Bonum Certa Men Certa

Stopping GNU/Linux (and the GPL) May Be Mission Impossible

GNU/Linux up to ~10% in India as PC sales plunge

India’s PC shipments drop below 5 million for the first time in four quarters: report

Summary: Low-budget and low-energy computing will favour GNU/Linux; Microsoft Windows is far too bloated to remain competitive as prices of energy soar and supply chain woes translate into low sales

TWENTY hours ago we mentioned how Vista 11 had gained only 2.61% market share in 15 months, according to one survey. To put things in perspective, 15 months after it arrived at the scene (summer) and after billions of dollars spent on "marketing" (fake articles), plus bundling/preinstalls on new PCs, the market share of Vista 11 is similar to that of GNU/Linux, not even counting ChromeOS. The world's dominant operating system is now Android and Linux is running inside it.



In Africa, Android is the dominant operating system in almost every country [1, 2]. And also in Africa, GNU/Linux has grown on the desktop/laptop this month (and in recent months). Android is the dominant platform there, but Windows is waning even in its form factor of 'choice' (it could simply not capture other markets).

GNU/Linux in Africa



Africa's significance here is that it illuminates the impact on poverty at a time when more and more country enter a crisis of poverty, which means no more $1000 laptops with the latest Vista or whatever Apple markets to insecure people with a new credit card.

"Africa's significance here is that it illuminates the impact on poverty at a time when more and more country enter a crisis of poverty, which means no more $1000 laptops with the latest Vista or whatever Apple markets to insecure people with a new credit card."It seems like a safe prediction that GNU/Linux will continue to grow and the Linux Foundation's role will be attacking the community while handing over GNU/Linux to monopolistic corporations.

Not many people noticed it, but the licence of the code connecting Linux to Rust is not GPL. This highlights some of the potential dangers of adding Rust to Linux. There are many such dangers. A reader recently suggested an article that might praise the benefits the GPLv2 and GPLv3 have provided and that they were adaptations to changing situations; now with the tsunami of Microsoft lobbyists the situation is moving yet again and GitHub is basically a massive attack on the GPL.

One associate noted that "[t]he GPL in and of itself is a clever hack of copyright law and has provided great benefit. Linus Torvalds himself has mentioned many times that very thing and once, right before he got abused, even stated in a video that it was his best decision ever to use the GPLv2."

Microsoft hates the GPL so much that its CEO publicly compared it to a cancer and went out of his way to lie about it, to demonise it, and to attack people who had come up with it. Entire companies were set up by Microsofters for the sole purpose of attacking the GPL.

So what is the GPL? It's a legal 'hack' that ensures people don't turn Free software into proprietary software. They need to give back changes that are made and delivered.

GPL is a key thing. The media barely mentions it, but it is the cornerstone of the movement. Aside from the lawsuits, it's one of the reasons why GNU/Linux grew so popular so fast, whereas the BSDs remained smaller (in relative terms; BSD is also a success story).

"Entryism has long been on the cards."Right about now Microsoft is trying to use secure [sic] boot as a GPL evasion tool. It's already using it to prevent GNU/Linux from even booting. Microsoft is trying to hire the man who did this and his current employer wishes to be acquired by Microsoft. There should have been an antitrust complaint, but instead we got sold cheaply to the abuser. Around the same time Microsoft made a plan to use GitHub as an anti-GPL weapon (that was in 2014) and "UEFI / restricted boot is a means of license evasion / violation," an associate explains. You may modify your operating system, but then it might not boot on your computer. It's a bit like TiVoization, which GPLv3 sought to tackle.

