[ Thanks to Robert
McMillan for this link. ]
“How Did an Unknown Startup Company Hire the Creator of
Linux and What are They Doing with Him?“
“I could tell you what I’m working on, but then I’d have to kill
you.” For close to a year, this was Linux creator Linus Torvalds’
answer to anyone naive enough to ask him about his day job. It’s
not that Torvalds was paranoid. He just happened to be working for
the most secretive start-up in Silicon Valley history: Transmeta,
Corp.”
“But in January of this year, the veil was lifted, and the true
story of Transmeta and what exactly they’re doing with Torvalds
could be told.”
“It turns out that a major chapter in the story occurred in
Seattle, where, three years ago, Transmeta CEO David Ditzel found
himself pitching his vision for a whole new kind of computer chip
to one of the founders of Microsoft, Corp., Paul Allen. It was
1997,and Ditzel was two years into a journey that could be traced
back to a fundamental revelation he had while on leave from his job
at Sun Microsystems. Ditzel saw the need for a clean slate in the
development of computer chips.”