Ubuntu
Increasingly so, and following the path that RedHat was taking prior (and probably worse to come given their new ownership)
RedHat is one of, if not the, biggest contributors to Linux. They offer RHEL, which you license as a business or use for free for personal use.
RedHat became pissed off about contributing so much to the Linux ecosystem when a number of other corporate distros simply took their product, changed the name, then shoved it out the door with a price tag that undercuts them, taking money while contributing virtually nothing to the wider ecosystem.
And to be clear I don’t mean distros based on RHEL, like Pop/Elementary/Mint is to Ubuntu, I mean literally clones. The exact same software with zero differences other than name.
RH then changed their subscription terms so that redistribution of their source code means they can drop you as a RHEL customer. I.e. you wouldn’t have access to further to source code.
This is widely believed to be compatible with the GPL licence that Linux uses — GPL only guarantees users need to be able to see source code, not necessarily that it has to be completely open for anybody to see. GPL also doesn’t compel the developer to provide updates for everyone, so if the developer thinks you’ve broken other terms they’ve set, they are allowed to drop you/not deal with you further. GPL doesn’t force a developer to have you as their continued customer.
People argue that RH may well be complying with the GPL legally, but they aren’t in spirit.
I’m still not sure where I come down on it tbh. Philosophically I want RH to go with the spirit of the GPL, but I do find it really shitty that a number of other projects just straight up take RH’s product, put a different name on it, and skim money away from an organisation that has transformed the Linux desktop and made it usable.
Thing is, I don’t even think it’s worked. They can still get all the packages by pulling it in a slightly cumbersome way from CentOS.
Nothing, someone who never needed access to the RHEL snapshot source is butt hurt that it only exists as part of centOS stream, making it harder for community rebuilds to exist.
It’s no big deal for 95% of users, truly a nonissue. That last 5% can buy RHEL for production or use it for free for personal hosting or development.
