Technology

I genuenly dont understand why a glorified set of dotfiles have recived such an enormous amount of donations and publicity. Not a good set of dotfiles mind you, in fact it looks like subpar compared to the many superior Hyprland dotfiles. Whats even more absurd is that people are saying "this will get people to use Linux", yeah im sure this is what Linux needs another distro thats slightly different.

I understand why Framework would support Hyprland as it is warts and all because, I believe, it's one of the most famous/successful projects in its domain. But Omarchy? That shit is new and unproven, there are much better distros to support.

Fair Warning: Long rant ahead.

Great article, and it gets to the heart of something I've felt is becoming more and more prominent in the Linux and Open Source Community, and really any community. And it's something we simply can't ignore.

That is that you can't separate politics from life. It's everywhere. The author points out that Framework's mission is to encourage right to repair and responsible consumption by discouraging planned obsolescence.

While right to repair might be popular in both left and right wing circles, that is only because both sides want control over their devices and to distance themselves from Big Tech. But their views on regulation with regards to the environment and social equity/inclusion are as far apart as the general right left paradigm is as a whole.

To be blunt, you simply cannot have normal people work under the same tent as crypto fascists, transphobes, and general right wing grifters, no matter how significant their individual contributions might be.

I personally am tired of these sorts of controversies being brushed under the rug by tech influencers like BashBunni and Brodie Robertson who in their coverage of Omarchy did not broach this topic even just to say that there is a controversy at all. It's cowardice at best, and right wing apologism at worst.

Yes, there are particularly brilliant software engineers that are also assholes. And yeah, without those assholes, we wouldn't have the technologies we have today. The mistake is thinking that they are brilliant because they are assholes. Another mistake is thinking that holding onto one productive asshole is better than hanging onto the good will and contributions of many normal people that still provide worthwhile contributions.

To be very frank, fuck that. I refuse to believe in the false dichotomy that in order to create good software we have to put up with bigots. If anything, their attitudes end up holding themselves and their colleagues back. We shouldn't be asking ourselves, "How much less productive would that person have been if they had wasted time/energy on being socially conscious and empathetic." And instead have asked "How much more productive and better off we all would have been had they been a more empathetic and compassionate person." Because we're all worse off when a colleague is being a bigot, and it's in all of our interests to call it out when we see it.

If I had a better brain I'd be writing like Arya here. Loved the little references to DC++ and Fallout: New Vegas.

Also, it's sad it's only now I realize what kind of guy DHH is. I've seen him a few times talking with Primeagen, so that was the extent of my knowledge about him up until now. And sad that Brodie Robertson is helping sanewash him, although I think Brodie is pretty oblivious when it comes to politics.

If they want to support a Nazi, they clearly do not want my money. No problem.

They can have a big tent without making it a Nazi bar, but still choose to do so. They deserve the consequences of that decision until they kick the fascists out of their tent.

the worst part of framework's response is their "oh we partner with anybody we don't see politics"; which is literally just the "if there's a nazi at the table and 10 other people sitting there talking to him, you got a table with 11 nazis"

DHH is a massive piece of shit. I keep seeing his stupid name popping back up recently and I wish he would go the fuck away. No community needs his toxic views.

For fucks sake. A big tent is nice and all, but I am not entering any tent that has fucking fascists in it.

Very happy with my Framework 13. I hope I can keep recommending it to people without feeling it's at odds with my values.

It's not like other producers are realistically better, but I kinda expect Framework to be good.

Welp, time for me to find a different laptop to purchase. My old HP went out after nearly 10 years of use (thank you, Linux) due to motherboard failure (source: I work in tech support and laptop repair, plus I took it to Best Buy for a second opinion). I'm using a loaner laptop from a friend as an in-between, and while it's not a bad laptop itself, I would like to get something, well, new. Plus I'm due for a stipend from work, so I'll definitely have the money for it.

I've always heard that Framework is a good laptop, and have even recommended it to someone at work, but now I'm not so sure. As for me personally, I'll have to hunt down a new laptop to purchase, as I definitely don't want to support someone who follows the "if you have 10 people who sit with 1 Nazi" saying. I did get some recommendations from a Best Buy worker, but then they all come with Windows, and while I do have a guide on how to make Windows more privacy-friendly (and I can always just install WSL), I was looking forward to keeping Linux as my daily driver (as I do on my desktop).

Pretty good post about the situation. I would just add a few thing :

The harasement from the hyperland project got so bad they are banned from FreeDesktop.org and I've seen how many talented people gave up on working on the Linux ecosystem because of that.

Right to repair does not match well with right wing politics (TL;DR AuthRight need control and in lib-right absolute capitalism having reparable stuff is a surefire to kill your company ) but it's a murky and difficult subject so I understand why it's not mentioned.

Also of note, framework didn't advertise thoose project on fedi/mastodon so this seems like they had known from the start a backlash would occur.

Insted of banning abrasive people from forums, we could flag them and use AI as a filter on everything they say in that forum. In a similar vein of how Overwatch dealt with trolls in their ingame chat. If you say "too easy" your message is replaced with something less abrasive. Take away their power to be assholes for no reason. Make it a little badge "I'm an asshole".

Vaxry is still pretty ableist, I think he's just better at hiding it now. https://mastodon.social/@acidiclight/115348200226656321