I've read most of the report and it's got a lot more than "last time". Speaking as someone who has done a lot of my own research on Stallman's bullshit, the depth of this report is astonishing. The allegations it makes regarding the conduct of the rest of the FSF is particularly alarming.
I think you should at least skim it before you comment.
Will you please explain why you attempted to conceal your involvement in this article? Furthermore, why did you do that so poorly? Domain blunder aside, I'm sure I'm not alone in having immediately recognized the thesis, specific political lexicon, and structural outline from your earlier blog post.
Do you see yourself as a viable leader of this community?
He needs to do as much damage to Stallman while he still can. Stallman's recent health scares (as noted in the "stallman report") have most likely prompted this as Drew knows once RMS passes away he wont be able to get his revenge on the guy or have him removed from what has been his life's work.
There are screenshots from Drews live streams which show his browser history/bookmarks which show links to 4ch board for cartoon drawings of lewd/nude children which make this all the more sickening. No wonder Drew loves his "research" so much.
What’s even more horrifying is he believes in forcing IUD surgeries onto teen girls. Why is a man this old so invested into sexual art of and opinions relating to the sex life of young teens? It’s genuinely disgusting to think about.
Well you see this quite often, you have these men who protest very loudly online about CSA end up being found guilty of assault or in ownership of assault media themselves.
One can only hope Drews local law enforcement find a reason to seize all his computer equipment and do a forensic investigation.
Here is an interesting find from a comment 12 years ago made by Drew on reddit (https://undelete.pullpush.io/r/todayilearned/comments/udlwf/...):
"What an ass, you don't have to call him out in the middle of a (mostly) unrelated post. I pity pedophiles - you can't control what turns you on, and they happen to be turned on by something illegal. It's a dick move to try and bring it up and shame him publicly."
Definitely needs his hard drives searching by authorities.
Of course you've "read most of" it. You wrote it after all- or did you ask ChatGPT to write you an anti-free software screed and only read part of it before you posted it?
Your cited source is not really a good view of the situation. He did not reverse his position at all on the Minsky/Epstein issue (and the article quotes Stallman doubling down on this, saying he's resigning over "a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations" of himself), and he was re-instated at the FSF without ever providing a meaningful apology or a reversal of any of his problematic positions. Following his reinstatement he has continued to maintain and advocate for problematic political views regarding sexual assault, and he has never meaningfully retracted his views on child sexual abuse or apologized for anything he has ever said.
I can't help but wonder if the initial blowblack didn't cause some amount of oppositional defiance. or if the FSF just can't operate without him or the inverse. Kind of his life's work.
Not excusing his behavior, just trying to understand it (without putting in enough effort to really understand it, I suppose). I guess I still have to hope that there's some plausible explanation beyond "he's a shitty person".
Maybe there's room for a new foundation for anyone that wanted to pick up the torch. Aside from that, I'm not really sure what there is to do.
I am sympathetic to the cause. I respect the Linux project as a whole forming a consensus on the right direction for the kernel and I respect the right of the Rust developers to participate in the consensus-making process and advocate for what they believe is the right direction -- and put in the work to get there. I can hold this view and disagree with their opinion at the same time. I celebrate the difficult technical and political work they're doing to advance their cause, and I respect the hell out of that -- the fact that I would make different choices doesn't contradict this in any way.
The fact of the matter is that politics was always going to be difficult, and for all of the respect and admiration I have for the Rust-for-Linux team -- which I do have, thank you -- I am equally sympathetic to the kernel hackers who didn't ask for this project on their doorstep, and for their own needs to be accommodated. I condemn the toxicity that has bubbled up in this process, from C hackers and Rust hackers alike, but even absent that toxicity I think that the political challenges of Rust-for-Linux are enormous and distract from the fundamental work of the project.
People have burnt out and quit the project, and you cannot erase their experience when it questions the viability of the project. I'm offering them compassion and a different path that might celebrate their work without leading to burnout. People having burnt out and quitting the project is a historical fact, and not my fault, even if I'm the easy polemic for you to pin the blame on. I think it'd be a fucking shame if they quit pursing their passions for OS development in Rust over it and I've said as much and that's more than I can say for you and everyone else filling my messages with personal attacks and bad faith reading of everything I have to say.
