome and totally helped catapult NAM into the limelight! You sent a ton of new people over to my channel too!
Now, a year later, NAM is used in many applications. It really blew up. Insane stuff.
i just got back into guitar and always been a linux guy. this thing made me happy. something new and really interesting to go with my new PC. i have a growing coellection and the mod-audio-desktop is coming along nice
Thanks for making this video and sharing your thoughts. Excited to see what you make with it!
Thanks for watching!
^^^ The author of NAM here, people, what’s up with no upvotes 😅 Steve, you rock!
@@agafonkin ;)
There's a ton of things that can still be improved; capturing the tone stack, capturing multiple power amp settings ... thinking about what's about to come (or what might come) is even more exciting.
I agree that when NAM is available running in a stereo I/O guitar pedal with high quality audio reproduction, a lot is going to change very suddenly.
THIS. I don't need/want to make captures, I just want to use models on a pedal-format piece of hardware. If someone could sell me a pedal for $300 that could load and perform NAM models, I'd be all set. Give me optional IR loading for cabs and both 1/4" and XLR output jacks please and thank you.
And I think to myself...What a wonderfil world we live in!!!
The golden age of being a guitarist is happening...right now.
CHEERS.
Great video. There's literally millions of commercial software and hardware that use some open-source code. The argument that because it's open-source, nothing in its ecosystem can be commercial is not a valid argument if you look at the history of open-source. It would be great to see a hardware manufacturer make a pedal version of this like Tonex.
Great video. I found NAM a few weeks ago myself. I'm sure someone on the Helix group posted about it. I don't have an issue at all with comercial sales of models. You have a lot of cool amps and you know how to get great tones from them. I've bought a number of your products and have been pleased with them all. With this technology the future is bright indeed. My biggest challenge is playing with technology instead of playing guitar. It would be cool if Line 6 could/would put there own NAM variant into the existing Helix family but not throw out modeling. I'd see it more like an IR verses their own cabs. But does the Helix need more DSP? More memory? So many great options and the future is just looking brighter!
A little late to the party, but I just downloaded NAM and have been downloading tons of models and IR's and am super impressed.
I have several amps and tons of pedals and have tried other software, and haven't been excited about my tone in general when recording. But I've been totally inspired by how my guitar sounds using NAM
Choice and competition is a good thing for the consumer. There will be some people that love to use this and want to tinker etc and others that say it's too complicated or a time waste. Similar to how nobody thinks Apple provides the best hardware/capabilities for a computer but it's the most valuable company in the world because a lot of people like the convenience/elegance and don't care about paying a premium for it.
I think the real value will come from the open source community trying and pushing new things that the for profit companies will then have to adopt or get left behind. They are going to have to keep coming up w/ reasons to buy their stuff. It may be features or it may only be design, but they will be pushed by NAM. For the consumer that's a very good thing.
Kemper is Blockbuster; TONEX is Netflix; NAM is free streaming 😀
Sorry but kemper is now the worse if all : Axefx 3, ToneX and obviously NAM.
So the worst is still good, actually great, actually awesome and the same unit just keeps getting better.
NAM is Napster lol.
It gives your computer viruses? Lol
Without the ads!
I'm loving this. I'd buy profiles the same way I buy IRs. I see no harm in that. If you're willing to profile and share your amps with us, you should get paid appropriately.
Open source software has been changing the world for decades! We all benefit from it whether we know it or not. One thing I don't hear people talking about is the ability to convert tone captures from one platform to another. It would be possible with the NAM capture format but not the others, I don't believe. Without that, you will always need to hang on to the tube amps to make new captures later.
It's really exciting to see where the quality of digital modeling has come. It would be so nice if Helix managed to apply in a new update the possibility of loading custom amp models. NAM is an example, the capture is made on the computer and processed on the servers, generating a file so that it can be loaded onto a player. Imagine if Helix was that player!
I am one of those evangelists you mentioned ;-)
Great video on the subject, and your observations are insightful and interesting.
On the frontier regarding paid profiles:
Just do your thing. In the end, you will always get pushback, be it because of your viral take on things, be it because you are being called "sponsored" (Headrush Prime) etc.
NAM offers you yet another possible income stream from a growing platform, and will make you an OG professional moving onto NAM. This in the end potentially will allow more gear to be aquired, which possibly might end up in some more freebies for us plebs.
