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Red Hat vs Hyprland: Silencing political "undesirables"
Beneath the drama: The abuse of corporate power, extremist politics, bullying, & censorship of "wrongthink".
April 14, 2024
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The Open Source world is no stranger to drama.  Heck, if it's a day that ends in "Ay!", there's likely some random, usually overblown, drama happening in one Open Source organization or another.

But, sometimes, within that drama, there exists a bigger story.

Such is the case with "Red Hat vs Hyprland".

Within this drama there lies a tale of extremist poltiics, abuse of corporate power, and silencing of political "undesirables".  The things we learn here -- burried beneath the layers of drama -- are deeply disturbing, with significant ramifications for the entire Open Source industry.

Cutting through the noise

As with all drama, there's a lot of finger pointing.  And... noise.  So much noise.  Let's cut through all of that and get right to the facts.

The basic facts of this event:

  1. The core developer behind Hyprland (a tiling Linux window manager which has gained significant traction), a man who goes by the name "Vaxry", has been banned from any involvement in the Freedesktop project (an umbrella project covering Xorg, Wayland, and many other core Linux Desktop projects).
  2. This ban means that Vaxry will not be allowed to report bugs or submit code patches to Freedesktop projects -- often directly relevant to his own work on the Hyprland window manager.
  3. The ban (affecting Freedesktop) was enacted by a Red Hat representative (using a RedHat.com email address), based on a perceived 2 year old "Code of Conduct Violation" on a Hyprland chat server.
  4. Red Hat, Freedesktop, and Hyprland are all separate organizations.

As with any drama, there's a great deal of other information out there -- along with frenzied onlookers yelling about it from the sidelines -- but those are the core actions and facts.

The key takeaway: A representative from Red Hat was using corporate power to force a person out of other (read: non-Red Hat) organizations.  For reasons not related to Red Hat.  Nor related to the organization the person was being banned from.

In essence, Red Hat flexing it's muscle -- bending large portions of the Open Source world to do it's bidding.

By itself, that's bad enough.  But it gets worse.  Much worse.

What was the "violation"?

In order to understand how truly disturbing this issue is, we need to know a few additional details.  Starting with the initial "Code of Conduct Violation".

Back in 2022 -- yes, two years ago -- on the Discord chat server for the Hyprland window manager project, a man who identified as "Trans" listed his preferred prouns as "she/her".

A moderator on that Hyprland chat server changed that "Trans" person's pronouns to list as "who/cares".

Screenshot of the "Code of Conduct Violation".

Flash forward to 2024, and this "who/cares" action comes to the attention of another man who identifies as "Trans".  An employee of Red Hat named Lyude Paul.

To give you an idea of the motivations of the actions which follow: Lyude Paul has a publicly stated goal of "bullying" anyone who does not adequately show respect to "Trans" issues, as shown in his social media posts.

Source: Lyude Paul's Mastodon account.

Lyude Paul also promotes the idea that "right-wing people are not welcomed" in organizations.

Source: Lyude Paul's Mastodon account.

As Lyude Paul has a stated objective of "bullying" people -- making sure they are "not welcomed" -- if they do not profess the correct political ideals (or do not support "Trans" activism in the proper way)... it is not entirely surprising that this gentleman would use his position at Red Hat to ban those he disagrees with.

And that is exactly what happened.

Source: Lyude Paul's official email from RedHat.com.

Lyude Paul -- using his Red Hat email address -- informed Vaxry (the lead developer of Hyprland -- the project where the "who/cares" chat server incident occurred) that he was now banned from the entirety of the Freedesktop project and organization.

An important note: When a person sends an email from their corporate email account, they are acting on behalf of the corporation.  That is a hard and fast rule that has been in place since... well... forever.  Likewise Red Hat has not distanced itself from these actions in the least.

You can read the full emails, from Lyude Paul / Red Hat, as published by Vaxry.

The Red Hat Problem

This is an example of Red Hat, a corporation with a wild history of discrimination and censorship, using their corporate power (and strength within the Linux and Open Source world) to bully and silence those they politically disagree with.

Red Hat could condemn these actions (which were done in Red Hat's name) by their employee.  They have not done so.

None of this should be terribly surprising, considering what we already know about the IBM subsidiary.  They have a history of taking extreme political stances... and they actively discriminate against employees who deviate from their allowed, always extremely politically Leftist, ideals.

Considering Red Hat's historical stances and actions, it is no surprise that an employee of Red Hat would be able to use the corporate power of Red Hat to bully others who possessed the wrong ideas (as was the publicly stated objective of Lyude Paul).

A singular bit of drama... and a trend.

