“Forget for a moment what you’ve read about techno-savvy
twentysomethings making a fortune on initial public offerings.
“When thousands of computer buffs received an offer for what
amounted to free money — the chance to get in on one of Wall
Street’s hottest IPOs this year — some of them blew it.
“Instead, they wound up fuming — and flaming — as the stock of
Linux software vendor Red Hat Inc. soared sixfold in its first
three days of trading…”
“Red Hat’s special offer was intended as a means of paying
back programmers who have done volunteer work on Linux… Instead,
hundreds of the programmers didn’t — or couldn’t — cash
in.”