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Goodbye from a Linux community volunteer (lore.kernel.org)

submitted 1 month ago by 0x4E4F@infosec.pub to c/linux@lemmy.ml

86 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Official statement regarding recent Greg' commit 6e90b675cf942e from Serge Semin

Hello Linux-kernel community,

I am sure you have already heard the news caused by the recent Greg' commit 6e90b675cf942e ("MAINTAINERS: Remove some entries due to various compliance requirements."). As you may have noticed the change concerned some of the Ru-related developers removal from the list of the official kernel maintainers, including me.

The community members rightly noted that the quite short commit log contained very vague terms with no explicit change justification. No matter how hard I tried to get more details about the reason, alas the senior maintainer I was discussing the matter with haven't given an explanation to what compliance requirements that was. I won't cite the exact emails text since it was a private messaging, but the key words are "sanctions", "sorry", "nothing I can do", "talk to your (company) lawyer"... I can't say for all the guys affected by the change, but my work for the community has been purely volunteer for more than a year now (and less than half of it had been payable before that). For that reason I have no any (company) lawyer to talk to, and honestly after the way the patch has been merged in I don't really want to now. Silently, behind everyone's back, bypassing the standard patch-review process, with no affected developers/subsystem notified - it's indeed the worse way to do what has been done. No gratitude, no credits to the developers for all these years of the devoted work for the community. No matter the reason of the situation but haven't we deserved more than that? Adding to the GREDITS file at least, no?..

I can't believe the kernel senior maintainers didn't consider that the patch wouldn't go unnoticed, and the situation might get out of control with unpredictable results for the community, if not straight away then in the middle or long term perspective. I am sure there have been plenty ways to solve the problem less harmfully, but they decided to take the easiest path. Alas what's done is done. A bifurcation point slightly initiated a year ago has just been fully implemented. The reason of the situation is obviously in the political ground which in this case surely shatters a basement the community has been built on in the first place. If so then God knows what might be next (who else might be sanctioned...), but the implemented move clearly sends a bad signal to the Linux community new comers, to the already working volunteers and hobbyists like me.

Thus even if it was still possible for me to send patches or perform some reviews, after what has been done my motivation to do that as a volunteer has simply vanished. (I might be doing a commercial upstreaming in future though). But before saying goodbye I'd like to express my gratitude to all the community members I have been lucky to work with during all these years.

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[–] kbal@fedia.io 98 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Later in that thread:

Please accept all of our apologies for the way this was handled. A summary of the legal advice the kernel is operating under is

If your company is on the U.S. OFAC SDN lists, subject to an OFAC sanctions program, or owned/controlled by a company on the list, our ability to collaborate with you will be subject to restrictions, and you cannot be in the MAINTAINERS file.

Anyone who wishes to can query the list here: https://sanctionssearch.ofac.treas.gov/

[–] schizo@forum.uncomfortable.business 79 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Which is exactly what anyone who wasn't wanting to just snort some concentrated outrage knew was the case.

And you can argue as to if OFAC list should apply to things like this or not, but the problem is that the enforcement options for OFAC violations include 'stomp you into the ground until you're powder', most people are just going to comply.

[–] 0x4E4F@infosec.pub 27 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Also from that thread.

Again, we're really sorry it's come to this, but all of the Linux infrastructure and a lot of its maintainers are in the US and we can't ignore the requirements of US law. We are hoping that this action alone will be sufficient to satisfy the US Treasury department in charge of sanctions and we won't also have to remove any existing patches.

US law CAN'T apply on foreign ground, period. Nothing can. Just because they can bully their way around that, doesn't mean they are right.

And it should be only fair that Israeli maintainers be removed as well.

They should also rethink their infrastructure policy and whether they still want it on US soil.

This is all wishful thinking, I know, but this just goes to show you how they have absolutely no backbone whatsoever. As if anybody is gonna touch the Linux kernel and jeopardize the safety of millions of systems. We all know that is never going to happen, but they still bent over for the US... so typical... just goes to show you how little backbone everyone has, including Linus.

Oh, and don't get me started on the Russia/Finland history comment...

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 18 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (8 children)

Does everyone here just not understand how international sanctions work?

As someone with a STEM degree in a STEM field, I'm consistently bummed out by how clearly silo'd my colleagues' educations were. It is so plainly obvious as soon as you try to have a conversation with them about anything outside of their area of expertise.

And don't bother trying to correct or teach them anything, because in their minds, they're smarter than you, and you have nothing worthwhile to teach them.

This thread is full of software engineers with just no concept of how society functions, or even a basic understanding of the geopolitical context of any of this.

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[–] BCsven@lemmy.ca 7 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

If the company is in the USA they can restrict who you colloborate with. They also can control what you export as a oftware product under ITAR/EAR rules. It is why when some encryotion work had to be done the devs crossed the border into Canada to work on development, because under USA law encryption code is a controlled export product even if opensource

[–] 0x4E4F@infosec.pub 3 points 1 month ago (7 children)

Then why in the hell was the LF founded in the US? That is something that clearly needs explaining. For example, Sweden is a much better place to do these sorts of things, their software laws are very liberal.