People do have to understand that taking your time and effort does cost money. Nobody is forced to buy your packs and can find awesome packs in the community for free, but that also goes for any other platform you offer captures for.
Great video, great plugin, great future for us guitarists.
As fast as this is developing I can see us getting to the point of component level captures in short order
Downloaded your purple Marshall and woah! The IR is insane! My fav so far
My long experience with open source has led me to understand that decisions are not made by the end users. They are made by those who put in the the work of making it happen. What the "community" wants isn't necessarily what the Devs want. The doers and makers ( the developers) make all the decisions. The community gets to use what they provide.( often without much thanks. ) And that's the way it should be.
Thanks for the NAM free pack.
You bet!
I can’t believe people are giving you shit for selling dude, people really are entitled, I payed 400 bucks for the tonex pedal and I already felt like it was highway robbery getting access to tonenet and all the work that people have put into capturing the expensive amps they’ve bought and collected over the years. I had a helix for a while and bought a couple of your presets and they were absolutely worth the money and sounded great, you’ve made enough a name for yourself that people should know they’re getting a safe bet and the best possible capture when buying from you. Absolute sheer entitlement to think that these people somehow just deserve play these amps for free, they should be grateful for the amount of free stuff that’s already out there.
thank you for doing the video and sharing NAM captures of 2 great amps.
Very well said about the commercial stuff. This is open source. That means it is everything. Well said.
Ps: by the way, as the audio engine and model file format is fully open, it could be used to build other products like a hardware platform too...
Oh damn, thats YOUR purple plexi that I've been playing. Thank you man
🦉👍I've tried many guitar vst plugins, amp modellers etc for heavy rock projects, but this plugin is extremely realistic. Whereas some vst's sound a bit "distant" in the speakers and end up "mushy" in the mix,, these sound "up front" and sit extremely well. But be careful with eq-ing as you can lose the great natural sounds that already exist. Choose your IR carefully. I wonder where Steve Atkinson will take this NAM project and look forward to its future versions!
something I'm finding is that if you have to adjust NAM's tone knobs more than a tick or two, the profile is not good to begin with. Find a profile/IR that needs virtually no knob adjustment, and very little post EQ for best results. Too much tweaking loses the sound of the original amp and doesn't work as well. With that philosophy in mind, I've got some fantastic sounds from this plugin. love it.
i would love to import all my fav kemper profiles for my desk set up.
thats what we need software to run profiles!!
A couple more NAM & IR slots & VST slots would be handy when using the standalone but what a great thing it is !
When are you uploading your NAMM interview with Steve?
what is even more cool is that this is sort of something new, it has broken through to the non-tech world in a bigger way than has ever happened yet, that I'm aware of anyway.
I hope you and other profile creators create amazing profiles for the NAM.
Also I hope that Fractal Audio and other modeling device makers all add a "NAM Block" player to play these great profiles
Be nice if Kemper adds one as well, not sure of the best solution for them
This is great for musicians of all sorts, and benefits us all
This is how I see this industry moving actually, to have access to great tones on the platform you choose
I’ve got nam stuff on the site!
The future is here.
Although tomorrow it'll be history.
What’s amazing is that one guy did what it took teams of engineers at NDSP and Kemper to do. One of those two should talk to this dude.
That's not totally fair though. NAM does the core part really well. But Neural and others offer way more than just a capture player. They have fx, user interface, hardware implementation. That's where the extra team of people come into it.
@@rossbalch Yup but I was only referring to the part NAM does, not all the other pieces.
@@tonepilot my point is though, it didn't take a team to do the part NAM does. They likely had only one or two folks handle the algorithm too. The rest is peripheral.
@@rossbalch Hey! That was my point lol
@tonepilot your point was "wow this guy is amazing, he is better than these teams of many on his own"
His point was "he is amazing, but hasn't have had to deal with *list of things*so he is not better than the companies that make those products because he has been good at 1 thing"
There you go this multiple reply comments summarised in one
Nice discussion. The commercialisation debate is gonna be a heated one. But like you said, it's kinda moot. Steve chose the MIT licence which allows for commercial use. He could have chosen an NC one but he didn't. I personally am excited about where it can go. Commercial options aren't going to take away the free community. That will always be there because it's open source.
Just downloaded NAM then loaded up a session in logic to record some guitar… it was buggy as all get out.. had several sample rate issues pop up.. swaped the plug-in for Tonex and I was back in business …. TJ profiles sounded great though.
