this post was submitted on 02 May 2024
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Increasingly so, and following the path that RedHat was taking prior (and probably worse to come given their new ownership)
What did RedHat do? Did I miss something?
RedHat is one of, if not the, biggest contributors to Linux. They offer RHEL, which you license as a business or use for free for personal use.
RedHat became pissed off about contributing so much to the Linux ecosystem when a number of other corporate distros simply took their product, changed the name, then shoved it out the door with a price tag that undercuts them, taking money while contributing virtually nothing to the wider ecosystem.
And to be clear I don't mean distros based on RHEL, like Pop/Elementary/Mint is to Ubuntu, I mean literally clones. The exact same software with zero differences other than name.
RH then changed their subscription terms so that redistribution of their source code means they can drop you as a RHEL customer. I.e. you wouldn't have access to further to source code.
This is widely believed to be compatible with the GPL licence that Linux uses — GPL only guarantees users need to be able to see source code, not necessarily that it has to be completely open for anybody to see. GPL also doesn't compel the developer to provide updates for everyone, so if the developer thinks you've broken other terms they've set, they are allowed to drop you/not deal with you further. GPL doesn't force a developer to have you as their continued customer.
People argue that RH may well be complying with the GPL legally, but they aren't in spirit.
I'm still not sure where I come down on it tbh. Philosophically I want RH to go with the spirit of the GPL, but I do find it really shitty that a number of other projects just straight up take RH's product, put a different name on it, and skim money away from an organisation that has transformed the Linux desktop and made it usable.
Thing is, I don't even think it's worked. They can still get all the packages by pulling it in a slightly cumbersome way from CentOS.
That's actually not what I was referring to.
First of all, RedHat now belongs to IBM, and they've never been shy about squeezing customers for a buck.
Second, having dealt with their support, it's hit or miss to get a somebody helpful or an endless cycle of tickets. Patching and versioning is sometimes a complete mess.This especially sucks as the main reason most organizations go with RH versus others is for patching and support.
There's also a lot of things where there's a RH-specific implementation , which is further distancing fun other Linuxes and often ignores standard ways of configuring things.
RedHat actually benefitted from Fedora, CentOS etc as it allowed the community to develop products in a way that could be tested to be reasonably compatible, and to develop our port back fixes etc. It wasn't just "RedHat made this and others just took it" but in many ways a symbiotic relationship. Yeah some orgs just went with CentOS but often it was those who worked on RH corporately would run CentOS at home in order to have a similar environment.
I know they're owned by IBM now. Doesn't change anything about my comment.
And yeah there was a symbiotic relationship. There still is. Fedora is still quite alike RHEL in many ways, as is CentOS, as are the RHEL clones.
None of this goes against my comment.