Some of these things need to be rethought if you ask me, this is not something that should be left like this. If no one in the kernel, including Linus, doesn't see a serious problem with "we have to move people around to code", then most of these people are probably braindead... I'm sorry, but if it was me, once I found out I had to move devs around to code, I would have been "fuck this we're moving the foundation".

[–] kattfisk@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 month ago (6 children)

You might be surprised to learn that Sweden also has sanctions against Russia, together with the rest of the EU, Norway, Switzerland, Japan, Australia, South Korea and a bunch of other countries. Because this is not about the US being an ass, it's about Russia being an ass.

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[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Oh hey, a reasonable comment here that actually has a decent score... These comments are wild. But given the recent... I'll just say, conspicuously pro-Russian, turn this site seems to have taken in the run up to the election, it's not exactly a surprise.

[–] schizo@forum.uncomfortable.business 8 points 1 month ago

I'm shocked I didn't get downvoted to shit myself.

It's just that it was VERY clearly either sanctions or a NSL, since the Linux Foundation is in the US and the two things that result in a public entity like that making silent, un-explained changes are, well, sanctions and NSLs and you don't say shit because your lawyer told you not to.

I don't necessarily agree that tossing contributors off an open-source project is in the spirit of the OFAC list, but the problem almost certainly is that they're employed by some giant tech company in Russia.

And, in Russia, like in the US, and Israel, and China, and anywhere else you care to mention, tech companies are almost always involved in military supply chains, since shit don't work without computers at this point.

Which leads to a cycle of being unable to work with Weapons, Inc. and someone works for Weapons, Inc. so now that person can't be worked with either and so your choices are.... comply with the OFAC list, or take a stupid amount of legal risk up to and including angry people with guns showing up to talk to you.

We really don't know the whole story and immediately jumping to "Imperialists bad!" is how certain chunks of Lemmy roll these days.

I think they'd be much happier if they all moved to North Korea and helped achieve the goal of Juche by becoming dirt farmers.

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 40 points 1 month ago (4 children)

But folks who work for US companies building weapons for Israel are totes okay?

It's honestly fucking wild that an internationally developed open source project has to play by the US government's rules when the US government is out here helping commit genocide right the fuck now.

Like, look in the fucking mirror on this why don't you.

Maybe the better rule is that if you work for a company that produces weaponry for war you shouldn't be allowed to contribute, period.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 23 points 1 month ago (3 children)

You may be amazed to learn that there aren't many international sanctions against the USA at this time, but I imagine you could probably get into legal trouble for collaborating with Americans if you're in, I don't know, North Korea maybe.

[–] davel@lemmy.ml 26 points 1 month ago (2 children)

You may be amazed to learn that the reason there aren’t many international sanctions against the USA at this time is not because the USA is a beacon of peace, freedom, democracy, and national sovereignty. Because the US is very much not that.

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[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 15 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

US isn't helping fund a genocide in Israel or anything! /s

[–] kbal@fedia.io 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Address your complaints to the government of the USA. Or, if you have the right to do so, cast a vote in the upcoming election there to prevent it taking a big step in the opposite direction from a world in which it might consider anything like similar sanctions against Israel.

[–] davel@lemmy.ml 12 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

“Write a stern letter to a foreign government” and “Vote against ‘very probable 101% genocide’ and for ‘proven 100% genocide’” are some weak tea, and beside the point being made.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 8 points 1 month ago

Your particular complaints are better addressed to almighty God I suppose. So long as you don't blame linux kernel devs for them it's all the same to me.

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[–] 0x4E4F@infosec.pub 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Maybe the better rule is that if you work for a company that produces weaponry for war you shouldn't be allowed to contribute, period.

This is something I can actually get behind on.

But, you see, there is just one teeency weeency tiny problem with that. They spend trucks of cash on whatever they deem will give them what they want, including funding organizations that they profit from.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 points 1 month ago

But folks who work for US companies building weapons for Israel are totes okay?

Who here said this?

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[–] Omega_Jimes@lemmy.ca 51 points 1 month ago (2 children)

It sucks if well meaning people are caught up in this, but it also sucks if you're living in the aggressor state of an ongoing war.

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 34 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yeah must suck to live in Israel.

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[–] matcha_addict@lemy.lol 28 points 1 month ago (3 children)

So shouldn't this also include the US and the many countries (most of Western Europe, plus others) involved in coalitions bombing the middle east and elsewhere?

[–] Omega_Jimes@lemmy.ca 22 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yes, if the issue was a moral one. This issue, however, is a legal one.

[–] TheOubliette@lemmy.ml 10 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Then it isn't about living in an aggressor state, is it?

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[–] Wolf314159@startrek.website 16 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Whataboutism isn't a very convincing argument.

[–] 0x4E4F@infosec.pub 8 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It is if you're biased.

[–] Wolf314159@startrek.website 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I'm not biased and I'm not picking a side, but there is a lot of whataboutism is this thread and I stand by my stance that it is a weak argument and a logical fallacy.