That’s what cool about paid platforms. They work…
Love the take on this HW. This is the TRON take on guitar modeling.
you can either dream about owning that boutique amp, or buy a model of that amp at its sweet spot, and be happy using it.
Thank you for the packs.
I think you meant to say Tone Hunt, rather than Tone Hive. The latter is a studio, the former is the NAM capture repository.
Yes!
Hey man great vid! are you going to do any Headrush Prime captures? im getting one tomorrow and would really love your captures to be on it!
Thanks Rock on!
HW, This Purple Plexi sounds great here. Thanks for sharing.
it is revolutionary -- you're not wrong to be excited about it!
Do you think NAM could be put into hardware modeling units like the NUX MG30 in a firmware update?
It depends how that hardware unit is currently coded. Anything that uses C++ could totally be programmed that way.
"There are people that will tell you it's better than everything else combined" Mmm.. I feel personally attacked haha.
Thanks a lot for the amp models!
There is actually 1 person selling models for a while. Most people hate the idea, but as you mentioned, some support it. Steve himself agrees with doing it, so... Anyway, the vast majority of people creates and shares captures for free, and that's the beauty of all this.
go ahead with the TJ plug-in branch!. We need less high gain tones, an amps with pedals in front.
I appreciate all you do to push the tone conversation forward. I signed up for your newsletter (multiple times) and the free IR pack, but haven't received any amp models or anything NAN related via email. When I load the IRs into the NAM module, I get an error message because it is in stereo. I'd like to get a good tone dialed in before springing for your paid packs. Any suggestions about these two issues? Yes, I've checked my SPAM. Lol
That’s pretty fair of you. What could be a threat could also be an opportunity.
You’re mission if you choose to accept. Capture the Strymon big sky
😂
more tubes for me! opensource is great you should all go for it wait years till the bugs get fixed you know the drill it takes years to learn it anyway.
I love all these great tools we have available to us these days! Now all we need is talent. 😁😆
I grabbed it for when my amp is out j the shop, or I want to just plug my pedal board in and do quick playing…or try different amps! I keep my Sky King on a DI and will continue.
But…it’s pretty good. Not sure I’d want to bring a Mac Mini or MacBook to a gig with an AD/DA preamp setup. If ARM supported with a decent DAC one could make a small live rig for sure. But for home recording, I’d use it to track with other real amps.
But could be killer going to a PA, mini DAC and a small setup like a Raspberry PI/4in screen. For me it’s not so much the quality we can get. It’s the ability to get the software out on the stage. If we can build our own setup on an Apogee USB DAC on a small PI with a 4in screen…that’s very cool and affordable. $350 tops maybe on all that and free software. You could build your own housing, or buy a pre made housed Raspberry PI with screen..load software and DAC over USB. If that’s possible, someone could just sell the hardware then we could load programs Vs buying a set Kemper. Be a fun build I do personally, if we get there!
I want me some Nam Nams of that Trainwreck!!!!! No i need some!! help
I like the fact that when you do your demo's they are not fully saturated thrash metal demos. Not that there is anything wrong with that genre but I think where many comparisons between tube amps and modelers/profilers fall short is they only play metal demos. I think the warmth of tube amps really shine in clean and bluesy tones. The modelers/profilers have the most difficulty in accurately depicting these tones.
I think that's why all the prog and metal guys like Fractals.
@@bettsdn I play metal, I like my tube amp.
The only time I don't use a real amp is when I am working out ideas at my desk. I love the models to give me something close to what I am used to. The question, how many songs can I put together if I don't spend hours on technology and focus on creating music. One of my band mates is a tone chaser and I think it's not adding to his creativity. He seems to always be frustrated with his tone, like it will never be good enough. This stuff reminds me of that.
Some people made nicer and more usable gui to nam. But there are several forks of the plugin. It would be nice to integrate all those into the main project, and even add some nicer gui, like tonex and others have
So can you make Kemper profiles from the plug-in?
this is awesome
My 15-18 year old self probably would have loved this. I don’t really get that the 50 year old person l am today honestly could care less. Awesome great sounding options are so abundant. There is probably a cheaper good DAW option out there. I’m familiar with Reaper and it’s surprisingly cheap. I can download this for free and and hmmm what 🤔 l have a few Tube amps and a Kemper and my feeling has been for years likened to my iPhone l have often thought my next phone forever will be an iPhone. I feel the same way about my Kemper. My next amp will be another Kemper. RUclipsrs have graciously provided endless videos promoting the Kemper and other new devices. It’s ALL getting better and feeling better and most importantly sounding better. Age demographics and the perspective that a 15 year old or a 30 yr old with a family and bills or a 50+ year old with kids and grandchildren approach all this geargasm option paralysis. We are all drunk on the latest gear that is ALL. WE ARE GEAR WHORES. Will this help write good songs?
