SUSE Goes Aryan: You May Not Use the Germanic Brand Anymore (It's Monopolised by the Corporation)
Worse than grammar Nazis; we'll track reports about this in a dynamic (updated) page
JUST when you thought RHEL becoming proprietary was the worst it can get, with CentOS support withdrawn a lot earlier than promised, here come not the Nazi collaborators (IBM) but the Nuremberg company which "banned mentioning Jewish holidays":
On 7/15/24 10:43 AM, Knurpht-openSUSE wrote:
Sources I will and cannot reveal. What was told to me confidebntially stays with me until I;m told I can share it. Don't blame the messenger for the message.
I'm also not sure who your source is, but the information they have given you does not reflect the information that was last given to the board from SUSE. Who to make it clear are not forcing us to rebrand the project.
I think anyone focusing on whether or not SUSE is, will, or could "force" openSUSE to do anything is missing the whole point
SUSE is an organisation that enables openSUSE to do far more than SUSE needs openSUSE to do. SUSE actively provides resources to openSUSE above and beyond what SUSE clearly needs to improve their business.
This status quo is built upon good will. Good will isn't fostered by either party throwing around threats or making firm demands.
The fact is, SUSE have formally, calmly, and quite nicely, asked openSUSE to stop using the SUSE brand.
If we as a community fail to work productively with that request, then we will be choosing to decrease the good will between SUSE and openSUSE.
I would expect that choice would not lead to SUSE escalating matters to get their own way, I don't see that as the "SUSE way" of doing things. What I would imagine is an outcome that's would actually far worse - Apathy and a tendency to put priorities elsewhere.
A huge amount of what openSUSE excels at is facilitated by SUSE either giving openSUSE more than SUSE would otherwise need, or SUSE turning a blind eye and supporting it's employees when they give extra contributions to openSUSE during work time than the business would otherwise need.
Any decrease in good will between SUSE and openSUSE puts those sort of contributions at risk.
And sure, there are policies like "Factory first" that do directly foster direct engineering links between openSUSE and SUSE. But I do not think openSUSE should take them for granteded.
It's not like openSUSE is the only Project/Community that SUSE fosters around it's products. SUSE Manager has Uyuni, Rancher has Rancher. If openSUSE demonstrates it's not aligned with SUSE's interests, then I expect SUSE to focus its efforts on open source projects that are aligned. SUSE will adapt to protect it's business, and this Project will need to adjust to a reality of less good will from all levels of the SUSE hierarchy.
The same goes for the discussions regarding Governance. At oSC you had SUSE senior managers, budget holders, speak up, in public, saying that they felt this Project's governance has issues that need to be addressed. One of them has even come to this list and elaborated on that view.
SUSE doesn't want history to record that it was the big mean corporation that forced its community to do something. But just because things are being said nicely doesn't mean they should be ignored.
Infact..aren't we meant to be a community? Aren't we meant to respond positively when people ask us to do stuff nicely?
Ultimately, I believe that if openSUSE continues to travel in a direction that hinders the SUSE brand, or ignores the need to address it's governance issues, we need to be prepared for history recording that openSUSE drove itself to obsolescence by failing to listen to the needs of one of its largest stakeholders.
I'd rather we avoid such a fate and refocus this discussion. Like Andy's presentation implied when it says "We're all grown up..", let's act like adults, we've got stuff to do.
They say "[a]ny decrease in good will between SUSE and openSUSE puts those sort of contributions at risk."
They basically take away the identity of the project; they attack the very concept of an openSUSE and doom/relegate the project to obscurity. █
