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The Free Software Credibility Index

At some stage it was realised that an index is needed which tells people who to trust on Free software matters.

The scale has 6 notches. 0 means least credible; 5 means most credible.

Independent

Jeff Gould0
Rob Enderle0
Pamela Jones5
Matt Hartley3
David M Williams5
Beranger3
Ken Starks (Helios)5
Sam Varghese5
Michael Gartenberg0
Carla Schroder5
Thom Holwerda2
Nicholas Petreley5
Vichar Bhatt (E@zyVG)4
Roland Wolters (Liquidat)4
Bob Cringely (pseudonym)3
Mike Dailey0

Information Week

Information Week2
Alex Wolfe0
Paul McDougal1
Charles Babcock2
Serdar Yegulalp3
John Foley2

Analysts

Gartner Group1
IDC1
JupiterResearch0
Frost and Sullivan1
Forrester1
Yankee Group0
Burton Group1
451 Group4
Dennis Byron1
Katherine Egbert1

Linux.com/SourceForge

Bruce Byfield3
Robin Miller3
Tina Gasperson4
Lisa Hoover4
Joe Barr4
Mayank Sharma4

Jupitermedia

Brian Proffitt4
Amy Newman4

ZDNet

ZDNet News (including Australia, Asia, UK)2
Peter Judge4
Mary Jo Foley2
Adrian Kingsley-Hughes1
Dana Blankenhorn4
Ed Bott0
Paul Murphy (pseudonym)2
Marc Wagner0
George Ou0


Security Firms

Symantec3
Secunia1
McAfee0


Miscellaneous



Fox2
CNN1
BBC2
Heise4
Fortune2
David Kirkpatrick1
Tim Berners-Lee4
New York Times2
NBC0
PCWorld/IDG2
Paul Krill4
Shane O'Neill0
Savio Rodrigues2
Zach Urlocker3
InfoWorld2
LinuxWorld4
Timothy Prickett Morgan4
Gavin Clarke1
Kelly Fiveash1
Dan Goodin3
Maureen O'Gara0
MilkingTheGNU (Pierre)5
Caitlyn Martin4
Nick Farrell/Inquirer1
Charlie Demerjian3
Egan Orion4
Preston Gralla0
David Ramel1
Neil McAllister2
Mike Elgan2
Techworld2
Manek Dubash1
Glyn Moody5
Doc Searls4
Eric Lai2
ComputerWorld3
OStatic3
Techcrunch2
Erwin Oliva/Inquirer.net1
David Pearce1
M. Tim Jones (Emulex)5
Rodney Gedda4
Jim Finkle1
Dan Lyons1
Var Guy (JP)2
Penguin Pete3
Gregg Keizer2
Paula Rooney4
Tim Anderson1
Susan Linton5
Andy Updegrove5
The Register2
Ashlee Vance2
Andrew Orlowski1
Gordon Haff2
Matt Aslett5
Don Parris5
Ben Worthen0
Todd Weiss3
Jay Lyman4
Motley Fool1
Jim Zemlin3
Amanda McPherson3
Jonathan Corbet5
Danijel Orsolic5
Rick Lehrbaum (DeviceGuru/LinuxDevices)4
Henry Kingman (LinuxDevices)4
Don Marti5
Jeremy Allison5
Richard Stallman5
Bruce Perens5
John Fontana3
Falko Timme5
Oliver Meyer5
Michael Tiemann5

Paul Allen's C|Net

CNET2
Ina Fried1
Matt Asay3
Dave Rosenberg3
Martin LaMonica2
Stephen Shankland4


Ziff Davis

eWeek3
Steven Vaughan5
Joe Wilcox2
Jason Brooks3
Peter Galli2


2012 Update

Mixed List

Darryl K. Taft2
Zack Whittaker (formerly Microsoft UK)1
Matt Rosoff0
Lance Whitney1
Florian Müller0
Jack Wallen4
Jono Bacon4
Neil Richards5
Swapnil Bhartiya5
Mark Shuttleworth4
Linus Torvalds4
Michael Larabel4
Ted Tso3
Jon Gold0


Recent Techrights' Posts

Confluent Insiders: IBM Laid Off Over 800 at Confluent, Not Just 800
For the record, the layoffs at Confluent won't be over. After the bluewashing there will be "IBM RAs" impacting Confluent folks, aside from PIPs
Where and How to Spot LLM Slop
Many people correctly perceive LLMs as a site's downfall, a step towards the abyss
Links 25/03/2026: Nations Return to Russian Oil and Burning Wood
Links for the day
Gnome Foundation Inc is in Trouble
the agenda is set GAFAM and IBM rather than donors
 
