The GNOME team has censored -- and deleted the account -- of the maintainer of Manjaro Linux GNOME Edition.
Why would GNOME take such a drastic action for a person so important to the packaging and distribution of GNOME software?
Because that Manjaro Linux GNOME Edition maintainer... dared to post a link to an article published by The Lunduke Journal.
How to Get Banned from GNOME in 1 Easy Step
On July 21st, The Lunduke Journal published an article entitled "GNOME Ousts Elected Board Member in Secret... and Tells Nobody for 2 Months" -- covering the expulsion and banning of GNOME Board Member, Sonny Piers.
That article was then posted by Mark Wagie -- a member of the Manjaro Linux Core Team, and maintainer of the Manjaro GNOME Edition -- to a GNOME forum post, relevant to the topic.
Within roughly 1 hour, that post was flagged and hidden...
Shortly thereafter, the post was deleted entirely... as was Mark Wagie's account.
That's right. GNOME deleted the account of a Manjaro Team Core Member, and a GNOME package maintainer. All because he posted a link to an article that had the name "Lunduke" on it.
From Mark Wagie:
"Today, I dared sharing your article on the GNOME Discourse forum in the Updates to the GNOME Foundation Board of Directors Roster topic. It didn't take long before my reply was flagged as spam and hidden. My account was also deleted with no communication whatsoever. I was able to take screenshots before my account was deleted.
A fellow Manjaro forum user told me he messaged the GNOME Discourse Moderators and 'questioned the wisdom of banning the Manjaro GNOME maintainer from their forums.'"
This is, without question, incredibly peculiar. Banning a prominent contributor? All because he posted a link to an article relevant to a topic being discussed?
An article, I might add, that nobody has objected to based on the facts.
Is the leadership of GNOME so afraid of the truth of their actions being exposed, that they resort to banning anyone who simply links to articles about GNOME?
Or, perhaps, is the GNOME leadership filled with so much hatred and fear for all things "Lunduke" that they are willing to cut off their own nose to spite their face?
He Who Shall Not Be Named
Here's something truly crazy: This isn't the only instance of people being censored (and banned) from portions of the GNOME project for uttering the name "Lunduke"... this week. This is simply the most ridiculous example.
While it's true that the GNOME Foundation operates with a high level of secrecy -- often ignoring members of the press entirely -- they appear to reserve the bulk of their animosity for anyone who dares to mention articles or shows from The Lunduke Journal.
And they are not alone.
Leadership throughout the Big Tech and Open Source world have hard "Do not mention Lunduke" policies -- with some within the Open Source industry regularly screaming, bullying, and threatening anyone who dares to link to The Lunduke Journal.
One prominent Linux distribution even went so far as to add automatic censorship to their forum -- which instantly changed the word "Lunduke" to "violates forum rules".
Likewise, members of the Fedora (Red Hat) Linux Marketing Team speak openly about the need for hard censoring anything related to "Lunduke". (The Fedora Marketing Team also likes to call Jewish men "Nazis", apparently.)
The fact is... they fear the word "Lunduke".
Why? Because, when you do shady things, the truth makes you look bad. Wikipedia, Red Hat, The Linux Foundation, Google, Microsoft, and, yes, even GNOME (and so many others). They fear the truth.
The Lunduke Journal reports the truth.
All of which has resulted in "Lunduke" becoming the Big Tech and Open Source equivalent of "Voldemort" or "Beeltejuice". Should that name be uttered a little too loudly -- or, perhaps, three times in a row -- Lunduke will appear and wreak havoc.
And, you know what?
I'm ok with that.
Because here's a fun secret about being "He Who Shall Not Be Named"...
Everyone instantly knows exactly who you are talking about.