This particular incident has elicited strong reactions -- and has grabbed the attention of many across the Linux and Open Source industry.  Lots of drama.  Lots of opportunities to quote people who are making big, outlandish statements.

And most of that drama is little more than distracting fluff.

But the core -- the facts -- are truly disturbing.  And, once again, Red Hat finds itself at the center of another story where people are being discriminated against.

A few closing thoughts.

  • If this sort of bullying, censorship, and blacklisting of those with the "wrong politics" is allowed to continue... it will get worse.
  • Lyude Paul is guilty of far more extreme "Code of Conduct" violations than Vaxry -- as is shown in the screenshots above.  Yet Lyude Paul has not been banned, censored, or punished in any way by Red Hat or Freedesktop.
  • It would appear fairly obvious that the "Code of Conduct", at least in this case, is being used as a weapon to selectively harm specific individuals.
  • Considering Red Hat / IBM's history and dedication to discriminating against specific groups, it seems a fair assumption that these actions are not only allowed but encouraged by corporate leadership.  Should that not be the case, The Lunduke Journal encourages Red Hat and IBM to make a statement regarding it.  If such a statement is made, The Lunduke Journal will publish it in full.
  • Will Open Source organizations -- such as Freedesktop -- allow these sorts of discriminatory actions to continue?
  • Should Freedesktop, and others, continue allowing this type of discrimination... what result will that have on existing Open Source projects and users of those projects?

The Lunduke Journal has reached out to representatives from IBM and Red Hat for comment.  As of the time of publication The Lunduke Journal has received no response.

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The United States Court of Appeals (Second Circuit) just issued a ruling against the Internet Archive (Archive.org) -- rejecting their appeal, and upholding a previous ruling against them in the Hachette vs Internet Archive legal battle.

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Hachette v. Internet Archive: The Short, Short Version

 

To make sure everyone is up to speed, here is the short, short version of this legal battle.

For many years, the Internet Archive has been creating digital copies of physical books (by scanning them) -- then allowing people to "borrow" those digital versions from Archive.org (in theory limiting the total digital books being "lent out" to the count of the physical books in the Archive's possession).

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The Strange Appeal of The Internet Archive

 

On April 19th of 2024, the Internet Archive filed their final brief in their attempt to appeal this ruling against them.

In that ruling, one of the Internet Archive's core arguments was that it cost the Internet Archive a lot of money to make so many digital copies of books without permission... so, therefore, the Internet Archive should be allowed to do it.

That is neither a joke nor an exaggeration.  It sounds weird, because it is weird.

The Internet Archive truly attempted to make the case that spending a lot of money committing a crime... should make that crime legal.  (Could you imagine the mafia making that case?  Wild.)

You can read the full analysis, by The Lunduke Journal, of the appeal (including the appeal itself) for yourself for more details.

The reality is... there was never any chance that the Internet Archive's attempted appeal was going to be successful.  Their defensive arguments were highly illogical (bordering on flights of fancy), and brought nothing new or noteworthy to the case.  This was all painfully obvious.

 

The Lost Appeal

 

On Wednesday, September 4th, 2024, the opinion was handed down from the United States Court of Appeals.

While the full ruling is roughly 64 pages long, this single paragraph -- from the second page -- summarizes things quite well:

 

"This appeal presents the following question: Is it “fair use” for a nonprofit organization to scan copyright-protected print books in their entirety, and distribute those digital copies online, in full, for free, subject to a one-to-one owned-to-loaned ratio between its print copies and the digital copies it makes available at any given time, all without authorization from the copyright-holding publishers or authors? Applying the relevant provisions of the Copyright Act as well as binding Supreme Court and Second Circuit precedent, we conclude the answer is no. We therefore AFFIRM."

 

To call out the truly important parts:

"Question: Is it 'fair use' ... to scan copyright-protected print books in their entirety, and distribute those digital copies online, in full, for free ... all without authorization from the copyright-holding publishers or authors? ... we conclude the answer is no."

You can read the entire 64 page ruling for yourself.  Heck.  You can even read it on Archive.org.  But that line, right there, sums it all up.

Naturally, the Internet Archive has issued a statement.  Albeit... a short one.

 

"We are disappointed in today’s opinion about the Internet Archive’s digital lending of books that are available electronically elsewhere. We are reviewing the court’s opinion and will continue to defend the rights of libraries to own, lend, and preserve books."

 

What Happens Now?

 

The Internet Archive gets sued by some of the biggest book publishers... and loses.

The Internet Archive appeals... and loses.

What happens next?  Well.  Unfortunately -- for both the Internet Archive, and its users -- the future looks rather bleak.

