Pop Weekend in Schagen, Netherlands & Debian Day

After the Debian Day Volunteer Suicide, the death of Frans Pop, a group of people traveled to the Netherlands for the funeral.

The funeral was held in the town of Schagen (Wikipedia, OpenStreetmap), approximately 50km north of Amsterdam.

Every summer Schagen has a music festival, coincidentally, it is called Pop Weekend. This year it is the 40th anniversary of Pop Weekend on 2 to 4 August 2024. Could this be a good opportunity for people to get together and commemorate Pop's work?

We know that Frans Pop sent his resignation email, a de-facto suicide note, on 15 August 2010, the night before Debian Day. We don't know the exact day he went through with the suicide, whether he did it on Debian Day itself or a few days later.

What we do know is that if he was watching the debian-private emails after sending his resignation, he would have only seen two people thanking him for his work.

Some Debian people are just incredibly rude like that. I resigned from some of my voluntary activities around the time my father died. Some people have been complaining for six years. None of these people ever paid anything for my work. None of these people every thanked me for my work. But after I resigned, they spent over $120,000 on legal fees to insult my family and I.

Given that only two people thanked Pop after his resignation/suicide email, could the Pop Weekend be a good opportunity for people to get together and belatedly thank Frans Pop for all his work?

If you would like to discuss this idea, please make contact via debian-devel@lists.debian.org

Subject: Re: Death of Frans Pop - funeral report
Date: Fri, 27 Aug 2010 16:45:43 +0100
From: Steve McIntyre 
To: debian-private@lists.debian.org

Hi all,

The funeral for Frans Pop happened yesterday in Schagen and 6 DDs went
along to pay their last respects. Colin Watson and I flew over from
the UK and we met up with Thijs Kinkhorst, Jeroen van Wolffelaar,
Geert Stappers and Joost van Baal from the Netherlands.

We got to meet a number of people from Frans' family, and a lot of his
friends too. Although the backgrounds were very different (stories
from childhood, student life, National Service and his Debian work),
the picture painted of him was remarkably consistent: a fairly quiet
person who worked hard on everything he did to very high standards. He
was a perfectionist in most areas, almost obsessively so. He also kept
his life very compartmentalised and private, meaning that many of his
friends had not previously met.

I spoke briefly about Frans' work in Debian, highlighting the areas
where he worked and the number of people he had worked with in various
teams. I also told the group about the massive number of messages of
sympathy and condolence which I had been asked to pass on. His family
knew that Debian was important to Frans, but were not aware of just
how wide his influence and effect had been. They were especially
surprised and grateful that people had travelled so far for the
funeral; I told them that I would not have missed it for anything.

I now know more about the circumstances surrounding his death, but I'm
not going to share it on a mailing list to cause more pain and
argument. Contact me privately if you want to know.

I've sent email including the proposed obituary text to Frans'
stepfather and brother today to ask for their approval, and I'm hoping
to receive that shortly. I also asked if they would be happy with any
potential dedication(s) that might be made. I'll report back on these
as soon as I hear anything more.

Rest In Peace, my friend. You will be missed.

-- 
Steve McIntyre, Cambridge, UK.                                steve@einval.com
There's no sensation to compare with this
Suspended animation, A state of bliss

Please see the chronological history of how the Debian harassment and abuse culture evolved.