I'd rather fix the abuse (the cause of the particular burnout), because it impacts not only the Rust developers, but all current and future contributors, and indirectly us users as well.
> and that's more than I can say for you and everyone else filling my messages with personal attacks and bad faith reading of everything I have to say.
In a metaphorical sense… since HN is not your inbox and this is not your submission.
>This person read that email about one Rust Kernel developer resigning because of burnout. Now he goes into how the Linux project is a “burnout machine” and how his heart goes out to the “developers who have been burned” (how did we get to plural?).[1]
There are several Rust-for-Linux folks who have complained about the same things and been at various levels of burned out over the course of the project. Ignoring them because it raises uncomfortable questions regarding the viability of the project doesn't make it go away, it just erases their experiences.
>The “so where do we go now?” almost gets ahead of itself before it says in the next paragraph that “the path is theirs to choose”. Well yeah because the only person who implied there was a crossroads is the author here.
>The predictable conclusion is to abandon the project and do something adjacent to the Linux Kernel.
This article is in response to someone who already decided to abandon the project, and to suggest what's next. I didn't impose the conclusion to abandon it on anyone, and in fact I explicitly supported it if burnout victims choose to return to the fold.
Yes, I stand by the conclusion that Rust-for-Linux is probably not a great idea, and I'm allowed to say that without being anyone's "enemy". I also believe people when they say they're burned out and quitting the project and take their needs seriously, something I think is missing from your comment. All of this is compatible with compassion. I'm not and have never been your enemy: I can say that I think it's not a good idea and wish you well in your efforts nevertheless, and I have.
Cygwin is a POSIX implementation, not a Linux implementation. Linux is mostly POSIX compatible and so Cygwin is source-compatible, but not binary-compatible, with many programs that work on Linux.
I have not contributed much to Linux -- my claim to fame is submitting a one-line patch which generated 50+ emails of arguments from LKML before Linus merged it -- but I have read a ton of the Linux source code and familiarized myself with many of its internals many times, as well as doing extensive low-level systems work in userspace against the Linux API/ABI. I often use it as a reference in my own osdev work, or working on Hare, etc. Have read a lot of the syscall API surface, DRM internals in depth, dcache and several filesystem implementations, io_uring, etc. Not ignorant to what would be involved in making a Linux-compatible kernel.
Well -- never let it be said I wouldn't say it directly to you, and I hope after reading this you will at least understand why I feel the way I do.
I said what I said above, because I find your writing deeply incurious, and what is probably worse, directed towards others who are similar incurious, in much the same way say Fox News or MSNBC is in my country.
When I read your writing, I never have the sense you've ever thought critically about your opinions at all. There also seems to be only good things and bad things in your cosmology.
I hope you know this isn't to denigrate you as an engineer, or you as a person. You may be a wonderful person, and you have certainly built artifacts which are useful to your users. You do also seem to be very principled and sincere in your beliefs. And it's certainly not to say I always live up to my/these aspirations!
On the other hand, I think, when a software engineer expounds more broadly on software (which seems to be your only beat), they owe their readers a duty to be self-critical. For instance, as you, yourself, note: You're known for your Rust hot takes[0]. If you (or the comment readers) want me to get more particular see "Does Rust belong in the Linux kernel?"[1]. There you skip talking about memory safety to spend more than a few graphs on the "Trendiness" of Rust. An argument AFAIK that was never made by those seeking to integrate Rust into the Linux kernel.
And this is where I usually get off the Devault train, because it is another shallow strawman based on vibes. Not once do you ask, as someone who is intellectually curious might: "Maybe Rust is trendy because it provides lots of interesting and useful features. Perhaps I/Drew should try this new language, then I'd have some basis for the many graphs I wrote about 'Trendiness'."
Unfortunately for the reader, that never happens. Each blog post is one string of unschooled, untested assumptions tied inexorably to another string of assumptions, on and on, ad infinitum. I'll admit I've compared you to Tucker Carlson more than once because that is exactly what reading a Drew Devault blog post feels like, because yours is actually a deeply conservative breed of tech demagoguery, saying to your readers, again and again: "We already know what's right. Someone just needs to say it now and then..."
