Participating in a opensource community has lot of advantages, you get to know really cool people. You learn lot of new things… but also strange anecdotes happen.
Some time ago I was talking with Will, and we both remembered one of the most funniest (now) things ever happened in #kopete irc channel. We laughed a lot, until Will told me. “I still have those logs somewhere”. I said “Really! I think it is time to blog them.
April 3, probably 2003 or 2004. I was in Chile by then. It was sleeping time for Europa. In the channel you can see Sean Egan, GAIM’s lead developer, and myself. Until….
The following takes place between 5 am and 6 am… Events ocur in real time.
--> Lazlo ([HOST REMOVED].edu) has joined #kopete
<Lazlo> uhh, hi all heh. I have a strange request. is that Sean Egan
from New York (sorry kinda new to irc)
<SeanEgan> hm?
<Lazlo> hello ?
<Lazlo> oh heh
<SeanEgan> Um, yeah. I'm from New York
<Lazlo> uh, hi -- I searched on google and it said a 'Sean Egan' was in
this chat room. Do you know where Valley STream is?
<SeanEgan> Yeah, that's where I live on Long Island
<Lazlo> ehh, what's the zip code heh (sorry for these odd questions I have
to protect an identity here, kinda iffy)?
<SeanEgan> hehe, um, it's [ZIP CODE REMOVED]. Who are you?
<Lazlo> uh, Are you at [ADDRESS REMOVED]?
<SeanEgan> ok. Who are you?
<Lazlo> can anyone here tell me if this is really Sean Egan?
<SeanEgan> they're probably all asleep. This is a very European channel.
<SeanEgan> being KDE and all 
<Lazlo> uhh, hi all heh. I have a strange request. is that Sean Egan
from New York (sorry
<Lazlo> um, what's KDE? I don't use computers mujch
<SeanEgan> It's alright. Why do you know m address?
<Lazlo> whatever man -- look, are you really Sean Egan?
<SeanEgan> Yeah.
<Lazlo> um, I think I may have found your wallet near a truck stop
<SeanEgan> really?!
<SeanEgan> haha!
<SeanEgan> I lost my wallet yesterda
<SeanEgan> y
<Lazlo> phew! hah, man i wasn't sure if I could find you heh
<SeanEgan> well, you do have my address
<Lazlo> heh, true but i'm in west virginia. you're credit card is [CREDIT
CARD REMOVED], right?
<SeanEgan> ,,,
<SeanEgan> Um, I'll take your word for it...
<Lazlo> ?? heh, maybe I should buy some stuff haha
* SeanEgan hopes you're joking.
<SeanEgan> Ok. The address you have is my Long Island address, but I'm up
at school in Binghamton
<Lazlo> um, i can rent a car with the credit card and drive to drop it off
if you like?
<Lazlo> by the way, who's the hot girl in the picture heh
<SeanEgan> Dude, that's my sister.
<SeanEgan> Listen, just mail the wallet to me. I'll PM you my address.
<Lazlo> man just calm down -- i'm trying to help here i didn't know
<Lazlo> what about the cost to send it?!?
<SeanEgan> no, it's alright. I'm going to PM you my address, and you can
mail it to me?
<SeanEgan> Um... I don't know. Maybe $2?
<Lazlo> $2?!? i think more than that man
<SeanEgan> If you want, I should have some cash in there, you can pay with
my money.
<SeanEgan> But I need my id and my credit cards and stuff.
<Lazlo> look i took the time to search your name and stuff
<SeanEgan> yeah, pay for postage with my own money, I don't care
<Lazlo> i'm not even talking about postage man -- I'll use the card to buy
stuff I think is right, seriously. you owe me big time
<SeanEgan> you want a reward?
<SeanEgan> How much cash do I have in there? $30?
<duncanmv> oh, Americans
<Lazlo> whatever dude -- you don't get it! How much do you have on your
card, can i buy some stuff?
<SeanEgan> No, you can't
<SeanEgan> Are you serious?
* duncanmv doesn't find it a funny joke
<Lazlo> why wouldl i joke?! look, i'll just buy some stuff or you won't
get your wallet
<SeanEgan> Lazlo: I just called my bank and they've cancelled the credit
card.
<SeanEgan> I'll let you keep all the cash I have in there as a reward, but
if you would please return it to the address I PMed you, I would really
appreciate it.
<Lazlo> ??!?!?
<SeanEgan> And so would the Occidental University Police, if you catch my
drift.
<Lazlo> now you WONT GET YOUR FRIGGIN WALLET
<Lazlo> uHGHGHG
<duncanmv> ok, just call his college tomorrow
<duncanmv> and tell them [NAME REMOVED] has your wallet
<duncanmv> tell them the ip and time log
<duncanmv> and tell them you offered him even a reward
<SeanEgan> Lazlo: Let's not make a big deal out of it. Keep the cash, and
mail the wallet to that address, ok?
