We, as nerds, are all one people. Brought together by our shared hatred of Regular Expressions.
We, as nerds, are all one people. Brought together by our shared hatred of Regular Expressions.
One year after the explosive IBM & Red Hat leaks, we look at each lawsuit... and the people involved in the racist practices at the Big Tech, Linux Giant.
The IBM / Red Hat Leaks: What we've learned so far:
https://lunduke.locals.com/post/5515346/the-ibm-red-hat-leaks-what-weve-learned-so-far
Blu-Ray is dead - everyone from Sony to LG is ceasing production -- with no physical media alternative to take its place.
For buying movies we went from VHS to DVD to Blu-Ray. For music we went from vinyl to cassette tapes to CD. For computer data storage we've had a million options for buying software on physical media (from various floppies to CDs and Blu-Ray discs).
Now we have... nothing.
Plus: Skyrocketing revenue, and no mention of "Diversity" or "Climate Change". Which, for The Linux Foundation, is quite weird.
The article:
https://lunduke.locals.com/post/6453427/linux-foundation-drops-linux-spending-to-historic-lows-in-2024
Ads are filling the entirety of the Web -- websites, podcasts, YouTube videos, etc. -- at an increasing rate. Prices for those ad placements are plummeting. Consumers are desperate to use ad-blockers to make the web palatable. Google (and others) are desperate to break and block ad-blockers. All of which results in... more ads and lower pay for creators.
It's a fascinatingly annoying cycle. And there's only one viable way out of it.
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Those in power with openSUSE make it clear they will not allow me anywhere near anything related to the openSUSE project. Ever. For any reason.
Well, that settles that, then! Guess I won't be contributing to openSUSE! 🤣
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If you look carefully at the picture in this news article, you can see that this bakery is still using a C64. My faith in humanity has been temporarily restored. https://www.wishtv.com/news/brownsburgs-hilligoss-bakery-marks-sweet-milestone/
The Mac Mini M4 Has Arrived
I have added the Mac Mini M4 to my home lab. I did some “dad math” and rearranged some costs such that it has a zero “family budget” impact. Woohoo!
I’ve never ever bought a base model Apple anything. It’s just that his computer is quite the deal now that it starts with 16gig ram. The 256gig drive will be the biggest pain point. But I have a Thunderbolt 4.0 external nvme coming. And there ARE ways to upgrade the internal drive now.
Use case - running local AI models.
On the base model? Yes.
I thought long and hard about the M4 Pro which could be a significant upgrade including thunderbolt 5 and more cpu and gpu cores. But if I was really building an AI powerhouse, I’d need to have a lot more ram, and that moves this out of the “home budget”. And NVIDIA owns the “serious AI machine” market and you’d want at least two of those high end gpu’s. So…I’ll use cloud services for the truly high end stuff for now. And I don’t ...
The Linux Foundation, earlier today, released their 2024 Annual Report. And, hoo boy, is it a doozy.
The short-short version: Massive increase in revenue (now close to $300 Million Dollars), with spending on Linux continuing to drop to historically low numbers.
And, in a dramatic departure from previous years, almost zero discussion of politically charged topics (such as Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Climate Change).
Let's start with the numbers.
First and foremost, it's worth pointing out that -- as of this year -- revenue for The Linux Foundation is closing in on 1/3rd of a Billion Dollars annually.
While The Linux Foundation may technically be a "non profit", those numbers would make many "for profit" corporations blush. Massive, steady income growth.
Where does the largest bulk of that revenue come from? Corporate "membership" dues, naturally. To the tune of over $125 Million USD.
With the highest paying corporate members being the likes of Meta, Microsoft, Oracle, Samsun, Red Hat (IBM), Huawei, and the like.
These corporations pay a premium to have a seat on The Linux Foundation Board of Directors. Which, it should be pointed out, consists of over 70% GPL violators.
One of the peculiar facts about The Linux Foundation is how surprisingly little of their income they spend on... Linux.
And, perhaps even more peculiar still, is the fact that the percentage of their revenue spent on Linux appears to decrease every year.
In 2021, The Linux Foundation spent roughly 3.4% of their revenue on their namesake project. As of 2024... that number appears to be down to 2.3%.
And this isn't simply a matter of overall percentages going down (while revenue rises). Spending on the Linux Kernel is down, year on year, in terms of actual US Dollars as well.
In fact, the amount currently spent on "Corporate Operations" for The Linux Foundation... is roughly 3 times that of what is spent on the Linux kernel.
As time goes on -- and spending numbers become finalized -- we are gaining an increasingly clear picture of the spending priorities of The Linux Foundation.
In the previous annual report (2023), "Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion" were a critical component.
In the 2023 report:
This year, in the 2024 report, the words "Diversity", "Equity", and "Inclusion" are never used. Not once.
Well. Once. Barely. On the second to the last page, in a footnote, you find the following statement: "75% of [travel] funding went to diverse community members." That, right there is the sum total of discussion around "diversity".
In fact, the "LGBT" acronym is also never used in the most recent report (another significant change from previous years).
This appears to mark a dramatic shift, away from "DEI", for The Linux Foundation. At least in terms of messaging.
The 2024 Linux Foundation annual report also contains absolutely no reference to "Climate Change".
"Wait, why would the Linux Foundation be talking about Climate Change," you ask?
Well. Last year, in 2023, the annual report was filled to the brim with Climate Change -- with 37 distinct references and over 10 pages focused on the topic.
That focus appears to no longer be a priority for The Linux Foundation.
One of the most prominent new topics of the 2024 report was "the right to fork". Something previous annual reports stayed clear of almost entirely.
“The right to fork open source code is at the core of open source licensing. All open source licenses grant the right to fork their code, that is to start a new development effort using an existing code as its base. Thus, code forking represents the single greatest tool available for guaranteeing sustainability in open source software.
In addition to bolstering program sustainability, code forking directly affects the governance of open source initiatives. Forking, and even the mere possibility of forking code, affects the governance and sustainability of open source initiatives on three distinct levels: software, community, and ecosystem.”
This is particularly interesting, given the stated intention for Russia to hard-fork Linux over the recent ban of Russian programmers from being official kernel maintainers.
A few other facts which are worth noting from the 2024 Annual Report:
What does all of this mean? Will the decreasing spending on Linux continue into 2025? Will the decreased emphasis on messaging around "DEI" issues translate to real-world changes? Will the "right to fork" emphasis continue if Russia follows through with their proposed Linux kernel fork?
Lots of questions. Lots and lots of them.
Looking for a particular video or article? Below you will find a sampling of Lunduke Journal content, all of which is free for the world to enjoy (subscribers and non-subscribers alike).
The following list is nowhere near complete -- and is being added to constantly. If you're looking for a searchable, sortable index of every article and show, you'll want to go to The Lunduke Journal Content Archive at Lunduke.Locals.com/content (which is an added benefit for Lunduke Journal subscribers).
(You won't find these many of these stories covered anywhere else.)
Ladybird Web Browser becomes a non-profit with $1 Million from GitHub Founder
Don't wave the LGBT flag? SUSE & openSUSE says you are "Rotten Flesh"
Elementary OS & Asahi Linux declare war on "Right Wing" nerds
NixOS commits a "purge" of "Nazi" contributors, forces abdication of founder
Ladybird Web Browser Developer Attacked by Unhinged, Dishonest Activists
Microsoft Write - The First Word Processor for Windows (ported to Mac... and Atari ST)
Ground Zero for the Personal Computer Industry: 1977's West Coast Computer Faire
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