Either way, expect Microsoft to play "hardball" and do anything it can to sabotage GNU/Linux, including bribing the Linux Foundation to lie to us like Jim Zemlin constantly does. Entryism has long been on the cards.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Linus Torvalds Blasts Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC) for Attempting to 'Protect' Linux
Like it 'protects' women
New Record for GNU/Linux in Australia (at Microsoft's Expense)
Windows is at an all-time low, GNU/Linux... all-time high
Fighting Over Whose Pockets Are Deeper (or Who Borrows More Money)
When processes favour those who are more wealthy (or more willing to go into infinite debt or steal money of other people) those processes match the attributes of lawfare rather than law
 
Doxing is Illegal in the UK (Even If You're Based in the US)
Somebody has just added my identity (name, mugshot etc.) to a "hitlist" site of a political nature, pandering to violent people
Misunderstood Weapons of Censorship
It's cruel world out there. One needs to be aware of these shady activities, including "censorship-as-a-service".
Google Confidently Wrong, Nowadays Defaming People Too
I can relate as people did this to me and to my wife
What Happens When Americans Are Out of Office (Away From Work) for a Week? Vista 11 "Share" Falls to Just 10%.
How's that for slow adoption?
2026 Will Have EPO Focus, People Will See What the EPO is Trying to Hide
We certainly hope people will be held accountable
EPO People Power - Part XVII - Drugged, Stoned, and Drunk at the Office During Working Hours (Campinos Friend and Propaganda Chief Has Long Done This)
It's a total disgrace that press all over Europe is still trying to cover this up!
Gemini Links 28/12/2025: Health Ordeals and Discontinued Pedals
Links for the day
Slop About "Linux" Came Only From One Slopfarm This Weekend
Another day has passed with no LLM slop found in our RSS feeds
Links 28/12/2025: 'Digital Detox' and Slop "Backlash Grew Massively in 2025"
Links for the day
Links 28/12/2025: "Mass Quitting Apple" and "Generative AI Industry is Fraudulent, Immoral and Dangerous"
Links for the day
Links 28/12/2025: Fascination, Holidays, and Mormonism
Links for the day
Microsoft's Weapon Against the Reality of XBox (the Console) Dying Seems to be LLM Slop
XBox is dead/dying
Raffles for the Immaterial: Unauthorised Bingo for Red Hat "Vouchers"
This is IBM and some slop images
Andy Farnell on Standing Up Against Technological Oppression
some portions from it
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, December 27, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, December 27, 2025
Once Again, GAFAM Deletes All Your Data, Only Corrects This After Millions of People Lead an Uproar Online ("Richard Stallman Warned Us About This")
No lessons learned, eh?
You Know Your Critics Are Jealous and Have Inferiority Complex When...
One day we'll write about all this in great depth
Starting a Book With a Flawed Premise or Weak Hypothesis
To me, Schneier is a sort of "RMS of sec"
Microsoft's Mass Layoffs (30,000+ in 2025) Not About "AI", Just Business Failure
"AI" is replacing... the old excuses for mass layoffs
"But Corruption is Everywhere"
"We'll always have Polio..."
EPO People Power - Part XVI - Berenguer Does Not Speak German, So What Did He Tell German Police That Busted Him?
based in Germany and does not speak the language
Challenges for EPO Insiders to Try to Tackle in 2026
Nothing will get solved as long as the circus that runs this show tries to keep the circus going
Days Without Slop About "Linux"
It's time to move on
Links 27/12/2025: Canada Post Strike Called Off, Debate About Europeans "Working Over Christmas"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/12/2025: Household Appliances and Flight Fright
Links for the day
Links 27/12/2025: US Cracking Down on Whistleblowers, Expanding Bombardment Campaigns Worldwide
Links for the day
Resuming EPO Coverage Today, Can António Campinos 'Survive' Cocainegate?
We said we'd continue in the weekend
Links 27/12/2025: More Attacks on Media (Meduza Co-founder Sentenced to Prison in Absentia), "What Owning Music Means To Me"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/12/2025: geminiprotocol.net Downtime and Capsular Gemlog Manager
