Cool story.

For Eric Blossom, founder of the GNU Radio project, the vision plays itself over and over again, like a Möbius film strip. An electrical engineer by trade, Blossom knows better than most the thin barriers that separate one person's garage-door opener from another person's global positioning satellite receiver. He also knows the proprietary barriers that hinder technological innovation. Rather than curse those walls, Blossom has decided to gut the floor plan entirely with the help of free software. Sony, Philips and Nokia be damned.

Radio Free Software