Similarly, re: your latest article[0], yes, you do, in a footnote, express that you thought Ted T'so's behavior was bad. But your solutions have nothing to do with remedying the bad behavior. Your solution is -- I was right all along, it was never going to work out, this couple needs a divorce. At every turn I keep expecting you to say: "Was I right? I think so because..." but, as a regular reader, I should know better. We are on the Epistemic Closure Express. Drew's writing only knows one destination.
TBC this beef doesn't just extend to your writing on Rust. Your writing on Linux packaging was what first bothered me[2]. Never once do you ask yourself questions like: Is there something wrong with the Linux model of 12 different package managers? What if a dev wants users to actually use his or her software, what should they do instead of wait? Do I really imagine distro maintainers are scouring the land looking for new software to land in their distros? Is there a software solution, perhaps a declarative language/system, which would make this easier? Your answer here is like your answer to bad behavior within Linux -- your problem isn't a problem. Because I can't tell my reader Linux has any problems? Because that would be too grey for my black/white world?
No matter the situation, no good can come from hatred. The RfL situation has already come from anger and bad, derailed arguments.
Instead of having beef with a stranger online and comparing him to an alt-right figure (which is very much not okay) I think having a good faith reply to a good faith personal opinion will at worst do nothing and maybe result in something at best.
Focus your hatred to the injustice of the world instead.
> No matter the situation, no good can come from hatred.
Appreciate this POV, probably ascribe to it. Suppose my "hate" for Drew is mostly re: his public persona. I "hate" Drew like I hate teams that play in the same division as my team, which is to say it that hate is lightly held.
So, yes, "hate" is probably too strong a term.
> Instead of having beef with a stranger online and comparing them to an alt-right figure (which is very much not okay)
I would disagree with this notion. In many ways, Drew is a demagogue and a populist and a (tech) conservative.
I am (tech) conservative in some/many ways too. But this disagreement isn't about our politics.
> I think having a good faith reply to a good faith personal opinion will at worst do nothing and maybe result in something at best
Agreed. But the problem I have with Drew don't extend to his good faith opinions. What bothers me is the incurious way in which he chooses to express himself, not what he believes.
Which I suppose it would be fine if he had a smaller audience, but he seems to want a broader relevance. I really do believe that 100 more and then 100 more people who express themselves in a similar way would be bad for any community.
>and comparing him to an alt-right figure (which is very much not okay)
When I read your reaction to being compared to one of the most influential conservative political commentators, I had an inkling that you were missing the forest for the trees. Twas such an egregious transgression that you were compelled to virtue signal about how "very much not okay" that is, then attempt to gaslight people with scary terms like "alt-right" (nowhere in his Wikipedia is he listed as alt-right). This is a common pattern I see from a certain segment of the population with a high propensity to have pronouns in their profile. As an experiment I click on your profile, and, well...
For what it's worth to me as a bystander you sound much more like Tucker Carlson or some Fox News host than anything that Drew has ever written (not that I pay particularly strong attention or that Inecessarily always agree with him). Instead of any arguments you essentially just attack the person with insults and strawmen.
I hope you don't just dismiss my post and it might trigger you to review your own style, considering that you seem to feel quite strongly about what/how people write.
> Instead of any arguments you essentially just attack the person with insults and strawmen.
Could you point out where I did this?
> I hope you don't just dismiss my post and it might trigger you to review your own style, considering that you seem to feel quite strongly about what/how people write.
Absolutely. Point out what you think is unfair about what I said above, and I will review. Thanks!
> More like an activist than ... well ... a normal well-adjusted person.
What then am I an activist for exactly? Rust for Linux and better package managers? If you think "activism" is my aim after reading my comment, I think you missed my point.
The point is -- I can't stand Drew's writing. And the reason why is not because he expresses strong opinions which I don't share, it's because -- Drew doesn't ever consider the possibility he's wrong. Even as a nodding feint to the reader that acknowledges intellectual humility is something we all expect. So, I will accept, in that limited space, I'm an activist. I am an activist for Drew writing better.