<Lazlo> what the f*XCKC wahta kinda platce is this??!? stay out of
this duncanmv. dude don't you DARE TELL MY schools
<Lazlo> SeanEgan: NO! crap there's only $24 dollars in the WALLET man
<SeanEgan> Listen, that wallet has my drivers license in it, it has my
social security card, it has my school id... I really need that.
<SeanEgan> You can keep the $24, just mail it back to me, please.
<SeanEgan> What do you think is a fair reward?
<Lazlo> F*CUI@ NO!!! look, i could have sold your stuff already but i
didn't. social security cards are expensive
<SeanEgan> Listen, how much do you want from me?
<duncanmv> I could have sold your social security card? wtf? gansters?
<Lazlo> LISTEN! I'm talking a few hundred dude -- and some stuff.
<Lazlo> all i know is the people on the internet always look for this
identify stuff
<SeanEgan> It's not worth a few hundred to me. I can just get the ID
reissued for a hundred.
<SeanEgan> at most
<SeanEgan> OK, and you just told me that you're selling my social security
number, so I can get new one and make sure it's worthless.
<SeanEgan> I'll offer you $100.
<SeanEgan> final offer.
<Lazlo> F@#@! FINE dude, whatever -- how will you send me the money then?
i definitely WONT send it until the money gets here. i'm no fool buddy
<duncanmv> ok
<duncanmv> I logged into [UNIVERSITY NAME REMOVED], and got all his data
<duncanmv>
<SeanEgan> My ATM pin is [PIN REMOVED]. That's the Citibank one. If you
withdraw anymore than $100, I report you to the police and they'll have your
picture and everything and you'll go to jail, do you understand me?
<SeanEgan> Also, I'm changing the PIN FIRST THING tomorrow, so you have to
act on that quick.
<SeanEgan> deal?
<Lazlo> This is some world of shit dudes! i try to help and all you do is
threaten police call!!@@ LISTEN I HAVE MY RIGHTS
<SeanEgan> Lazlo: You have no clue how deep trouble you're in right now.
<duncanmv> your rights is stealing Sean's money? come on
<SeanEgan> 10 people have this conversation logged; we have all your
personal data; you really are in no position to talk about your rights.
<Lazlo> WHATEVER This is the LAST time i try to help some looser out who
can't keep his wallet. Where's your gratitude man?
<SeanEgan> Ok. Take $100. Send me my wallet.
<Lazlo> f&%@ fine. you're lucky.
<-- Lazlo has quit ("leaving")
I never knew what happened with Sean’s wallet. So today I emailed him and asked. This is the happy end of the story:
Ha! I didn’t think anyone remembered that! That guy was nuts. I was
able to reason with him, though. It turned out I was able to promise
him a feature request in Gaim and that sufficed for him. He sent the
wallet back, and I never found any weird fraudulent charges on any of
my cards
My guess is that he wasn’t any older than 16.
Just remember, every time a Gaim user sends someone a file by dragging
it into a conversation window, it’s because I lost my wallet.
-s.
Spam Poison
hahaha, that really made me laugh. awesome.
Seb Ruiz
30 Oct 06 at 5:59 pm
wow, that was too funny. at least it had a happy ending
seele
30 Oct 06 at 6:11 pm
Wow. That’s just…. Wow.
Joseph
30 Oct 06 at 6:16 pm
that was priceless.
bsander
30 Oct 06 at 6:53 pm
As others have said, really funny. Made me chuckle this morning.
mark_alec
30 Oct 06 at 7:31 pm
So he was a GAIM user? That doesn\’t make much sense. Other than that, nice anecdote.
Pilaf
30 Oct 06 at 8:39 pm
This have make my day
Michaël Larouche
30 Oct 06 at 9:23 pm
Laughing Out Loud !
Good job Sean
Jejem
30 Oct 06 at 9:25 pm
Lazlo thought people are stupid or something. What a moron !!!
Jukka Laitinen
31 Oct 06 at 4:12 am
That story saved my day
Joni
31 Oct 06 at 4:58 am
Sounds just like Cartman from South Park. I think he would do something like that
Heh
31 Oct 06 at 6:06 am
ahha
n1
Tony
31 Oct 06 at 6:13 am
Big LOL! Really nice story
gmichels
31 Oct 06 at 8:35 am
Haha! That was great…
Tuomas
31 Oct 06 at 8:50 am
i dig the story man
add to delicious
joe7d6
31 Oct 06 at 9:17 am
Just great, i laughed my ass of with this one
Joz
31 Oct 06 at 10:00 am
i quess this guy didnt realize that he was talking in open source community channels oh well a this was bright spot in my day
shadow
31 Oct 06 at 10:37 am
Man I hate that Lazlo. what a nutcase =P
MrDiscipleFIN
31 Oct 06 at 1:56 pm
HAH I would of called the police anyways to get that idiot to jail for being an idiot, becouse he was such an idiot, get the drift?
nikomo
31 Oct 06 at 7:02 pm
Funny thing how like all the replies are made by finnish people coz\’ this was a link in finnish page
Wepa
1 Nov 06 at 5:38 am
Wow there are really some truly screwed up nutcases in the world. Actually that Lazlo guy does remind me of Cartman just like someone said earlier. Good thing you got your wallet back though. I would have just sended the wallet to you if you would have paid the costs of shipping it there
so I guess there are still some honest people in this world.
