"Emacs is the ground. We run around and act silly on top of it, and when we die, may our remnants grace its ongoing incrementation." -- Thien-Thi Nguyen.
I worked with ttn a long time ago, 1999 to 2001, and lost touch with him a few years later. The last time I saw him in person was in my kitchen in Oakland in 2001.
oh, i have one of those cobalt cubes (no longer in use, don't know if it still works). i loved that machine. it served as a home server for many years.
I left before the acquisition, and then re-joined the team formally known as Cobalt at Sun in 2002. I don't remember Thomas, but it has been a long time. I worked remotely, so unless I worked directly with someone I was not likely to know them.
I thought this was notable too. I guess sometimes people's online lives are separate enough from their in-person lives that a long online absence can be attributed to the person just taking some time away, without anyone digging in to find out what's going on.
https://savannah.gnu.org/users/ttn
https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/ThienThiNguyen
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Emacs