Do you really need another example of Drew's lack of intellectual curiosity? Well...
One might read Drew's "Rust is not a good C replacement"[0], and think wait a minute, Drew does actually collect some evidence there that Rust is adopting more features per year than C, Go or even C++. Yes, I'll admit Drew occasionally collects the worst evidence to make bad points.
Drew concludes: "[This prevalence of features] speaks volumes to the stability of these languages, but more importantly it speaks to their complexity. Over time it rapidly becomes difficult for one to keep an up-to-date mental map of Rust and how to solve your problems idiomatically." And this conclusion might be a reasonable inference to draw after one has worked with Rust over a year or so, and one can provide some examples of certain redundant or complex behavior, but Drew doesn't do that. He takes some information, which could be relevant, provides it out of any context, and simply moves on.
I'd note there is still no evidence Drew has ever even tried Rust in any of Drew's writing. He just doesn't like it from afar!
Or perhaps Drew could have provided an example of a feature that wasn't a good feature from the year of this blog entry (2019)? No, that might have required him to wrestle with his point a little, and that would be hard! As Drew says, "My approach wasn’t very scientific, but I’m sure the point comes across", failing to understand his superficial approach is exactly the problem with his writing, and this point.
His bullets in support are similarly facile. As Drew says: "C has a spec. No spec means there’s nothing keeping rustc honest. Any behavior it exhibits could change tomorrow." Left unremarked upon by Drew is how much of C's spec leaves C's behavior undefined, compared to the implementation defined behavior Rust, because that wouldn't serve to celebrate C and flog Rust. So we don't get the ordinary hemming and hawing one often sees in good writing ("It could be like this, but I think it's more like this..."). Instead, we get black and white. Heroes and villains.
This is the wildest single thing I've ever seen on HN. You decided it would be a good use of your time to try to explain - straight to someone's face - why you hate them. As though you were filing a Jira ticket about a human being. And you thought that was a good use of your time on this Earth.
> Not once do you ask, as someone who is intellectually curious might: "Maybe Rust is trendy because it provides lots of interesting and useful features. Perhaps I/Drew should try this new language, then I'd have some basis for the many graphs I wrote about 'Trendiness'."
From the article that you clearly barely bothered to read, and whose author you're accusing of a lack of curiosity:
>> I might even jump in and build out a driver or two for fun myself, that sounds like a good opportunity for me to learn Rust properly with a fun project with a well-defined scope.
> This is the wildest single thing I've ever seen on HN. You decided it would be a good use of your time to try to explain - straight to someone's face - why you (in your own words) "hate" them. Wild.
That's not exactly what I intended.
When I said "hater", I was poking fun at myself for being a "hater." Informally, in the US, a hater is simply a negative or critical person. You don't want to be described as a "hater", and I self-applied the term. But since "hate" is perhaps too strong a term for this forum (or is too US centric?), I disclaim that word as describing my feelings towards Drew, and apologize to him if I was misunderstood (Drew, I'm sorry!).
Now that we are past that word, how I feel about Drew and his writing is laid out in the parent comment.
> I mean, Drew literally says this in the article you're commenting on
I think you may have mixed up the two posts to which I was referring. It could be I wasn't clear enough.
>> I might even jump in and build out a driver or two for fun myself, that sounds like a good opportunity for me to learn Rust properly with a fun project with a well-defined scope.
I'm not sure how Drew claiming he might write a Rust driver in the future lends Drew credibility here? At least not the credibility I indicate is missing from Drew's post.
You're apologising to someone "if he misunderstood" when you said you hated them. How magnanimous.
Maybe one day you'll spend time composing your thoughts to put out there, looking forward to engaging in a discussion on a topic close to your heart, and instead you'll find someone saying they personally hate you.
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Ironic given that the creator is only 17 himself per the original post. Having run a site like this before, you can expect to get some awful stuff uploaded before long, up to and including CSAM. Not sure I can trust a minor to moderate this stuff and push that "report" button in good conscience knowing that a minor will have to view the material to make the call.
I think you should at least skim it before you comment.