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, December 26, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, December 26, 2025
Tossing Embarrassing News Under the Christmastime Bus
This isn't just some coincidence; those are conscious choices
Victim-Blaming in Debian
Verhelst previously did blame-shifting when Debian suicide clusters happened
IBM Cuts in Japan, Red Hat is Attached to a Sinking Ship
IBM, which controls Red Hat, is a rapidly shrinking company
Manchester United Dumped Microsoft Because Qualcomm Sort of Did
The Windows PCs were an utter failure
Free Software Foundation (FSF) Supported by Unconventional Digital Bartering Communities
But no strings attached
Geminispace: 5,000 Capsules in 2026
There are 4.8k now
Gemini Links 26/12/2025: Careful What You Eat and "My Secret Santa"
Links for the day
The Indigenous Community Versus Corporate AstroTurt and 'Cancel Culture'
Good people will recognise exactly what's happening here and respond to it tactfully
Richard Stallman: Epstein is a Serial Rapist. Bill Epsteingate: Epstein is a Friend.
Supporting the FSF (or Richard Stallman) is supporting those who asserted Epstein had serially raped women
The Paradox of GAFAM: Saying You Protect Women, Appointing Abusers of Women to Run the Company
older articles
Censored by FreeBSD Core Team Secretary, Reinstated After Talking About it in Public
FreeBSD misfiring a CoC?
Links 26/12/2025: Chatbot Toys Terrorising Children, US Undeclared "War on Terror" Unilaterally Extends to Nigeria During Holidays
Links for the day
Links 26/12/2025: French Postal Services Under Russian Attack, U.S. Cheetos Accuse People Who Obstruct Information Warfare by Russia of "Censorship"
Links for the day
Debian's Daniel Kahn Gillmor is Wrong, Signal is No "Gold Standard" (It's Also Promoted by Proponents of Back Doors)
I'm not too sure why Debian or the ACLU would wish to associate with this
Next Year Will be the Year of Quantum, Just Like 2020, 2015, 2010, 2005 and So On
"Quantum" is the future
The Silent Power of Coercion Over Speech
The important thing is optics
Kazakhstan Doesn't Need GAFAM Datacentres (Spy Hubs)
Suffice to say, as far as we can gather nothing came out from the empty (false) promises of GAFAM's "data centers in Kazakhstan"
So Simple That You Can Touch and Feel It
In light of recent experiences
Christmas Music Project: Back to When Music Was Music
now Canonical (or Ubuntu) says we should make available tens of gigabytes of disk space
Internet Relay Chat (IRC) Under Attack by Cross-Network Spam Floods
So far we've been spared (our network has not been targeted at all) [...] Let's hope the spam won't discourage the hundreds of thousands of people worldwide who still use IRC
An "AI-Infused" Windows
Microsoft Windows isn't becoming a worthless pile of garbage by accident
Microsoft Laid Off Over 30,000 People This Year, Coders Are "Too Expensive"
Go get some popcorn. Microsoft "slopware" is about to get real!
Critics Have Long Said Microsoft Produces "Slopware", Microsoft Wants to Prove Them Right
Slop instead of code is a step in the right direction?
The Top 8 Innovations of IBM in 2025
What innovations will come out from IBM in 2026?
And as the Year Turns...
The significance of new years isn't based on geology or astronomy or anything like that
Appliances Versus Computers
Replacing a computer inside an object of some kind or inside an appliance (which nowadays includes "modern" cars) isn't simple and isn't cheap
A Dark Side of Europe
They try hard to silence people who speak about these issues
Why People Love Techrights (and Also Loved "Boycott Novell")
I will continue to publish for many decades to come
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, December 25, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, December 25, 2025
Browsing Techrights With a GUI and 10 Megabytes of RAM Per Tab
Some people say it's not possible in 2025, maybe in part because they depend on very bloated software
A Tribute to Richard Stallman
It's about knowledge and sharing
Links 26/12/2025: Impermanence, Salt and Thermometer, Freetube
Links for the day