The Free Software Foundation (FSF) grants two annual awards. Since 1998, FSF has granted the award for Advancement of Free Software and since 2005, also the Free Software Award for Projects of Social Benefit.
Larry Wall, 1998
Miguel de Icaza, 1999
Brian Paul, 2000
Lawrence Lessig, 2002
Yukihiro Matsumoto , also known as Matz, is a Japanese computer scientist and software programmer best known as the chief designer of the Ruby programming language and its original reference implementation, Matz's Ruby Interpreter (MRI). His demeanor has brought about a motto in the Ruby community: "Matz is nice and so we are nice," commonly abbreviated as MINASWAN.
Yukihiro Matsumoto at the ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest in Tokyo, 14 March 2007
Matsumoto giving the keynote speech at EuRuKo 2011
Matsumoto accepting an award from the Free Software Foundation (founder Richard Stallman, right) in 2012