2008-07-03 Nut launches death threats at Debian women

2008-07-03 The Register Phil Manchester \community-built software\gender inequity\death threats http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/07/03/debian_death_threats/ Nut launches death threats at Debian women &rdquo;Women working on Debian have been getting death threats from a nut job who believes they're killing free software.&rdquo;  Women working on Debian have been getting death threats from a nut job who believes they're killing free software.

A poll by new project leader Steve McIntyre into whether people are happy on Debian revealed one female coder had been getting the threats as thanks for her hard work.

Further daggering soon revealed she was not alone.

McIntyre told The Reg: "I have since discovered that several of our female developers and documenters were threatened. It was some kook in the US who made quite a name from himself harassing women for supposedly destroying the free software movement."

In an email to the Debian community McIntyre promised to "track down and deal with the perpetrators" in future incidents. He told The Reg the women pledged to stand together and not to be intimidated. Which is good, "because we want more women to be involved in open source," he said.   