Gentoo is losing sponsors while a certain other distro keeps raking them in.
We truly are in hell
Linux accepts LLM code so I swapped to OpenBSD. It’s a shame but I really love the community and humanity that comes from people, human beings, working together towards a goal.
I used Gentoo for a while before that and loved it but, alas, the community and Linux as a whole just doesn’t share my values.
I would say, for anyone using Linux and looking for a change of pace, OpenBSD is awesome and is still in that space of “respecting the user”
Afaik Gentoo is anti AI. As much as they can while still using the kernel I guess.
https://linuxiac.com/gentoo-council-implements-ban-on-ai-assisted-contributions/
What’s behind in the drop of sponsors?
Their post does not say but I’m sure the current economy is no small factor. Businesses are tightening belts because things are only expected to get worse. Sponsorship of a dwindling Linux distribution is an easy cut to justify.
I wonder what the number of users is various distros. I used Gentoo on my desktop around 15-20 years ago and really loved it, but now I prefer vanilla Debian. I think Arch took over a large part of the Gentoo user base.
Gentoo doesn’t do user stats, so it’s impossible to tell.
Yeah, I know, I was thinking more along the lines of the Distrowatch popularity ranking of which specific pages get the most hits (and Gemtoo pretty low down these days).
I would expect Gentoo’s rankings on Distrowatch to be lower than its actual uptake. I mean, it’s an oddball distro, an old and well-known one whose reputation probably spreads more by word of mouth than anything else.
If I were to hazard a guess, I’d say that hardware costs being driven up dramatically has made it more difficult for their sponsors to provide infrastructure to the project for free.
