
TempleOS creator Terry Davis is homeless and living in a van - founderling
https://www.reddit.com/r/Drama/comments/7218gh/templeos_creator_is_now_homeless/
======
moron4hire
As far as I can tell, Terry Davis has been given multiple chances to get well.
He chooses to be sick.

It's tragic, but you can only lead a horse to water, you can't make it drink.
I've been on the side of trying to help a family member get better. It's
impossible to help someone who doesn't want help. And it's one of the hardest
things in the world to give up on someone who doesn't want help. You question
your decision for the rest of your life. And sometimes you go back, and get
reminded almost immediately you did make the right decision.

Also as far as I can tell, the only reason most people care about anything
involving him is because of some stories about him being a "heroic"
programmer. Not that they've had any realistic confirmation of that
experience, because they almost certainly haven't tried any of his software.
So there seems to be this perverse, backwards reasoning that "Terry says
terrible things, but it's ok, he's sick, but he chose to be this way, but it's
ok, he wrote his own OS".

It's terrible that anyone should have to live this way, even the worst people
in the world. But I'm not terribly convinced that the concern I see expressed
is anything other than asshole programmer worship. Take away, "he wrote his
own OS", and I just have a really hard time imagining very many people giving
two shakes.

~~~
htk
I agree with your first sentence, but let’s not forget the defective equipment
that needs to be fixed or stabilized with medicine is the same equipment
responsible for the decision to take it or not.

------
mrob
TempleOS has no process isolation, so it's completely unaffected by Spectre
and Meltdown. I'm starting to think there's a lot of wisdom in its design.
Complexity of modern computer systems keeps increasing but the value I get
from that complexity isn't increasing nearly as fast. Spectre and Meltdown are
just recent examples of some of the cost of that complexity. Do we really need
an OS too complex for any one person to completely understand?

~~~
sharpneli
That's like saying "I don't have any doors in my house, just open frames. So
I'm not affected by the weaknesses in locks."

~~~
mrob
If lack of doors was standard, everybody would see the open frames, and
culture would adapt to them. Weaknesses in computer security are much harder
to spot. Spectre has been possible for decades without mainstream attention.
It's this lack of understandability that I think is dangerous. Many people
will assume systems are secure just because they don't see an obvious way to
exploit them, and because the complexity has grown far beyond what will fit
into a human brain there will undoubtedly be non-obvious flaws. Is weak
security really better than no security? The "no security" model really means
"socially enforced security", which is playing to human strengths. It's much
easier to understand than figuring out the full consequences of speculative
execution.

~~~
DougN7
I might believe that stance if you can think of any human scenario where there
is value and nobody tries to take advantage of it.

We can’t have nice things/utipia as long as some people are evil.

------
zichy
If you want to draw attention to a schizophrenic person who needs help, maybe
linking /r/Drama is the wrong way.

~~~
reeteshv
IMHO, this attitude is akin to "throwing the baby out with the bath water".
I'm sure the readerships of HN & Reddit are not mutually exclusive.

Tomorrow, someone will object to linking a WSJ article as it's a conservative
newspaper.

Then, somebody else will object against The Guardian for it being too left-
leaning.

~~~
humanrebar
From the /r/drama sidebar:

"Do your part to keep our community healthy by blowing everything out of
proportion and making literally everything as dramatic as possible."

I think it's fair to consider /r/drama an especially bad place to originate a
story about someone who needs help.

~~~
reeteshv
That paragraph is prefaced by the definition of the word Drama.

If we want to avoid drama, we should stop sharing a significant number of
recent events, e.g. the Meltdown and Spectre drama, launches, touchdowns and
failures of SpaceX, a majority of anti-Google comments, etc.

~~~
zichy
What are you talking about? Do you grasp the basic difference between a
security vulnerability and a mentally ill homeless person?

~~~
reeteshv
I understand your scepticism about my ability to grasp basic differences,
considering that we have never met nor interacted before.

Hence, this clarification...

As per my understanding, there is plenty of Drama in the security
vulnerability incident - Intel CEO selling a large chunk of stock after the
company was informed of the vulnerability; the differing views on the actual
performance impact of the patches, the discussions on whether it was a genuine
oversight error or corporate greed that led to the situation in the first
place, etc.

The reason I mentioned this along with the original article is simply because
I was trying to clarify that there have always been dramatic posts/comments on
HN.

Therefore, sharing an article from r/Drama sub-reddit didn't seem sacrilegious
to me.

I apologise if I have offended your sensibilities...

------
tscs37
The amount of dedication Terry shows for his project is beyond what you see
anywhere else in the software dev space.

For anyone who hasn't, I recommend to watch his videos on TempleOS (there are
a lot of hymn videos or ranting videos, you can ignore those), they are a
genuinely interesting perspective into OS Development.

~~~
rootlocus
> The amount of dedication Terry shows for his project is beyond what you see
> anywhere else in the software dev space.

