GlyphI do agree with Red Hat that we ought to ensure that the people who *really* make open source software need to be fairly compensated
It is just *wild* to me that the people who built a business on a linux *distribution* are trying to die on the hill that "people who just take source code and build it aren't adding any value".
Shawn Webb@glyph though, I suspect RH does a bit more than just repackage things. I think it would be worthwhile to look at diffs comparing upstream and downstream and contributions to upstream.
It might also be worthwhile to look at direct and indirect contributions made as a result of RH involvement. How many people unaffiliated with RH sent patches to some random project because of their use of RH? hard to quantify the butterfly effect.
0xC0DEC0DE07EA@c0dec0dec0de @lattera on the one hand, RH does do a lot of good work upstream. What I’m mad about is not a lack of overall contributions, but bad governance and unilateral decision making. On the other hand, this practice of pretending to support EOL’d software by deploying patches unreviewed by upstream, is actively bad. See this post from nearly a decade ago, which I’ve linked a few times in this discourse already: https://alexgaynor.net/2015/mar/30/red-hat-open-source-community/
@glyph @lattera I’m not a fan of RHEL, really. I don’t like using an old, slightly off-brand version of my whole software stack and having to maintain concurrent knowledge of how the actual, current versions work and are configured versus the Red Hat time-shifted versions. But they offer someone to point to blame for my employer and that means more than these arguments (and harm to the larger ecosystem that we depend on) for them.
Benjamin@lattera @glyph This may not be common, but at my previous employer, we used RedHat. When I asked why, I was told it was so we had someone to blame/get-support when something goes wrong.
Their role in the ecosystem is to be paid to fix the weird bugs that the free maintainers aren’t interested in fixing.
Dmitry Tantsur
kez | ole@glyph one can hope that either oracle stops them (I can‘t believe I‘m saying this) or suse becomes more mainstream. Cos honestly fuck redhat for this.
James Bennett@glyph I really dislike these takes, given that RH has in fact contributed a ton to the software they include in their distributions and to the Linux ecosystem as a whole.
I also worry what this does to ongoing conversations about sustainable OSS maintainership if our knee-jerk reaction is to say we expect to get not just the software but also the ongoing maintenance gratis and that complainers are to be shunned and mocked.
Noah K@ubernostrum @glyph I don't think anyone is saying Red Hat doesn't deserve to get paid, I've even literally said that. But I think it's very fair to point out the hypocrisy of Red Hat standing on the shoulders of (free) giants and saying "this far but no further”. _Everyone_ involved should be getting paid but I see no reason that Red Hat's efforts are of a different kind that is more deserving than everyone else, so their current position comes off as rent seeking rather than community boosting
@coderanger @glyph My issue is with all the hot takes premised on RH being a mere repackager. Which they are not.
I don’t know what the right way to try to get paid for a service like RHEL is, but I’m tired of takes that pretend there’s nothing of value added by RH.
@ubernostrum @coderanger I'm clearly being a little reductive here, but if you want some nuance:
I'm reacting to https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hats-commitment-open-source-response-gitcentosorg-changes which is a tone-deaf mess of a statement. There's a lot to dislike, but I am annoyed specifically at the claim that Red Hat rebuilding *my* code largely unmodified by integrating it into their build toolchain is "adding value", but other people rebuilding *their* code largely unmodified by integrating it into their toolchains is *not* adding value.
@ubernostrum @coderanger I didn't even know about AlmaLinux or Rocky a few days ago, but it seems clear that there's a community there, they have their own infrastructure, their own testing, etc. Rocky is a B corp, which implies a non-trivial amount of publicly beneficial value is being provided there
@ubernostrum @coderanger when @Migueldeicaza described this as a "reddit moment" he hit the nail on the head. It's not like Reddit does *nothing*, either. They run a big website. They have a lot of computers! But there's a lot of moralizing language in their statements around getting paid for labor. Red Hat / Reddit think "I made this" with respect to all the content they're putting their arms around with their infrastructure. The infra is valuable! But its value doesn't supersede the content.
My issue with this specific case is that Red Hat isn't just providing "infrastructure" or whatever. They are an actual real honest-to-goodness genuine producer of and contributor to Free and Open Source software, and also a paying employer of contributors and maintainers in the F/OSS world. And a really big and significant one, in their niche. The fact that their primary niche isn't *our* primary niche doesn't change that.
And like 95% of the complaints about their changes are from people who used one of the repackaged distros because they wanted the (perceived) improved stability/quality that Red Hat provided, but without paying what Red Hat charges. And as I understand it they still have free or cheap options for open-source projects that need them.
