Dylan M. Taylor is not a household name in the Linux world. At least, he wasn’t until recently.
The software engineer and longtime open source contributor has quietly built a respectable track record over the years: writing Python code for the Arch Linux installer, maintaining packages for NixOS, and contributing CI/CD pipelines to various FOSS projects.
But a recent change he made to systemd has pushed him into the spotlight, along with a wave of intense debate.
At the center of the controversy is a seemingly simple addition Dylan made: an optional birthDate field in systemd’s user database.
It’s a fucking field. Why is everyone loosing his mind over it? It’s not like it is required, nor will it prevent you to do anything if you put data in (except not being able to change it later).
If you have to complain, complain about the law, not poor guy that has to add it, by law.
A single law pushed through in a single state in a single country should not lead to systemic changes in FOSS projects used worldwide.
That field is here to allow the support of it, not to make it required everywhere.
Seatbelts isn’t required everywhere, but car maker won’t make two version of a car, one that support seatbelts, and one that doesn’t. They will make one model, with the required attach points to install a seatbelt, and install an actual seatbelt only on cars that goes somewhere where it is mandatory.
Here we are in a similar situation. That filed is here to make of possible for OS to support that law, but it doesn’t mean we’ll all have to conform to that law unless you live in a country that have said law.
The largest state in the union that has a GDP larger than many countries.
No. Don’t follow unjust laws.
Especially Foss projects which don’t have to follow laws, because they are outside their jurisdiction
Open-sourcing a software doesn’t make it magically immune to laws.
Of course it does. Do you know how laws work?
Who broke the law if the owner is everyone?
An open source software is, by law, the maintainer’s (which can be an individual, or a group of persons) property. It is said maintainer who has the right to grant you any kind of license over what he owns.
In the case of an open-source project, that license is very permissive, true, but if you take the time to read any of those, you will always see :
Source : the fucking law and the fucking licenses. And my friend, which happens to be a lawyer specialized in intellectual property laws.