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this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2023
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Linux
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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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Linux community is so inherently meritocratic that one can't meaninfully force anything upon any large group of them.
Thore particular two creations of Lennart took the world by storm precisely because they were so absurdly good that working on other stuff was a dead-end, obvious for all but such tiny fraction of people that even forming vacuous hate bubbles haven't rallied enough effort to foster and maintain alternatives.
It became trendy to hate Pulseaudio and call it bloat years after Nokia shipped a rather anemic phone where it already worked flawlessly. I need no further proof that there's no technical basis beneath the hate.
Even for developers, there is a very substantial cost to any deviation from the herd and little time or money for these projects. Factually a handful of companies run the Linux userspace and a handful of people run those companies.
You can go your own way but existing market share and resources matter more than quality or merit.
As a Red Hat employee who had his all-around sensible Fedora Change to prevent it from falling too far behind RHEL (!) rejected, I think I can confidently claim that your statements smell of conspiracy theories.
Do Linux-involved companies have resources to develop the projects they like the most? Yes. Do companies dominate userspace development? I don't think so, in fact, they're all seem quite focused in their interests, and their involvement with a median package on your community distro desktop system isn't even minimal, it's none. Do the se companies at least all push for a united agenda? Absolutely not. Can they force a single random community distro like Debian to pick something over something else? No. 99% of the distros? Goes without saying.
It's not a conspiracy theory to imagine that IBM's vision for Linux compared to 2000s or 2010s era Linux is opaque, complicated, and enterprisey. It's who they are.
The grandparent comment
Is pure fantasy. Software projects are dictatorships of those willing to put in the work, not meritocracies. There is nothing immoral or wrong about this but we should be realists. The entire software ecosystem is dominated by oft shitty good enough solutions which people poured enough work into to solve problems well enough.
Anybody can have a vision, but it's the work that matters. I'll be worried when they become a player.
Most linux distros are slight variations on the best components available. Yes, one can put in resources, do a great job and now everyone switches to the fruits of their labor. No, it does nothing to stop another player from one-upping them and taking the lead with their next best good enough. In political terms, dictatorships are incompatible with voting with one's feet.
Did you entirely miss the part where IBM bought Red Hat
It was hard to miss, I was working there. It doesn't mean that much as you're assuming.