You cant get cheaper than free, brother!
@@jasonzdora well l was meaning a DAW plus this FREE plug in.
There’s AI software for songwriting too 😂
@@kane6529 full Ai bands now too
@@kane6529 absolutely. Good addition there. How respectable is autotune, an AI written song, l straight up already know papers are being written for college classes using AI. We live in interesting times. Why do l absolutely love the human feel of an old R&B vinyl? Jimmy Reed or Otis Redding? An early Johnny Winter vinyl. I recently heard a Brad Paisley album and the recording was polished to a point that l could help but feel uninspired. I like Brad Paisley. I think it’s the times we live in. 😂 l feel like an old disgruntled geezer spewing grievances 🤣
Tone Junkie Plugin…..bring it!
NAM is the best one for sure. I’m totally addicted to it since I discovered it. In fact I tried it to bash the product compared to ToneX. But it’s way better than ToneX… and much better than kemper and Quad Cortex, I know what I’m talking about, has them for years
I don’t see how it’s “way better than tonex” they’ve done videos and the differences in the captures are like decimal points between tonex and Nam
@@Colinrisley the big difference is in the feel.
@@notalkguitarampplug-insrev784 I’ve been playing guitar for 17 years, have both tonex and nam and only the slimmest of differences is noticeable in my opinion.
About 400 euros better than ToneX 😅
@@TeuvoSick maybe for bedroom guitarists like you who don’t gig 😂😂
Those criticizing people who want to sell profiles or other derivations related to NAM should just look up Red Hat. It’s as old as open source. As a matter of fact, the very differentiation between free software and open source software is arguably based on this exact issue.
Acustica style CPU load - love the tones, though
Thank you so much!!!
Why such a big buzz it's still static. Doesn't have the Dynamics of mic'ed cabs moving air what's up with everyone.
Missed some high gain profiles for 7 strings guitar and stuff. Is there some
Of those?
Also, is this pack included in the everything pack?
Dangit Sooze. That Tele through that capture sounds magical 🔥
Very interesting....need a device like ToneX, that can play ToneX Tone Models, Kemper Profiles, QC Captures, NAM Models, and whatever the heck Headrush calls theirs. Need the ability to swap in or out, any number of effects of your choice. Most people don't need 25 reverbs loaded.....they want one or two that they pick out of 25
love the Skylark..... open resources ( imagine an resource based economy ) for the betterment of everyone.......
There isn’t anywhere to download the profiles on your webside
Have you tried AIDA-X yet and how does it compare?
But will it PDub and can I get captures of David Hislop's AC 30 and Prosonic?
I think that what would really allow this to help me would be a hardware device allowing play of the captures similar to what Tonex offered. Knowing nothing about this type of capture, could someone develop a way to convert this file type to be compatible with existing hardware products that may currently not offer capture? Being in the computer field, I see all types of files converted easily… My ideal device would offer stereo outputs with separate captures on left and right and enough port options to make sense on stage. That, without breaking the bank. As for charging for quality captures, I’d pay to get the quality and experience behind what you offer.
Essentially no. Files can only be converted when they essentially wrap up the same information just in a slightly different way, that isn't what's happening here. Don't worry though, someone will make hardware devices for this, it's almost guaranteed.
@@rossbalch I look forward to that. I don’t care to do the captures…. I just want to play all kinds of amps(at least captures).
Great video, if you take the time to make stuff, and then sell it, go for it, that's your choice, as the guy said, no one is forcing anyone to buy. I'll keep using my Kemper because it freaking rocks, and I'll keep using TJ stuff because it freaking rocks too. But I ill probably check out and use this NAM too :)... GUITARS4LIFE
Honestly, soundwise NAM is probably even better than the Kemper, which is insane in itself, considering the price difference. I say probably, because someone might disagree, and that's fine. I had a Kemper, and in my personal opinion, NAM sounds noticeably better.