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[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Yeah probably... But that's a separate discussion isn't it?

[–] MadhuGururajan@programming.dev 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

How is it a separate discussion?

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 points 1 month ago

Because this isn't a post about the results of sanctions against the US?

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[–] Matty_r@programming.dev 29 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Honestly must be incredibly stressful managing a project like the Linux kernel. Governments constantly wanting changes made for their own purposes, companies leeching off the work of volunteers, neck beards losing their minds over some change they don't like.

I don't envy them at all. This sort of change was inevitability going to piss people off - it could have been handled better but I think it was going to be lose/lose no matter which way it was done.

[–] princessnorah@lemmy.blahaj.zone 23 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I personally think this is a cop out. Obviously people would have been outraged either way, but personally my only issue is about how it was done. The whole point of the FOSS community is openness and transparency. The senior maintainers of arguably the most important FOSS project trying to operate secretively on something like this has shattered my trust in them, as well as many others.

[–] 0x4E4F@infosec.pub 11 points 1 month ago

The senior maintainers of arguably the most important FOSS project trying to operate secretively on something like this has shattered my trust in them, as well as many others.

Basically, my stand on this.

And that it was dismissed like it was "no big deal" by Linus and some of the other senior maintainers.

But seriously, Linus's comment regarding this was... just... I have no words... he basically put every Russian in the same basket, called them trolls and added a racist comment on top of that, I mean... yeah, I lost all respect for him. At least his previous fits were about code and only if someone fucked up something, this is completely different.

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[–] JackbyDev@programming.dev 3 points 1 month ago

neck beards losing their minds over some change they don't like.

Ughhh, it was so infuriating hearing that guy rant about how Rust was bad and was trying to take over at that conference. I felt so bad for the speaker.

[–] mariusafa@lemmy.sdf.org 23 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Wait linux community is removing maintainters because of their nationality???!!

[–] pound_heap@lemm.ee 30 points 1 month ago

Not nationality but alleged involvement with sanctioned organizations. There are plenty of Russian names on maintainers list remaining.

[–] li10@feddit.uk 19 points 1 month ago (2 children)

All the responses from the Russian devs appear to skirt around the issue, the massive elephant in the room.

If I were removed due to sanctions against my country because of their invasion of another country, I wouldn’t feel I had any right to complain.

If I were to complain, it would be about the actions of my country and the consequences due to that, rather than acting like it’s outrageous to be removed.

I understand making those complaints is complicated for a Russian, but giving backlash like this really does give the impression that they don’t give a shit about, or even support, the invasion.

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 52 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Are we going to remove Israel maintainers from the list since IDF soldiers are using Palestinians as human shields?

Oh, no, because US is okay with that genocide?

It's really more about how clearly fucking hypocritical it is.

[–] li10@feddit.uk 14 points 1 month ago (1 children)

So you think they’re against the invasion of Ukraine, and would like to see Israel hit with sanctions as well?

Because that wasn’t the impression I was getting.

I think we can all agree that what Russia and Israel are doing is horrific. Israel should be sanctioned as well, rather than letting Russia off…

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 19 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

That's literally what I suggested elsewhere here: If you work for ANY company in ANY country that produces weapons for war for ANY government, that they shouldn't be allowed to contribute.

Because that at the very least would be consistent.

[–] li10@feddit.uk 12 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Wouldn’t that stop nearly every country from being able to contribute?

Sounds like a convoluted way of saying to just let the Russians off, veiled as some over the top “consistency” argument.

Maybe let’s do that tho, and just start with Russia 😆

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 19 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

Way to purposefully misread it.

The whole issue is that the Russians work for companies with sanctions against them.

So, treat all companies involved in war the same way, and you'll never run into this hypocritical issue again.

There's plenty of companies (like Valve) who don't directly produce weapons of war or have contracts with their governments for war-services who contribute to Linux that could still do so, and plenty of individuals who don't work for military and military adjacent companies to contribute.

Acting like removing people who work at companies that contribute to wars will mean no one can contribute is obviously a grossly exaggerated misinterpretation.

[–] li10@feddit.uk 11 points 1 month ago (2 children)

That’s not completely unreasonable tbh, but I still think the current sanctions are fair if not perfect.

I didn’t purposely misread, this part was just a bit unclear:

If you work for ANY company in ANY country that produces weapons for war

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 11 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Looking at what you quoted, that's fair and can see how you misread it as such. I am sorry I said that it was purposeful.

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[–] schwar2ss@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 month ago

Google or Microsoft employees wouldn't be able to contribute, even if they're not working with any weapons manufacturer during their entire career there.

The idea is great in theory but isn't in feasible in rl.

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[–] basmati@lemmus.org 27 points 1 month ago (3 children)

There are no sanctions against these individuals. More importantly who gives a shit about what the US is whining about today or tomorrow, foss software is more important than whatever petty dispute the US egged on this time.

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[–] andyburke@fedia.io 7 points 1 month ago

byeeeeeeee

[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 month ago

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