Gekkolisko
1 Nov 06 at 11:24 am
Wow, what a story!!!
mikey@otol.fi
1 Nov 06 at 4:36 pm
Wepa, true. The story is on MBnet. http://www.mbnet.fi/net.nyt/juttu.aspx?id=1468
nikomo
1 Nov 06 at 5:53 pm
omg dude, I am crying from laughing so damn hard! You totally made a crappy day that much better! Now I can goto class tonight with a smile! Keep rocking bro!
nixternal
1 Nov 06 at 7:27 pm
Nice!
Sado
2 Nov 06 at 2:06 am
la volaita :S demas k tenia k aber sido un pendejo, weno saludos compadre ojala estes bien x alla
segfault
2 Nov 06 at 8:36 am
Did you really give him the ping???
Ethereal
2 Nov 06 at 4:06 pm
Hmm.. a user that admittedly didn\’t use computers much, didn\’t know about KDE, was probably 16yo, on a edu net.. asked for a new feature for Gaim, a program that wasn\’t even on windows until 2004-06-02… (unless you want to argue that a linux user admitted that he didn\’t know much about computers lol) sounds about as phony as a 3 dollar bill lol…
lol
4 Nov 06 at 2:08 am
And the Kicker is that you get feature requests for gaim by threatening people in the kopete channel
Jensen
4 Nov 06 at 2:51 am
great! I send filed by dragging them to the gaim window all the time. It is great! And I\’ll also have to agree with Jensen. \’tis wierd shit!
petter
4 Nov 06 at 3:26 pm
Dude, I have NEVER gotten gaim file transfer to work. Laslo got screwed.
brickbat
4 Nov 06 at 4:21 pm
@lol
The Windows Gaim changelog lists alphas at least since 2002-09-13. http://gaim.sourceforge.net/win32/ChangeLog.win32
Nick
4 Nov 06 at 4:25 pm
I agree with lol – maybe not that it’s phony, but I don’t understand how such a weirdo who claims to not know much about computers (which appears to be true) would be swayed with an offer to decide the course of gaim development. Did he know what gaim was, or did you have to explain that to him first?
If so, I guess he really was crazy…
agreed
4 Nov 06 at 4:40 pm
Sounds fake to me, since when does Google track IRC? Maybe if he said “Your website says you hang out on this channel” but I’m doubtful.
“uh, hi — I searched on google and it said a ‘Sean Egan’ was in this chat room.”
Bob Roberts
4 Nov 06 at 5:03 pm
Sean man, you have way too much patience!…. lol
Horacio
4 Nov 06 at 5:12 pm
great, much great
Lo\'oris
4 Nov 06 at 7:51 pm
Scorpio in Dirty Harry 4a7d3d609129a9296bf7ac0608c2097
lee
4 Nov 06 at 10:24 pm
Nice story !!!
Venkataramanan S
5 Nov 06 at 4:32 am
That is fantastic. And sad. Some grease to get features in software.
Now I know that there was probably someone to blame everytime I see something I don’t like in a piece of software
Bill
5 Nov 06 at 11:58 am
What a prick. He should have been reported to police for blackmaling.
I read a somewhat related story last spring when someone in NYC had found a cell phone from a cab and didn’t return it but gave it to his little sister. It was some teenage girl who really gave a load of crap for the guy who requested the phone back.
People like that make my blood boil. I couldn’t even think about keeping something that’s not mine and it wouldn’t be a problem for me to mail something like a wallet back in my own expense. But then again, I’m finnish. People still value honesty here.
Born-81
5 Nov 06 at 4:15 pm
Hehe…good stuff.
Rustycat
5 Nov 06 at 4:20 pm
Aika hassua.
Mikko
7 Nov 06 at 3:08 am
Where does this people come from
Haxter
7 Nov 06 at 4:12 am
It was worth losing the $100 to get my precious file transfering by dragging and dropping into the gaim windows.
Lazlo
7 Nov 06 at 7:26 pm
great, great story! this made my day. good thing it had a happy ending.
will
13 Nov 06 at 9:16 pm
who would have thought, a kid from Long Island going to Binghamton.
Lee
30 Nov 06 at 12:34 am
LOL!!
This is awesome… Made my day too
PS: Thank you Lazlo for the cool feature.. of course, more thanks to Sean!
Ali
12 Feb 07 at 4:23 pm
[...] LISTEN I HAVE MY RIGHTS!!!! Curios IRC log which took place somewhere in 2003-2004 at freenode. read it here [...]
Carlos Ferry’s blog » Funniest IRC Log I’ve ever read
10 May 08 at 6:00 am
What a hilarious guy. It seems to me like he was just trolling… he probably didn’t seriously want to take money or buy stuff using the credit cards.
I love the way he says things. “LISTEN! I’m talking a few hundred dude — and some stuff.”
Slick Denis
9 Sep 09 at 9:31 pm