I'd say Linus Torvalds shows at least the same amount of dedication to the
linux kernel.

~~~
galfarragem
AFAIK, Tarn and Zach Adams also (Dwarf Fortress).

------
NicoJuicy
I know he's perhaps not mentally stable, but after all. He has problems and he
does some amazing things.

Perhaps consider donating on top of his page:
[http://www.templeos.org/](http://www.templeos.org/) ( paypal).

~~~
myaso
Just donated 5$/month, will keep it up for a year at least. PayPal
transactions take a bit of time to go through -- the hardest part was filling
out the details :(

I really don't have the resources to arbitrarily afford charity, but fuck it
-- I spend more money on coffee in a month and it's been too cold to wander
around for a while here. It must feel really awful to some people who make 6
figure salaries to part with just a _little_ money to a person who is both
talented and likely lived in agony all his life. Maybe _some_ people can start
acting like the _ubermensch_ they pretend to be from their libertarian
ideology.

~~~
stevenh
I'd ask you to explain how all libertarians are Nazis but then I guess I'd be
taking the bait.

~~~
myaso
You'd be taking the bait if you actually made a donation to Terry.

~~~
tsheikhs
Plenty of people have made donations to Terry, so I'm not sure what you're
getting at.

~~~
myaso
Well, I'm in a charitable mood today so I decided to run a fundraiser on a
whim using nothing but my phone.

------
krisives
It's actually quite worse than that. Terry is kind of going through a
"teenager" phase it appears.

Apparently he left his parents house and started living in his car and his
family went to visit him unannounced. There was some kind of altercation
(probably his family trying to physically get him back) and the authorities
were called because of a disturbance and he was charged with "Battery" in Las
Vegas. He plead guilty to some minor charges. During the same time he's been
seen with what some are describing a hooker.

Unfortunately he also has an ongoing fascination with some famous YouTuber and
predators/trolls are taking advantage of him by posing as her to get him to
send naked photos =(

The Terry Davis story gets crazier every day and I have a lot of sympathy for
him. It upsets me to see the some areas of the Internet exploit him for the
whole "CIA" thing.

EDIT - A new development he was arrested in Arizona on the 27th of December
for property damage? Get well soon, Terry.

------
galfarragem
In a recent HN thread fellow HNers were asking what is a real artist: this is
it.

~~~
thomasz
No, this what a real schizophrenic is. It's a terrible disease that should not
be romanticized in any way.

~~~
rogual
There surely seems to be a correlation between great art and mental illness.
Van Gogh, Rothko, Frida Kahlo... I guess it depends on your taste in art,
though. I'd put Terry in this camp for sure.

~~~
Cthulhu_
Those were a few that were lucky enough to earn a living / have people take
care of them; that's only a small percentage, the rest ends up homeless, dead,
interned, jailed. Terry is headed that way too now.

------
founderling
He has a donate button on his homepage. I wonder if that brings in something?
Anybody here who ever used a donate button on their website and can tell
something about it?

How does one even receive 'donations'? Is that like getting paid? Do they have
to create an invoice for tax reasons? How is it taxed?

It would be nice if there was a number, how much is donated per month. I can
imagine donating something. Depending on how much cash flow there already is.

~~~
NicoJuicy
[http://www.templeos.org/](http://www.templeos.org/) on top of the page is a
donate button :) ( not affliated or any way. I just feel bad for him)

------
eptcyka
I wish there was a cure for his and his family's suffering. Irrespective of
him being a genius, he deserves to receive the medical attention he needs.

------
fb03
Putting aside all the "mental illness/nutjob" talks that everyone likes to
focus on so much, I would just _wish_ that someone somehow would be able to
connect with him and channel his genius (it is clear that he is quite good at
what he does) into some project with a proper objective and guidance.

Bram Cohen has Asperger's and he could create BitTorrent which is widely used.
I wonder if Terry Davis would create some game changer stuff as well if he had
better support....

It is a sad situation.

~~~
pavel_lishin
I wish someone would connect with him and get him to accept some treatment.
He's created great things, but it seems like his life is a struggle.

------
grawprog
I've read through a lot of Terry's posts on 8chan and his rants that got him
banned from a few websites. He's totally fucked but a genius. I've tried
TempleOS. It made my brain hurt to look at it and it really wasn't intuitive
in any way at all. I like the concept of the OS, a full OS where everything is
in the same memory space. But, it's way too annoying to really play with
anything in TempleOS.

~~~
digi_owl
Any OS from the era of cooperative multitasking should have much the same
behavior, iirc.

Heck, even DOS with a few TSRs could come close.

------
iovrthoughtthis
This is incredibly sad. :(

I haven't got any money to help and I don't even know where I would put it to
be helpful.

------
se30b
Does anyone have info about his current status? He has not updated his site
since Dec 15.

As far as the van thing goes, he wasn't really homeless. He went to his
parents house frequently and he could live there but chooses to live mostly in
his van because he likes it.

