this post was submitted on 25 Apr 2024
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I'm surprised that other people are surprised that for-profit companies constantly try to increase their profits; such companies only contribute to FOSS when that's more profitable than the alternative. The Linux kernel, AMDGPU, Steam, etc only exist because some part of the software/hardware stack is proprietary (which becomes a more attractive product as the FOSS portion of the stack improves).
I'm definitely not justifying the "rug-pulling", but people need to stop supporting projects with no potential for long-term profitability unless those projects can survive without any support from for-profit companies. Anything else is destined to fail.
What part of the Linux kernel is proprietary? genuinely curious.
While Linux itself isn't proprietary, it supports loading proprietary firmware/microcode blobs and running on proprietary hardware. Thus, part of the Linux hardware/software stack is proprietary.