First and foremost: Has the Internet Archive made, and distributed, digital copies of work you own?  This ruling will certainly not hurt your case should you decide to take legal action against Archive.org.

And -- holy smokes -- the amount of copyrighted material on Archive.org is absolutely massive.

The Archive.org software repository alone contains millions of items.  With a very large number of them being copyrighted material, posted there without permission of the copyright owner.

Simply going by the numbers, here's how much material is available on Archive.org (roughly):

  • 832 Billion archived webpages.
  • 38 Million printed materials (magazines, books, etc.).
  • 2.6 Million pieces of software
  • 11.6 Million videos files.
  • 15 Million audio files.
  • 4.7 Million images.

How many of those items do you think are there without permission (or possibly even knowledge) of the owners or creators?

Every single one now has an increasingly strong case when looking at potential legal action.

And it's about to get even worse for the Internet Archive.

 

UMG Recordings v. Internet Archive

 

That's right, the book publishers weren't the only ones taking legal action against Archive.org. 

Universal Music Group and Sony have an ongoing lawsuit against the Internet Archive -- regarding the distribution of 2,749 audio recordings (with potential damages upwards of $412 Million USD).

Seriously.

 

"Plaintiffs bring this suit to address Defendants’ massive ongoing violation of Plaintiffs’ rights in protected pre-1972 sound recordings. As part of what Defendants have dubbed the “Great 78 Project,” Internet Archive, Blood, and GBLP have willfully reproduced thousands of Plaintiffs’ protected sound recordings without authorization by copying physical records into digital files. Internet Archive then willfully uploaded, distributed, and digitally transmitted those illegally copied sound recordings millions of times from Internet Archive’s website."

 

Sound familiar?  Digital copies.  No permission from the artists or publishers.  Free downloads for everyone.

Naturally, the Internet Archive attempted to have this suit dismissed... but their attempt was denied in May of 2024.  (Because if there's one constant in life... it's that the Internet Archive always loses in court.)  That case is going forward.

 

 

What happens if the Internet Archive loses this UMG / Sony case?  What happens if they are ordered to pay $412 Million in damages?

To put it simply: Archive.org doesn't have that kind of money.  They bring in roughly $20 Million (give or take) per year.  That type of legal liability would absolutely destroy the Internet Archive.

 

 

And, here's the thing, the Internet Archive is almost assuredly going to lose that lawsuit as well.

Regardless of what you, I, or anyone else thinks of the Internet Archive -- and, make no mistake, I use that service several times a week (and love it) -- the law here is incredibly clear and well tested.

The Internet Archive runs one of the largest (if not the largest) website of pirated and stolen digital material on the planet.  Sure, it may also provide extremely valuable (and often, very legal) services as well.. but that doesn't make those crimes go away.

With each legal defeat, the Internet Archive grows increasingly vulnerable to additional attacks.

Simply being logical about it... it seems highly likely that we'll see additional suits brought against the Internet Archive in the months ahead.  Books, music, TV shows, software... Archive.org contains a massive mountain of copyrighted material in all areas.  These are suits which the Internet Archive would be almost certain to lose.

With this reality looming, how long until Archive.org will be forced to shut down entirely?  That day is likely not far off... and a sad day it will be.

 

The Archive Had to Know This Was Coming

 

The truly sad part?  The leadership of the Internet Archive had to know exactly what they were doing.

Every step of the way, it was obvious that they were going to lock horns with publishers (and lose).

Heck, I told them.  Repeatedly.

But, even if The Lunduke Journal hadn't pointed this out... it was a brutally obvious certainty to anyone even mildly familiar with copyright law and the workings of Archive.org.

Which means: The Internet Archive knowingly put their entire service at risk (including the Wayback Machine, the massive archive or pre-copyright audio recordings, etc.) because they wanted to publish copyrighted material against the wishes of the authors or publishers.

Despite this, they continue to push a public perception campaign where they pretend that publishers and authors are burning their own books.  When the reality is... the books are still available a wide variety of ways.  Archive.org simply got in trouble for copying and distributing them without permission.

 

 

Something I find truly fascinating about all of this, is that The Lunduke Journal will -- as usual -- get yelled at (rather extensively) for this article.  For simply pointing out the current reality of copyright law and how the Internet Archive has, knowingly, violated it.

People love Archive.org.  Heck, I love Archive.org.

And people are allowing their love for that website to convince them that anyone being critical of it... must, necessarily, be bad and evil.  An enemy.

But it is not The Lunduke Journal who is putting The Internet Archive in danger of being shut down.

Neither is it Sony, Hachette, Random House, or HarperCollins who are putting The Internet Archive in danger.

No, sir.

The only one putting The Internet Archive in danger... is The Internet Archive.

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