Video download link | md5sum b02c1ae0c220f3f9ac2c852f65e11846 IBM Learns That Some People Do Use Older PCs Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0



Summary: IBM keeps engineering its own blunders (own goals); in the latest example of it, which is rather revealing, IBM considers suspending the misguided plan to abolish BIOS support or assigning the task to a new special interest group (SIG)

IBM's Fedora 'project' (formerly known as community, back when Red Hat was more tactfully running it) is going to learn the hard way that working against the community leads to backlash. Each such backlash erodes the project's brand/image and therefore puts off existing users or potential (future, prospective) adopters. Why does IBM fail to understand these very basic things? Can it not grasp what it bought?

Judging by weekly numbers that are shared in official Fedora sites, the project already struggles. Not much is left except IBM staff. And many are leaving (the company, not just the project). IBM's takeover has already done a lot of damage; does IBM's leadership even care? How many IBM managers even use the platform? It's hard to 'monetise' some platform if you constantly piss off not only its users but also its developers.

"Let's hope that strong pressure from users of GNU/Linux will compel IBM to move away from its planned obsolescence agenda."The latest backlash, which we too participated in, has led to this face-saving action. It's a "we need to talk" moment. IBM's Matthew Miller says: "It'll obviously be difficult to find a time where _everyone_ can participate, so this wouldn't be a deciding-things meeting, rather a "talking about possibilities and hopefully coming to more mutual understanding" meeting. And I would make sure there are good notes." Many of the replies there are from other IBM employees. IBM's Ben Cotton wrote about it in his blog some days ago.

They've still not apologised for (mis)using lawyers to silence a Fedora volunteer, who earned many badges from Fedora before getting treated like trash. Over the past few years IBM banished quite a few longtime volunteers. Some of them used to speak out against companies like NVIDIA (how "unprofessional"), but apparently only IBM staff is authorised to criticise companies. Miller et al enjoy selective enforcement. This sort of Hubris will, in due course, alienate contributors.

So anyway, IBM may be backtracking on its attack on BIOS. As our associate put it, "the attacks on the BIOS, Restricted Boot, TPM, and Pluton are all hammering the nails in the coffin of general-purpose computing. In Apple there are the M1 and M2 chips doing the same."

"If IBM is trying to piss off both corporations (many used and invested in CentOS) and people, then it's doing a spectacular job."Let's hope that strong pressure from users of GNU/Linux will compel IBM to move away from its planned obsolescence agenda. IBM pays the Linux Foundation for greenwashing campaigns, which are inherently incompatible with planned obsolescence. As someone in LXer put it 11 days ago: "We dropped Fedora because it's not as good as Tumbleweed. Anyway, do the work. Many of the advantages are grossly overstated btw (if not just plain misleading). Just stop it. You know? Fedora, creating landfill... for the good of the planet."

"This is a kid's joke after CentOS 8.x support ( new face of RH ) was aborted," said the following comment.

If IBM is trying to piss off both corporations (many used and invested in CentOS) and people, then it's doing a spectacular job.

IBM ought to hire someone (or someones) that can understand the Free software community and advise the managers accordingly. All these blunders contribute to bad karma. ⬆