Official New Figures Show That Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Sees Rise in Dishonesty Among Law Firms Forcibly Shut Down ('Euthanised' Due to Misconduct)
It's rather if in our little country as many as 16 law firms were found to be so dishonest that they needed to be shut down
Back to Normalcy
In our datacentre at least
IBM is "Increasing Its Temporary and Part-time Headcount" While Net Headcount Falls (Despite Buying Many Companies and Their Workforce)
Headcount is a rather superficial yardstick.
EPO Union Decides to Continue Industrial Actions, Next Strike in Four Days
The latest strike had the highest participation rate
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, March 25, 2026
IRC logs for Wednesday, March 25, 2026
Microsoft's "Silent Layoffs" in Slop Clothing
"AI-powered transformation" is just a euphemism for mass layoffs
Public Talk by Richard Stallman in Half a Day "at the Engineering and Architecture Campus of Cesena of the University of Bologna"
He'll probably attract a fairly large crowd
Gemini Links 26/03/2026: Buying a House, Stargazing, OFFLFIRSOCH 2026
Links for the day
Gemini Links 25/03/2026: Resisting Authoritarianism and Why Slop Needs to Go Away
Links for the day
Fedora Maintainer-ship Using Slop (Mistakes) Would Make Fedora Less Reliable
It won't produce reliable code or stable systems one can rely upon
IBM's "Legacy Employees" (Experienced Workers, IBM Management Dubs Them 'Dinobabies')
This notion of "legacy employees" seems like something overlapping with "expensive" (well paid) staff, even if not entirely equivalent
EPO's "Current Industrial Actions Are Likely to Intensify Further."
There is another strike in 5 days
This Morning The Register MS Published Slop Promotion With the Term "AI" 15 Times In It. The Register MS Was (As Usual) Paid to Do This
This is not a serious publisher
SLAPP Censorship - Part 23 Out of 200: We Were Right All Along (for 2 Years) About Third Party Funding and Willingness to 'Break the Bank' in Pursuit of "Revenge"
How much damage can a person do to oneself in pursuit of cover-up of legitimate technical concerns?
Links 25/03/2026: Airports Further Militarised, "Slopification and Its Discontents", Microsoft 'Open' 'Hey Hi' Shutting Things Down
Links for the day
Gemini Links 25/03/2026: Blogging Fright and Absolutely Useless 'Apps' Made by Slop Machines
Links for the day
Rise in Energy Prices Will Significantly Accelerate the Death of So-called "AI Companies"
It should be noted that fake news about Microsoft OpenAI doubling workforce (mere words, not actions) can serve as a nice distraction from the death of Sora due to divestment
It's Always a Question of Trust
There's a widespread stigma of lawyers being manipulative and chronically dishonest
Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Must More Carefully Investigate or Assess the Financial State of Law Firms in the UK
We'll cover this in depth in the future
GAFAM Mozilla Removes Theora Support, Now GNU Needs to Re-encode Videos
Mozilla used to mean something to Free software advocates
An Open Admission Profits Depend on Addiction
Proprietary software tends to be like this
IBM Americas President Ayman Antoun Comes to OpenText, Weeks Ahead the Mass Layoffs Begin
Is that what IBM will be good at?
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, March 24, 2026
IRC logs for Tuesday, March 24, 2026
SLAPP Censorship - Part 22 Out of 200: When You Complain People Impersonate You in IRC (But You Yourself Impersonate People in IRC and Lock Them Out of Their IRC Handles)
We'll cover this with direct evidence some time soon
Gemini Links 24/03/2026: Junk Drawer Time Capsule and Building Outside Alire
Links for the day
Not Much LLM Slop About "Linux" Lately, It Only Ever Comes From the Same Few Sites
As long as only few such sites use LLM slop we can skip and avoid them
Links 24/03/2026: "Epic Lays Off Over 1000 Employees" and US in Financial Trouble According to the Fed
Links for the day
The "Media" Does Not Only 'Miss' Mass Layoffs
"The Treasury just declared the U.S. insolvent. The media missed it"
The Empty Suits of IBM Managers (NIH or "Nothing Invented Here")
IBM's management adopted the business model of parasites
2012: 'Secure' (Microsoft-Controlled) Boot Has Not (Yet) Been Made Obligatory. 2026: systemd Has Not Implemented Age Verification
should we stop calling "nazi" everyone we don't agree with?
More Threats (Including Physical Threats) Against Us Are a Dumb Move
It's like a "hit list" (targets list) and I shall keep the police duly informed
New Example of Pentagon in "Feminist" Clothing Inside Fake News of Publishers Paid to Promote Outsourcing to US ("Clown Computing") and American Slop
Google now pays money to promote Google as a friend of women
Hating Techrights is a Career
but is it good for civil society?
Dr. Stallman’s Work Will Never be Considered 'Mainstream' Because He Rejects and Works Against the So-called 'Mainstream'
Try to be more like Stallman
The New Layoffs: 'Silent Layoffs', 'Secret Layoffs', 'Quiet Layoffs', 'Passive Layoffs' 'Stealth Layoffs', and Unannounced Layoffs Disguised as Return-to-Office (RTO Mandates)
The US needs to revisit and fix the WARN Act
EPO "Cocaine Communication Manager" - Part IX - Cocaine Addicts in Charge of the EPO Attacking Families of EPO Staff
Things like being high-profile and being a serious drug addict aren't opposites
What Feminism in Science Means (Codes of Conduct Don't Tackle the Real Issues)
Universality matters, more so in a project or community that's said to build the "universal operating system" (Debian)
SLAPP Censorship - Part 21 Out of 200: It's About Behaviour Online, Not How Much Money From Shadowy Third Parties Gets Spent on Lawyers and Two Barristers
75+ KG of legal papers, 2 cases, 2 barristers (one hiding in the metadata) and maybe two law firms (also hiding in the metadata) against two modest people in Manchester seems disproportionate and vindicative
Links 24/03/2026: "Airports on ICE" and "Have You Paid Your “Intuit Tax”?"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 24/03/2026: Slop Interview and Why Slop Makes Lousy Code
Links for the day
Richard Stallman to Give Public Talk This Thursday at the University of Bologna (Italy)
Hardly the first time he speaks in Bologna
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, March 23, 2026
IRC logs for Monday, March 23, 2026