So I really really think that no matter how much someone dislikes RH or IBM as companies, or dislikes corporate statements, the reductive hot takes are a bad look. And I still don't know the right way for RH to make a business out of what they do, but I still think it hurts all OSS maintainers to just reflexively attack them for trying.
Jason Petersen (he)@ubernostrum why devote so much effort to running interference for them? Who cares if it is reductive? What is the downside?
@jason Well, for one thing I'm right.
For another, it's not "running interference". If people want to write critiques of the changes, they should do so! I'm just saying that I'm not a fan of the reductive hot takes, and I don't think they accomplish anything useful (in fact, I think they do active harm).
For yet another, I know plenty of people who work for or have worked for Red Hat. They're not faceless corporate drones; they're friends and colleagues, and seeing their hard work reduced to the "I made this" meme, and them dehumanized behind sneering at a corporation, is not something I care much for.
And finally, a big downside is that once you allow reductive angry hot takes at unsympathetic targets, you are on the way to allowing them at what previously would have been sympathetic targets. That's happened too much already, and I'd prefer it not happen any more, thanks.
@ubernostrum maybe they should quit then
@ubernostrum @jason upon reflection I stand by the hot take here. In some ways, yes, RH has been a good corporate citizen and contributed to the commons. And when they do, by all means, praise them. But in their statement they *specifically said* that their system was and is made by their own “late nights” as if their entire business model is not *made possible* by the asymmetry of their contributions. If there weren’t already an ecosystem to package, there would be nothing to contribute to
@ubernostrum @jason red hat exists in the first place because their model is capturing and harnessing the chaotic commons of free software, making it legible to the processes and structure of business and corporations. that doesn’t have to be inherently predatory or exploitative. It can be symbiotic. But it does require the acknowledgement of and respect for that other effort, especially in moralizing screeds written to persuade.
There’s no two ways about it: they fucked this up.
@glyph it feels like Reddit, it feels like Twitter, etc etc.
A common good arose, they built a nice thing with and around it, and now stick up a wall and say “we did the stuff in here”
I knew people at Twitter, and I’m sure there are good people at Reddit. I’ve done RPM packaging and had to interface with employees while up streaming; they’re good, helpful folk.
It doesn’t lessen the grossness of what the parent company does. Agreed on all points.
Jc2k@ubernostrum @coderanger @glyph well said. I am having a hard time with the lies myself. Also, some of the conduct from the people angry with this change has been really disappointing. Abusing RH staff that are politely telling you how RHEL is actually made to try and stop the misinformation unfortunately invalidates a lot of the passionate arguments I’ve heard.
@jc2k @ubernostrum @coderanger I guess I need to say this, then: harassing redhat employees is not okay. First of all 99% of them have nothing to do with this decision, and second they probably do good work in the ecosystem outside of this one unfortunate shift in strategy. I don't think we should be censoring every critical thought about a corporation because an employee *might* get harassed, but it is nevertheless a bad thing when it happens.
@glyph @ubernostrum @coderanger oh absolutely, unfortunately I’ve seen some prominent actors (community leaders of sort) in this discussion loudly and consistently disparage individual people - calling them ibm shills, using language like “I know your not that stupid”. It’s disgusting to see that in response to genuine engagement, and its dominated the discourse I’ve seen around what has actually been lost.
@glyph btw the thing I’ve seen repeated from RH staff is that Stream isnt a dev or beta release, it’s prod grade. Every Stream RPM has had RHEL QA. Stream should as safe or safer than running apt upgrade on Ubuntu LTS. I’ve seen it called a dev release by Ubuntu staff, that seems to be very wrong. This is probably why RH staff are confused about the fuss - to them everything is still open, and centos is a free and open enterprise grade os anyone can use today for free.
@glyph when I objectively read the engineering posts about how centos stream actually works and how it means RHEL dev now happens in public and not behind closed doors, some of the posts from the angry people read like conspiracy posts. For me, this situation is not open and shut case of evil like it seems to be for some…
flere-imsaho 🇺🇦@ubernostrum @glyph so should we agree that redhat may keep the ecosystem hostage in fear that they may decide to alter the deal further?
@ubernostrum @glyph or, goddess forbid, should we demand a modicum of ethics even from a bloody corporation?
@mawhrin I dunno, personally I think if you're going to come in that screaming hot at me then you're just going to eat a block. Whomst'd've thought that mayhaps perchance a modicum of cutesy-wutesy language does not, in fact, make one's behavior either cute or correct? Bye-bye, random domran.