Tuttle city manager threatens CentOS developers over default apache page

Posted on March 24th, 2006 by darkmoon

Tuttle City Manager Jerry Taylor is in our opinion one of the most non-technical people we’ve ever met after reading the e-mail transcripts between the CentOS developers and himself. After going out of their way to fix a simple apache default page issue, of which they were threatened about calls to the FBI and other insults, it’s amazing that this city manager didn’t actually do research on what exactly CentOS was and how it was managed.
What’s most funny about this story is that the city manager claimed:

“I am computer literate! I have 22 years in computer systems engineering and operation. Now, can you tell me how to remove ‘your software’ that you acknowledge you provided free of charge? I consider this ‘hacking.’”

That was from the T
Twenty two years? Obviously not website administration or else he would know about this product called apache and these crazy things called default web pages.
One thing the LUX staff has found over the years: many managers like to talk big, but when it comes to walking the walk, some fall flat on their face. It seems like the CentOS developers deserve not only kudos for going out of their way to fix a problem that was unrelated to but an award since they had to provide support to an “apache-illiterate” person that threatened them with law enforcement for no reason.
As for the Tuttle city manager? Our guess is that The Register’s national coverage of the Tuttle fiasco will put “The Place Where People Grow – Friendly!” just a bit bitter.
UPDATE (3/25 5:23PMEST): In case anyone wonders about Mr. Taylor’s background:

Taylor has a background in computers, and build the city of Harrah’s website.

This was mentioned in the TuttleTimes article when Taylor was hired. Taylor did graduate with a MBA and was in program management though. Could be lack of technological background, of which he should not have been claiming the twenty-two years of technical experience when it was actually management.
ratchetsblog < TheRegister < CentOS

Tags: Government, Linux, Society // View Comments

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    Great reading, keep up the great posts.
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    Amusing. Jerry Taylor, city manager of Tuttle, Oklahoma, has asked The Register to stop their readers from emailing him about this incident. My dear fellow. You are a public servant. Public servants have public emails. While you are definitely at...
  • Jerry the computer world has changed a bit since the days you started. Maybe a refresher course would be in order for you or better yet a remedial course for dysfunctional "literate computer people".
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