The Russian government has announced that it will launch a 'unique development community centered around Russians who have been expelled from the Linux kernel community.'

by [email protected] Larry Ewing and The GIMP

The Russian Ministry of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Media (Minkomsvyaz) has announced a decision by Linus Torvalds, the benevolent dictator for life of the Linux kernel, to expel Russian developers from the Linux kernel maintainers. They condemned the move as 'discriminatory' and announced that they would be starting their own Linux development community.

Linux-сообщество — РБК
https://www.rbc.ru/technology_and_media/28/10/2024/671e424c9a7947704249be2c

Linus Torvalds kicked the Russians out of Linux, now they're creating a sovereign Linux community in Russia — Ministry of Digital Development steps in | Tom's Hardware
https://www.tomshardware.com/software/linux/linus-torvalds-kicked-the-russians-out-of-linux-now-theyre-creating-a-sovereign-linux-community-in-russia-ministry- of-digital-development-steps-in

The issue was addressed in October 2024 when the MAINTAINERS file listed more than a dozen kernel maintainers who use email addresses with Russian-related domains or have been linked to Russia, citing 'various compliance requirements.' It all started with a proposed change to remove the . Torvalds endorsed the proposal and declared that 'it will not be taken back.'

Linus Torvalds explains why Russians are being fired from their Linux kernel maintainers - GIGAZINE

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Ivan Panchenko, co-founder of Russian software development company Postgres Professional, said in response to Torvalds' decision, 'The one that will suffer the most from the expulsion of Russian developers is Linux itself. 'This will have a negative impact on the life and mutual trust of the developer community, and ultimately on the quality of the products. However, the relatively small contributions made by Russian developers to the Linux kernel will not lead to any serious consequences.' He stated:

In response to Torvalds' decision, Minkomsvyaz said, 'The expulsion of Russian Linux kernel maintainers could be seen as another act of discrimination. We are ready to cooperate with Russian companies that are willing to cooperate with us.' 'We believe it is important to strengthen cooperation and establish a dialogue with the countries that have been expelled,' he said. 'We need to come to an agreement with the expelled maintainers and create our own alternative structure. 'We have a strong presence in Russia,' the company said in a statement to Russian tech media outlet RBC, emphasizing the importance of its own development community.

Panchenko said the creation of a separate development community would 'bring about changes to the open source world' and warned that this could have negative consequences for both Russia and the international community. 'Building an indigenous development community should be a national priority, especially in terms of developing system components essential to technological sovereignty,' he said.

However, perhaps because the decision to create this alternative community was made suddenly, Minkomsvyaz did not reveal which countries it was in discussions with, and at the time of the announcement, specific cooperating countries had not yet been determined. Yes, possibly. Panchenko pointed to China as a potential partner, but expressed doubts about whether China would be willing to share its technology with Russia.

And creating its own development community would essentially mean launching a fork of the Linux kernel. 'We need to be sophisticated enough to take full responsibility for a fork of the operating system kernel,' Panchenko said. 'A major issue remains that there are not enough skilled developers in Russia,' he said, emphasizing the urgency of human resource development.