------
rurban
This was 3 months ago. Apparently he lives happy in his van.

~~~
WillReplyfFood
Yes.No.

Schizos have the wanderlust, they try to discover new territories- but they
end up socially self isolating- and to reduce the suffering - drugs.

------
founderling
Here is he sitting in his truck and working on his computer:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBGgi5Lqn0U](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBGgi5Lqn0U)

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haloboy777
I have so much respect for that guy just looking at his achievement.

------
jstewartmobile
Let's drop homeboy some cash (top of page):
[http://www.templeos.org](http://www.templeos.org)

------
grassdubious
ELI5 the story behind this?

~~~
m0ck
He is a schizo autistic programmer who is convinced God told him to make an
OS, so he is working on it constantly for 15 years, doing nothing else (it
kind of resembles Noah's Ark). He used to livestream regularly on Youtube and
became popular on technology boards on 4chan, 8chan etc., for his rants about
God and "CIA niggers" and generally "being a living meme". Some people there
genuinely like him and even bought him that drum set he wanted, but others
(given *chans reputation) just liked to screw with him to induce more rants.
But he is really suffering from mental illness and should got professional
treatment.

~~~
3131s
And he also posts on HN, but last time I checked his account is shadow-banned.

~~~
slowmotiony
He gets banned whenever he posts because his mental illness is taking over and
he can't help but include slurs in his messages. Snowflake mods then usually
either delete his posts (like on reddit), shadowban him or just ban his whole
account. Which is really a shame because ignoring the slurs, his posts give
you a lot of insights into his mind.

~~~
pm90
Mods have good reason to ban him if his comments are peppered with racial
slurs: they are doing their fucking job. Mental illness is no excuse for
racism. Calling the mods Snowflakes is going a little too far IMO.

------
sexydefinesher
This is the guy King Crimson was talking about.

~~~
neilsimp1
Nothing he's got, he really needs?

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newsbinator
When I googled I found more details here:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Drama/comments/7218gh/templeos_crea...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Drama/comments/7218gh/templeos_creator_is_now_homeless/)

> Despite the mean spirited attention he gets, he does have a following of
> people who seem to genuinly feel for him, and want to do nice things for
> him. One thing his followers did which at least seemed well intentioned was
> buying him a drum set. Terry likes to use drum sticks, but didn't have a
> set, so a gofundme was set up and he was bought some drums.

> But shortly after receiving the drum set, Terry vanished off the interenet
> for a couple weeks. Eventually, this note was posted on his website:

>> I got kicked-out of my parent's house. I got in a fight with my Dad, went
to jail then mental hospital.

>> I'm adapting to being homeless. Hope to get a car to live in but no loan
yet.

> At some point after posting this note, he was able to get a van, which he's
> now living in.

~~~
kentiko
It blows my mind that a mental ill person is ending up homeless like this.
Society should take care of theses cases.

~~~
krapp
Unfortunately, he was born into a society that would prefer the mentally ill
take care of themselves.

~~~
b6
I can't lay that much blame on society. Have you tried to take care of a
mentally ill person? It's common for them to make it extremely difficult.
Schizophrenia often seems to cause its sufferers to be _absolutely certain_
they are not mentally ill at all. I've walked around for hours looking for a
mentally ill woman to give her a care package, only to be attacked by her a
few days afterward.

~~~
supreme_sublime
It really is sad. The only schizophrenic person I've interacted with was
thankfully on medication and it seemed to help a lot. A very sweet elderly
woman. I have spent a decent amount of time watching
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCaUOTQQBc3EO5sVjVusMn8A](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCaUOTQQBc3EO5sVjVusMn8A)

She is a schizophrenic woman in Boston iirc. Watching her delusions and
obsession with various objects is fascinating and heartbreaking. I really want
to talk to her just to try to understand better. I think it is impossible
simply because something is wrong inside her brain. I wouldn't be able to
rationalize why traffic cones aren't some kind of grand conspiracy of the
Patriarchy. I think she is homeless now, I hope she gets the help she
desperately needs.

------
senatorobama
Who are the kiddies who keep stirring him up?

~~~
digi_owl
Say hello to the offspring of Anon...

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agumonkey
Depending on "truck" it can be pretty alright.

See :
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UeVsHmKAFA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UeVsHmKAFA)
(EV mod of VW kombi)

Make a kickstarter to fund his future green life.

ps: for some weird reason I expected him to look like anderson cooper..

~~~
supermatt
If you have the money, time and experience to invest 7 months (in this
particular case) into converting it, then yeah. I think you will find 90% of
van/truck dwellers have a very different situation to that.

~~~
agumonkey
I'm sure this man can crack a bit of mechanics and power electronics, probably
not harder than writing an OS, also I said people could help.

Now for the majority of people in such need, sure it's hard, and I wish we
could turn their situation in a similar manner.

~~~
supermatt
He appears to be living on a mattress in a family car (for the last 3 months).
I think he’s definitely in that “situation”, with severe mental issues to
boot.

