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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

GNU/Linux Does Not Need Social Control Media to Succeed
When it comes to Social Control Media, Richard Stallman was right
SLAPP Censorship - Part 163 Out of 200: Attack on Computer Science and on Computer Security (or Associating Back Doors and Kill Switches With "Security")
Nowadays there are many who pretend to be security professionals
No Allure in Omarchy, the Political Hyenas Only Give it More Free Publicity
To me, Omarchy seems like a weak project because of the slop (an HR problem)
 
The Register MS Has Just Published Paid Spam That Says "AI" 19 Times
1.5 hours ago
Mainstream Media is Paid to Link "AI" Criticism/Boosting to Jeffrey Epstein Enablers, in Effect Showing How Corrupt This Media Became
Many readers will have noticed what was a paid-for PR campaign of a global scale
RSS is King: Why Having Subscribers or Followers in Sites You Neither Own Nor Control is Loss of Autonomy and Search is Mostly Slop (Plagiarising Sites, Not Linking to Them)
Because digital connections in third parties aren't assets; they endow another party with tremendous power over people (e.g. MElon getting to decide who can and cannot reach people or what messages to "dim down")
Claims of Tens of Thousands of 'Silent Layoffs' at IBM (and Red Hat)
Looking at recent activity in thelayoff.com, about 80% of the comments and posts are about PIPs
Links 27/08/2026: "Flock’s CEO Is Lying to Cops" and Microsoft's GitHub Actions Breaks Down Again (Too Many Layoffs, Loss of Knowledge)
Links for the day
Clownflare Sees GNU/Linux and ChromeOS at Over 13% in Bahamas
Narrowing down to desktops and laptops, and judging by Web requests that go through Clownflare, many people there use GNU/Linux or Google's 'bastardised' version of it (with spyware preloaded)
Richard Stallman Complains That Linux Gives a Bad Name to GNU and Asks for Feedback on What's Wrong with Systemd (and Wayland)
Maybe some people want to send him a detailed, polite explanation
Increasing Focus on Patent Injustices
We'll soon cover the EPO a lot more
There's No "Next XBox"
Nothing comes ahead except layoffs and price hikes
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, August 26, 2026
IRC logs for Wednesday, August 26, 2026
Gemini Links 27/08/2026: Conditioning, Lagrange 1.21, and Computer Games
Links for the day
Links 26/08/2026: Patent Troll InterDigital Utilises Software Patents in Unconstitutional Court, "WikiHow Launches Copyright Infringement Suit Against" LLM Plagiarism
Links for the day
The Register MS Has New Fake Article ("SPONSORED FEATURE") With "AI" 21 Times In It
The Register MS is one among many culprits
Gemini Links 26/08/2026: “Doomsday Clock”, Rwanda Genocide, and Boasting About Using LLMs Instead of Writing Code (Due to Employer's Pressure)
Links for the day
Twitter is Not an API or a Communication Site, It's a Really Bad Site That Forces You to be Enslaved by Its Algorithm (Amplifying Its Owner's Worldviews)
the crackdown on Nitter means we should all avoid accessing or linking to x.com (Twitter)
Don't Let Bastards and Haters Grind You Down
They say "jealousy is the sincerest form of flattery"
GNU/Linux Rose in Caribbean Islands
combined population is measured at 44,182,048
IBM's Quantum Computing Lies Explained Again by Sabine Hossenfelder
To become a CEO at IBM one must lie
Controlling Culture and Social Behaviour by Digital Locks
if you don't fully control the technology in your possession, then you're not using that technology, this technology covertly uses you
Goodbye, Dolly
This week we say "goodbye, Dolly."
Links 26/08/2026: Election Bribery (aka Vote-Buying) Deemed "OK" in the US, "Nitter is Shutting Down After a Cease and Desist Letter" by MElon
Links for the day
Analogue So Much Better and Faster
From what we can gather, the tram ticketing system does not use Windows; we never saw it crashing or rebooting (or showing some Windows logo) in decades, so we assume it runs some kind of Linux
Linux Today Dumped All Social Control Media Last December
Linux Today seems to have concluded that all Social Control Media is just a waste of time
Don't Say X.com is OK Because People Can Access It by Alternative Means
Can Mozilla please clarify who inside Mozilla greenlit a return to X.com?
The Reach of techrights.org Is Increasing
We are on the side of women victims
SLAPP Censorship - Part 162 Out of 200: An Outline of Events
An outline of events
Pushed to Live
We still have some other work - stuff related to the editing of pages - which is work in progress and has been subjected to testing for many months
GNU/Linux Measured at 10% in Germany, Based on Cloudflare
It's peaking late at night
Richard Stallman's GNU Project Began 42 Years Ago With GNU Emacs and More
GNU Project announced almost 43 years ago (next month it's the anniversary)
Fake Articles "Sponsored by HPE" Published in The Register MS
Selling proprietary products as 'alternatives' to other proprietary products
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, August 25, 2026
IRC logs for Tuesday, August 25, 2026
Gemini Links 26/08/2026: Journal Plans and Extending Finger Protocol
Links for the day
How Many Web Requests From "Linux"...
If one was to assert that "Linux == Android" or "Android == Linux" (it's not that simple), then "Linux" already accounts for about 30% of Web requests
An Explainer About Injunctions Done Wrong - Part I - Saving Money Where Money Cannot be Saved
Of course Garrett not being able to afford his own case is a key factor here
Links 25/08/2026: "U.S. Marines Cancel Drill With South Korea", "UK Prime Minister Burnham Arrives in Ukraine"
Links for the day
Not for the First Time This Week, Site Called "It's FOSS" is Promoting Software That is NOT FOSS (And It Knows It)
Is this an editorial choice? Advertising? What is it?
Gemini Links 25/08/2026: Geometry and FidoNet History, "Goodbye I2P and Yggdrasil, Welcome Telnet!"
Links for the day
Links 25/08/2026: Microsoft Salaries Leaked Again, "Oasis Photograph Sparks Copyright Lawsuit"
Links for the day
Microsoft Trots Out Its Propaganda Agent Preston Gralla to Make It Sound Like Microsoft Breaks Up With China (Reality: Microsoft Got Dumped by China)
This discredits any publisher that plays along
GNU/Linux Did Not Start in 1991 and America Wasn't Discovered by Europeans
it'll be 43 next month
SLAPP Censorship - Part 161 Out of 200: Low Standards in Defamation Cases Just Muddy the Waters and Distract From Legitimate Cases
The judge at the trial said that Garrett's case was a waste of the court's money
Rolling Out Some Changes Soon
To the regular reader no change will be seen
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, August 24, 2026
IRC logs for Monday, August 24, 2026
Gemini Links 25/08/2026: Separated by Plexiglass, Low-Tech Information Networks, Jörg Rippel Comes to Geminispace
Links for the day