The Chaos Theory

Dr. Roy Schestowitz

2021-05-09 12:13:03 UTC
Modified: 2021-05-09 12:18:48 UTC

CentOS users rushing to Rocky/Alma
Keep users running around in a panic until they settle on IBM subscriptions?

Summary: Making GNU/Linux less stable and less predictable isn't good for GNU/Linux users; but it certainly helps sell Red Hat support contracts and vexation inside the community weakens Red Hat's competitors

IN the context of mathematics, what we're dealing with is a high level of uncertainty or lack of predictability (animation shown to the right, having been 'stolen' from Wikipedia). IBM pioneered the FUD tactics, then to be adopted by Microsoft, the "love child" of IBM. They're still not done, they just make slight adaptations/refinements as their FUD tactics evolve somewhat... they're readjusting as they rally a mob of misled people.

Double compound pendulum Earlier this year (just before the cancel mob had a go at RMS yet again) we explained what IBM was doing to community-led distributions. Distro developers reach out and tell us about it. This morning I spoke to one distro developer who said "some have retracted their signature from the RMS open letter due to their revision of it [and] I am considering doing so as well..." (it has not been updated in 12 days now; last update 12 days ago).

"I used to love what IBM did for us, especially back in the days of the OOXML/ODF battles."As we explained numerous times before, IBM (et al) sought to destabilise the Free software community and it sort of backfired in a major way. Instead it destabilised IBM, which sees Red Hat engineers fleeing (IBM is anxious about people pointing that out). The brand of IBM is losing lustre. Developers no longer feel comfortable about Red Hat stuff, either. As one developer told us, regarding the Linux Foundation (LF) in particular: "IBM mostly gives money to LF so that they can try to buy their projects into LF initiatives [...] IBM shows up and tries to cram their [expletive] and it gets rebuffed because nobody wants it [...] so really, IBM is spending money and still losing [...] IBM ruining GNU/Linux with systemd and other [expletive] being a big one..."

I used to love what IBM did for us, especially back in the days of the OOXML/ODF battles. But the tide is turning when IBM starts laying off GNU/Linux developers and attacking/defaming the founder of the operating system. IBM isn't in good hands anymore (Palmisano was the end of that rosy era) and Red Hat is flailing by driving away its largest userbase (CentOS) or community of volunteers/contributors (Fedora). Who will be left to package stuff and report bugs? ⬆

Move fast and break things; systemd release every 8 weeks
Hurry up and break things

