this post was submitted on 30 Sep 2025
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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Everyone always says "Companies should fund FOSS instead of spending money on big corpos!", yet then this.
It's FOSS. It's auditable. Funding is a good thing.
That's true, but we also know that funding can come with stipulations. Oracle is an especially sketchy company.
But that counts for all big tech I guess.
In this situation it works well, IMO. For some more context, ZFS was created by Sun (FOSS). Oacle bought them and built Oracle ZFS out of it. OpenZFS forked at that point from Sun code, and that's what we use in Linux/etc. The Oracle variant supplies support to the FOSS variant. So Oracle has no control over OpenZFS.
So not using Linux at all then? Most of the development is paid for by big tech.
My comment moreso pertains to the "which is a good thing" part of the previous one.
Google managed to backdoor Linux and Firefox with their "FOSS" libWebp. Took literally years until some security researcher not affiliated with any of them found the bug by chance and made a public report, and by then it had already been explited by NSO for ages. If they had worked for Google (or Apple/Microsoft/Amazon/any of the other corporations that just imported Google's libWebp code without looking at it) they would have gotten silenced and the exploit would still be there as a gift to Israel. Turns out just because it's auditable doesn't mean it gets audited before it's too late.
And so have countless closed-source developers/companies/applications. A vulnerability existing does not change the fact that FOSS projects should be funded more.