Goodbye from a Linux community volunteer
Goodbye from a Linux community volunteer
Official statement regarding recent Greg' commit 6e90b675cf942e from Serge Semin
Hello Linux-kernel community,
I am sure you have already heard the news caused by the recent Greg' commit 6e90b675cf942e ("MAINTAINERS: Remove some entries due to various compliance requirements."). As you may have noticed the change concerned some of the Ru-related developers removal from the list of the official kernel maintainers, including me.
The community members rightly noted that the quite short commit log contained very vague terms with no explicit change justification. No matter how hard I tried to get more details about the reason, alas the senior maintainer I was discussing the matter with haven't given an explanation to what compliance requirements that was. I won't cite the exact emails text since it was a private messaging, but the key words are "sanctions", "sorry", "nothing I can do", "talk to your (company) lawyer"... I can't say for all the guys affected by the change, but my work for the community has been purely volunteer for more than a year now (and less than half of it had been payable before that). For that reason I have no any (company) lawyer to talk to, and honestly after the way the patch has been merged in I don't really want to now. Silently, behind everyone's back, bypassing the standard patch-review process, with no affected developers/subsystem notified - it's indeed the worse way to do what has been done. No gratitude, no credits to the developers for all these years of the devoted work for the community. No matter the reason of the situation but haven't we deserved more than that? Adding to the GREDITS file at least, no?..
I can't believe the kernel senior maintainers didn't consider that the patch wouldn't go unnoticed, and the situation might get out of control with unpredictable results for the community, if not straight away then in the middle or long term perspective. I am sure there have been plenty ways to solve the problem less harmfully, but they decided to take the easiest path. Alas what's done is done. A bifurcation point slightly initiated a year ago has just been fully implemented. The reason of the situation is obviously in the political ground which in this case surely shatters a basement the community has been built on in the first place. If so then God knows what might be next (who else might be sanctioned...), but the implemented move clearly sends a bad signal to the Linux community new comers, to the already working volunteers and hobbyists like me.
Thus even if it was still possible for me to send patches or perform some reviews, after what has been done my motivation to do that as a volunteer has simply vanished. (I might be doing a commercial upstreaming in future though). But before saying goodbye I'd like to express my gratitude to all the community members I have been lucky to work with during all these years.
Later in that thread:
Please accept all of our apologies for the way this was handled. A summary of the legal advice the kernel is operating under is
If your company is on the U.S. OFAC SDN lists, subject to an OFAC sanctions program, or owned/controlled by a company on the list, our ability to collaborate with you will be subject to restrictions, and you cannot be in the MAINTAINERS file.
Anyone who wishes to can query the list here: https://sanctionssearch.ofac.treas.gov/
Honestly must be incredibly stressful managing a project like the Linux kernel. Governments constantly wanting changes made for their own purposes, companies leeching off the work of volunteers, neck beards losing their minds over some change they don't like.
I don't envy them at all. This sort of change was inevitability going to piss people off - it could have been handled better but I think it was going to be lose/lose no matter which way it was done.
Are they legally bound to follow any sanction list in their dealings? If so Linux foundation should consider move out of the US jurisdiction, because the santion load is just going to increase and more countries will be included.
If they are just doing this because of a political fad and partaking "the current thing" then they are just voluntarily digging their own and the linux foundation's grave.
All the responses from the Russian devs appear to skirt around the issue, the massive elephant in the room.
If I were removed due to sanctions against my country because of their invasion of another country, I wouldnât feel I had any right to complain.
If I were to complain, it would be about the actions of my country and the consequences due to that, rather than acting like itâs outrageous to be removed.
I understand making those complaints is complicated for a Russian, but giving backlash like this really does give the impression that they donât give a shit about, or even support, the invasion.
o7
đ
Mad at the wrong people. Putin is your enemy, dude.