Microsoft Has Spent Months Preparing Lists of People to Cull in Massive Wave of Layoffs (Allegedly Start of July): There is some consensus that we're weeks away from mega-layoffs at Microsoft
Gemini Links 06/06/2026: "Competing" With LLMs and "Automation of Any Kind": Links for the day
IBM is "Making an Exit". Only the Executives Will Get Rich.: failure disguised as success
2026 is the Year of Blockchains, Says IBM's CEO a Decade Ago?: "falling upwards"
Most Coders Used to be Women, Not Men (and Men Who Dropped Out of College Now Plunder Everything They Can): "Ethics For Hackers"
25 Years With PalmOS: That my Palm PDA still works in 2026 (not in mint condition but close to that) says a lot about the "build quality" of gadgets 20+ years ago
Why We Dumped Online Shopping (Groceries): subsidies kept the "online" stuff artificially cheap
Microsoft Fell to All-Time Low in Monaco Last Month: So says statCounter anyway
Lawsuits That Don't Work: Not as expected anyway
SLAPP Censorship - Part 99 Out of 200: Graveley and Garrett Seem to Have Crashed Brett Wilson LLP (Worse Than Taking Russian Oligarchs as SLAPP Clients): a state of disarray
Links 06/06/2026: 'Linux' Foundation Openwashing Slop on Microsoft's Payroll, Ukraine Wants Permanent Ceasefire With Russia: Links for the day
50% of the 'Gains' Made by "Quantum" Hype Already Evaporated: "It was all hype about quantum nonsense. Heading back to reality now. Expect sub-$220 after earnings release next month."
Heap of Trash Online, Not Just the Fault of LLM Slop But Enabled by Slop: Google News has just promoted a pair of prolific slopfarms
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, June 05, 2026: IRC logs for Friday, June 05, 2026
Links 05/06/2026: Lawyers in Trouble for Citing Cases That Don't Exist (Slop Too Bad to Justify Costs; Even It It Did Work, It Would Still be Far Too Expensive): Links for the day
Gemini Links 05/06/2026: Bears in the Streets, WWII Revisionism, and Westworld: Links for the day
Microsoft's LinkedIn Called "Dying Platform" by One Who Worked There: The co-founder of LinkedIn has just stepped down too
GAFAM (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft) Layoffs Are Due to Surging Debt, or About 120 Billion Dollars Borrowed in One Year Alone: It's well above 150 billion dollars if one adds Oracle
After One Jeffrey Epstein Associate 'Leaves' Microsoft's Board Another Jeffrey Epstein Associate Steps Down, Workers Concerned About the Mass Layoffs: How many more loans can Microsoft receive? Those loans are becoming increasingly risky.
IBM Exploits Overambitious, Hungry Young Men to Help the "Great Quantum Hype Campaign" (Pumping the Stock Based on Deliberate Misinformation or Outright Disinformation): The boot-licking campaign is live...
What Will Likely Happen When the Slop Bubble Pops (and When It'll be Widely Accepted That It Popped): all the "most successful" slop companies are so deep in debt
The Register MS is Part of the Problem, It's Publishing "AI" SPAM Because it's Paid by Chinese Military-Connected Firms: Given that The Register MS is run by a Microsofter (since last summer), destruction seems inevitable
IBM's CEO Does Not Use GNU/Linux, So Why Did He Suggest Buying Red Hat Only to Lay Off Its Workers, Market Slop Instead of Linux, and Sack UNIX Professionals?: Shortly after IBM had bought Red Hat and there were mass layoffs we pointed out that Red Hat's CEO was not using GNU/Linux
If You're Not Focusing on Software Freedom, All You'll Get is Slopware and Buzzwords: If you're not focusing on attaining Software Freedom (and remember "Linux" is just a brand), then you're losing sight of the goals that actually matter
Red Hat/IBM: Microsoft is Our Partner of the Year: Red Hat is a really bad gravy
Gemini Links 05/06/2026: Enshittification of Institutes for Project Management, Codebases Contaminated With Slop, Personal Stories: Links for the day
Communicating With Freedom - Part II - Quibble Breathing New Life Into LibreJS: Notice how work on one thing led to thousands of lines of code added to a mostly dormant (but nevertheless important) project
Slop Has no ROI, an Economy Built on False Assumptions of Slop is Doomed: we're all going to suffer from this Ponzi scheme
Links 05/06/2026: More GAFAM Layoffs, Google Faces Regulatory Crackdown in UK Over Plagiarism in "AI" Clothing: Links for the day
Rumour That Layoffs at Microsoft Will Kick Off on July 1st, 2026 (Impacting 10,000 or More Workers): this is what the rumour mill or the word through the grapevine is
Mission:Libre, Which Teaches Young People Free Software Ideals, Needs Financial Backing: plea for assistance with Mission:Libre
The Slop Ponzi Scheme is a Problem and Threat to All of Us (Even Those Who Don't Invest in or Use Slop at All): This problem is systemic, not contained
"Blind Justice" Examines the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Turning a Blind Eye to Abuse by British Solicitors: We have some jaw-dropping examples of how the SRA does not do actual regulation - to the point where its staff does not actual work and does not look into any evidence at all!
7 Days From Now the FSF's Founder Gives a Talk in Bern, the FSF Has Just Advertised This: Meanwhile the FSF (or GNU) processes and uploads many recent talks by RMS
European Patent Office (EPO) Series: Down But Not Out – Costa's Comeback: he managed to secure a top-level EU position in June 2024
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, June 04, 2026: IRC logs for Thursday, June 04, 2026
Links 04/06/2026: Self-hosting Remotely and GemText Emphasis: Links for the day
Links 04/06/2026: Ukraine’s Daily Moment of Silence and Uber Lays off 23% of HR: Links for the day
SLAPP Censorship - Part 98 Out of 200: Microsoft Threatening Real Security Researcher With Criminal Investigation for Talking About Microsoft's Bug Doors/Back Doors: The crime should be the back doors (deliberate attack on every user's data protection), not talking about those back doors
Microsoft Would Get Away Even With Pedophilia: "Microsoft should never be above the law"
Journalists Should be Ashamed for Parroting False Claims From IBM Management About "Quantum Computing", Say IBM Insiders Who Work on "Quantum Computing": IBM is a buzzwords vendor. International Buzzwords Machines.
Free Software is Nourishment to Software Users, Unlike Proprietary Software: Quit treating "mere users" of software "like animals"
The "Peanut Gallery" of GAFAM Has Infiltrated Free Software Projects or Disrupts Free Software Communities: They contribute nearly nothing and do substantial damage; they're freeloaders who attack the most productive members of projects
Coding is Not a Quantity Game (It Never Was!): "less is more"
Exposing Corruption Using a Highly Resilient Platform: Growing levels of trust, based on our track record, help us attract whistleblowers
Mass Layoffs Expected at Microsoft in July 2026: They're preparing more "lists" of people
Reflection on EPO Leadership That Harbours Cocaine, IBM Leadership That Pumps-and-Dumps the Shares, and More: ManCity replaced Manuel Pellegrini with a more famous manager it didn't envision winning 20 titles in 10 years (it could only hope) [...] Team-building is something that "Pep" seemed to be good at, as was Jürgen Klopp
Pump and Dump by IBM Insider Traders: Nickle LaMoreaux, Gary Cohn, James Kavanaugh, Arvind Krishna, Robert Thomas, and Others: the shares are already collapsing
FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) Has Weakened If Not Ruined What's Left of Big Media: Many things that have existed for decades are now being rebranded as "AI"
SLAPP Censorship - Part 97 Out of 200: Garrett in Hiding (From the Simple Observable Fact He's Closely Connected to the Microsofter Who Strangles Women, Tells Women to Kill Themselves, and Worse): They use one another; they are coordinating this via the SLAPP industry in another continent
Links 04/06/2026: Microsoft Threatening Security Researcher for Naming Back Doors in BitLocker, "Demand is Booming for" Old Tech: Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/06/2026: "Word Vomit", Slop", and Moving to Gopher/Gemini: Links for the day
Rust Outsources its Financing (or Financial Control) to Microsoft: How long before the third "E"?
"Format Sovereignty" Can Only be Accomplished With LaTeX or OpenDocument Format (ODF) or Vendor-Neutral Standards for Editable Documents: Microsoft is, in effect, above the law
IBM's Shares Fell Nearly 13% in One Day (Including After Hours): its main product is false promises
The Cyber Show on the Importance of Software Freedom and Why GNU/Linux Could Not be Stopped: an excellent article
Drew DeVault Can Still Redeem His Reputation. Revisiting His Attacks (and Attack Site) on Richard Stallman Might be a Good Start.: DeVault has openly apologised (this past spring)
The Register MS is Publishing Paid SPAM; Some of It is Designed to Prop Up the "AI" Pyramid Scheme: The Register MS participates in scams
European Patent Office (EPO) Series: "Operation Influencer": Costa's political career was far from finished
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, June 03, 2026: IRC logs for Wednesday, June 03, 2026

The Chaos Theory

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