@@milankotevski1663 I sat with both today and I can't agree with that, personal opinions I guess. I can't see myself going to gig with a computer and a plugin. For me, with all the functionality and tweaking I can do on a Kemper, NAM doesn't even come into the same ball park, I see it as a tool for re-amping at best. I haven't tried using it to profile anything, and probably never will. It's cool. I dig it, but Kemper Rules in my guitar world. Maybe the profiles I tried with the NAM were just crap, who knows.
It’s the SkyNet AI. Bewwwaaaaaaaaarrrreee
Sooo good but it needs iPadOS imo
iPad pro just needs to support full os already
@@ironblast5 give this man a beer
I posted about this in a Kemper group and it was like setting off a nuclear bomb of butthurt Kemper owners.
They just don't want to admit that the Kemper uses dated technology and has now been surpassed even by a FREE plugin.
The Kemper is not bad by any means but NAM makes better captures
Well, I tried it, and I found that it used a lot of CPU on my computer. Lots of latency issues (though maybe my computer is slow, too?). I'll stick to my Iridium and POD Go for now.
It's very clear that NAM can make excellent Captures. Is there currently a way that such a Capture can be easily made into an IR that can be imported into my HX Stomp? I don't want to run the Capture from inside a DAW. Thanks
So is it a modeler or a profiler? Your video title calls it a modeler.
Those terms seem to be coming together. ToneX calls their captures Amp Models and this is called Neural Amp Modeler but it captures the sound of an amp. Only the Kemper profiler uses the term profiles, QC calls them captures, ToneX and Nam use a capture tech to make their models if that makes sense but it’s not a modeler like the helix or Axe.
@@ToneJunkieTV reminds me of 'tremolo' and 'vibrato' - 50 years after their initial guitar use they are still incorrectly applied...
now someone pls just do that for pedals.
is there something going on like NAM for pedals ? maybe a Neural Pedal Modeler perhaps ? pls post it.
NAM can easily profile drive and boost pedals. It just can’t do any time-based FX
Yea but does it chug?
It's interesting and awesome that you're really getting into this AI modeling!
If only some company would set up their hardware so we could run these in existing hardware like Kemper, QC or Helix 2. But, Doug’s closed system for QC would suck with an open source system. Hell, it sucks already.
Link to NAM is dead
His free download doesn't work either. I put a comment up when the video was posted but Tonejunkie deleted it. This probably will too.
@@steveeckert8396 Why would I delete a comment saying the link doesn’t s broken? Would t I just fix the link instead?
I don’t know what comment you’re talking about but I haven’t deleted any comments from you. Maybe RUclipss spam filters picked it up?
@@ToneJunkieTV I have no idea how or why it got deleted. There was no vulgarity, links or offers to "hit me up" on a messenger. I just know I posted it, liked it , checked it today and it was gone. Just to let you know, I emailed your gmail account right after your Thanksgiving IR special saying I "thought I ordered some IR's that were on sale and never got a confirming email " I never got a response. Does anyone else have access to your RUclips page or your gmail account?
Who’s the person that’s going to make reputable pedal captures to go along with it?
There are probably a few hundred pedal captures already made for NAM.
you happen to have a 57 champ? to make a NAM? 🥰
Although interesting, I don’t find NAM compelling. I have a MacBook Air M1. Occasionally it does weird things. I don’t want something that runs on my MacBook only. That’s why I like Tonex pedal, a hardware solution, that is reliable.
What pickups are in the Tele on 10:00
Yeah, it struck me immediately upon hearing how good those pickups sounded.
Bridge is a Seymour Duncan Brad Paisley. Neck is a Twisted Tele.
NAM models add something at 15khz? Heck, my hearing stops an octave below that!
can you do a high gain plexi tone? I tried the free ones but they are low gain
What do you think about using a cloner coming out of the preamp out or using a direct box such as Neve that can take the amped signal then adding the IR to your liking. Would this more accurately model what the amp is actually doing to the signal?
Preamp out isn't so great as the power amp is bypassed. The neve DI yes, certainly seems like having the speaker connected but taking the signal from a box like the neve is the most accurate.
@@rossbalch thank you for your response.
Linus Torvalds said his goal was that Linux should rule the world -- seemed like a joke at the time, but 20 years later it's true. Linux was something that Torvalds made for free and just threw it online and the community rallied around it and developed for it -- because it was cool and it was fun.