Two years ago, Red Hat killed CentOS, a widely-used free version of their Enterprise Linux distribution.
The community of CentOS users, myself included, were labeled as 'freeloaders', using the work
of the almighty Red Hat corporation, without contributing anything back.
Don't mind all the open source developers, Linux kernel contributors, and software devs
who used CentOS for testing and building their software.
Also ignore the fact that Red Hat builds their product on top of Linux, which they didn't
build and don't own.
I almost wrote off Red Hat back then.
It felt like someone stuck a knife in my back.
This past week, Red Hat took that knife and twisted it hard, when they published this
blog post.
Let there be no mistake: this was meant to destroy the distributions the community built
to replace what Red Hat took away.
There were only two things that kept me around after Red Hat betrayed us the first time:
First, instead of attacking the community of open source users, many Red Hatters reached
out and asked, "How can we do better?"
It didn't heal the wound, but it meant something, knowing someone at Red Hat would at least
listen.
Second—and more importantly—Rocky and AlmaLinux stepped in.
They prevented a mass-exodus from the Red Hat ecosystem, giving developers like me a
stable target for my open source work.
But Rocky and Alma relied on Red Hat sharing their source code.
Here's how it used to work: Red Hat would grab a copy of Linux, add magic sauce that
makes it Red Hat Enterprise Linux, then release a new version of it.
Each time they did that, they would also update a public source code repository with all the
data required to build it from scratch.
That's kinda the status quo because in open source, the source... is open.
And it doesn't matter if someone who uses your source benefits from it too... that's
kind of what it's all about.
We all benefit from sharing our work, and in this case, the GPL license Linux uses legally
requires us to share it!
Without that sharing, there would be no Debian, Arch, Mint, Ubuntu, PopOS, Fedora... or any
of the other hundreds of Linux distros that build on each other and prop up the community.
But Red Hat decided to put the source code behind a paywall.
Now, this is legal.
Technically, the GPL allows it.
But it's generally rude and annoying to do that when the code you're locking down is
largely based on other people's open source code.
But...
it's within their rights, so I'm not gonna argue that point.
What I will argue is the current subscription agreement, which might not be legal.
Red Hat says they can cancel any user's account if they download the source code and redistribute
it.
Let's say someone downloads the source through a Red Hat subscription, and uses that to build
a new version of Rocky Linux.
If Red Hat retailiated by cancelling that subscription, I'd definitely tune into that
court case.
I don't know if the community could front the money to take on IBM's powerful laywers,
and maybe that's what Red Hat's banking on.
But there's another player in this game who might, and that's Oracle.
Wouldn't it be ironic if Oracle were the ones who knocked Red Hat down a peg for being so
uppity with their abuse of their community!
But let me be clear: everything I've seen points to Red Hat trying to choke out downstream
distros like Rocky, Alma, and Oracle Linux.
I think their hope is users of those distros would get scared and sign up for a Red Hat
subscription.
They need this to happen to lock in some short-term profits to please their IBM overlords.
At least, that's my cynical take on it.
What Red Hat's doing is skirting right on the edge of legality the terms of Linux's
GPL License.
If you wanna dig into that, read this post from the Software Freedom Conservancy.
Red Hat used to be the company of rebels.
They used to have edgy ads quoting Ghandi and positioning Red Hat as the plucky underdog,
using open source to upend the old proprietary software companies.
It's funny they used to be so devoted to that Ghandi quote in particular.
In one sense, Red Hat kinda won, they're the default choice for running Linux in big companies.
The irony is that Cory Doctorow recently wrote this about a different company, but I think
it applies here: "HERE IS HOW platforms die: First, they are good to their users; then
they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they
abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves.
Then, they die."
What a juxtoposition!
They built up so much goodwill in the open source community through the years and used
to be known as the 'open source company.'
But they're throwing away that goodwill, at least as far as Linux is concerned, all in
the name of profit.
Developers like me, maintainers of the EPEL repository, Fedora maintainers who are rightfully
worried about the long-term impacts...
We're all being told to go sign up for a Red Hat Developer Account so we can snag our 16
licenses of Red Hat Enterprise Linux for testing.
Oh boy!
Thanks, I guess I'll drop doing something actually productive and spend a week retooling
my test infrastructure and automation to work with Red Hat licensing.
You know who doesn't require me to do that?
Debian.
Ubuntu.
FreeBSD.
Not even Rocky Linux!
And please tell your employees to stop patronizing me, saying I can use CentOS Stream.
There's a reason Rocky and Alma linux have been downloaded millions of times.
Stream is not a substitute for CentOS.
So I've dropped support for Enterprise Linux on all my work, effective last Friday.
And people are asking me about Ansible.
That's Ansible by Red Hat by IBM, by the way.
I don't think Ansible's gonna try locking down access, but the fact I have to spend
even a second considering that possibility is insane!
Who wants to build around an ecosystem where the open source users are called freeloaders
and where massive disruptions are implemented in the middle of a release cycle, two times
in a row, with no warning?
I don't see this helping Red Hat in any way in the long term.
In the end, this is just sad.
Sad for users like me who used CentOS and developed tools on it that onramped folks
into Red Hat's ecosystem.
It's sad for Red Hat, which used to fight for open source, but now puts up barriers
around their own source code.
And it's sad for everyone still in their ecosystem, because they're now forced to deal with Red
Hat's licensing shenanigans and the loss of so many in the open source community.
Rocky and AlmaLinux both announced they'll find a way forward.
I hope they can, if nothing else so people who stuck with Red Hat don't get burned again.
But as for me?
I'm done with Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
I'll keep up support for Rocky Linux and AlmaLinux on a best-effort basis, but I have no confidence
I'll be able to support Enterprise Linux moving forward.
Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me twice...
I'm Jeff Geerling.