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statement regarding the recent freenode/libera split 

that's all you'll get from me
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% Statement regarding the recent freenode/libera split
% Leah Rowe
% 20 May 2021
Introduction
============
Libreboot has long used Freenode for providing IRC chatrooms. Freenode is one
of the most popular IRC networks, and one of the oldest. Recently, there has
been some controversy about its leader, Andrew Lee, and some staff members have
quit to form a new network named Libera. I want everyone to know: I'm completely
neutral about the whole thing. I have no strong feelings one way or the other.
I wish success to both Freenode *and* Libera.
Libreboot now has a `#libreboot` IRC channel on both the Freenode *and* Libera
networks. The Libera one is to be considered *unofficial*, but it *is* owned
and operated by myself at the present time. I use the same `leah` nick on both
networks. The only reason I'm there right now is to protect the names of my
projects, and also to protect myself, so that someone cannot impersonate me or
my projects.
Plans for self-hosted IRC
=========================
I've had a plan on the TODO for a very long time, to self-host an IRC server at
`irc.libreboot.org`. I've concluded that the best decision for Libreboot would
be for me to now press ahead with this plan. The channels on Freenode and
Libera will remain open, but the self-hosted one will become the official
channel.
I have nothing against Freenode *or* Libera, but I would like to have more
control over my infrastructure. My next target is Git; I will set up a Git
repository, mailing list and (very likely) a SourceHut instance directly on
`git.libreboot.org`. However, self-hosted Git is not currently a high priority
due to the decentralized nature of Git.
About the Freenode controversies
================================
I was offline for several days. I came online again on 20 May 2021, which was
apparently a whole day after the events transpired. What I can gather is this:
* Andrew Lee, who owns Freenode, wants to run things his way
* Freenode staff were unhappy, because Andrew appointed new staff members
instead
* Those staffers who disagreed with Andrew's leadership have left and now run
the Libera IRC network
* Freenode will now have new staff members, under Andrew's guidance
Basically, the most natural thing for a Free Software organization is currently
in progress: someone is unhappy, so they made a fork, and the people left behind
now get to run things however they like. The result? Now there are two
organisations, who can both conduct themselves without tension or restraint.
Is that a bad thing?
Relationships, professional or otherwise, break down all the time. It's life.
However, I do hope that peace can be restored, and that all sides can begin to
cooperate once things calm down. *We* are all in the same fight, namely, the
Free Software movement!
Life moves on very quickly indeed. I'm here to tell you: Freenode is not the
world, and neither is Libera. Neither will `irc.libreboot.org` be. Neither is
OFTC. Neither is rizon. Neither is snoonet. Neither is EFnet. Neither is that
weird IRC server you found one day on a forum. IRC is IRC. It can sometimes be
a very crazy and chaotic place.
Anyway, yeah. That's all for now. I really don't have much to say. The rest
of this article will link to external resources, where you can learn more about
the recent events. I only wanted to tell everyone how *I* feel, so that I can
put this issue to rest. I believe that I have now done this!
Learn more about recent chaos
=============================
I was going to write more, but I don't think it's needed. Instead, you can
simply refer to the following pages and make up your own mind. I'm only
linking them here so that people have an idea as to what I'm talking about.
I value my neutrality, so I will not make any statement either way about the
contents of these articles. I haven't read them, precisely because I don't care
but I know you will want to read them, if you're interested enough to read this
article. So here they are!
News articles
-------------
Every link below will work with JavaScript turned off, but some of them are
running non-free JavaScript if you have JavaScript turned on. I assume you
already have LibreJS installed anyway, if you care about that.
The *following* news articles are from media outlets and other people, not from
the people in Freenode and Libera. however, those people also wrote articles
and they are linked in the next sections on this page.
First though, read these articles:
* <https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7ev8y/freenode-open-source-korea-crown-prince-takeover>
* <http://techrights.org/2021/05/19/freenode-and-cancel-culture/>
* <https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Free-Software-Exits-Freenode>
* <https://boingboing.net/2021/05/19/freenode-irc-staff-quit-after-new-owner-seizes-control.html>
* <https://hackaday.com/2021/05/20/freenode-debacle-prompts-staff-exodus-new-network/>
* <https://www.theregister.com/2021/05/19/freenode_staff_resigns/>
Andrew Lee's article
--------------------
Here is Andrew's article:
<https://freenode.net/news/freenode-is-foss>
I also spotted this article, which seems to be from Andrew aswell:
<https://gist.githubusercontent.com/realrasengan/88549ec34ee32d01629354e4075d2d48/raw/4f11b836a0705118733de5ba1b181b50c15201b2/freenode.txt>
From Libera (former freenode) staff
-----------------------------------
The following articles are from those individuals who recently resigned from
their posts at Freenode, and moved over to Libera IRC instead.
NOTE: for github-hosted links, I've linked to the `raw` pages, because these
pages are plain text and therefore do not force you to run any non-free
JavaScript code.
* Archive link, because this staff member's article was on the index page, which
will obviously change at some point:
<http://web.archive.org/web/20210519235343/https://www.kline.sh/> (archive
from 19 May 2021)
* Fuchs' article: <https://fuchsnet.ch/freenode-resign-letter.txt> - one could
say that Freenode no longer has any fuchs to give!
* Aaron Jone's article:
<https://gist.githubusercontent.com/aaronmdjones/1a9a93ded5b7d162c3f58bdd66b8f491/raw/d210ebc21f8d967b8cce25a75fcdc721f8acfe9a/freenode-resign-letter.txt>
* jess's article: <https://gist.githubusercontent.com/jesopo/45a3e9cdbe517dc55e6058eb43b00ed9/raw/7972a595255560f23d9a61bb7c9f4e696dce1db4/00-freenode.txt>
* Marco d'ltri's article: <https://blog.bofh.it/debian/id_461>
* Ed Kellett's article: <https://gist.githubusercontent.com/edk0/478fb4351bc3ba458288d6878032669d/raw/5a2b712c2073b3d357c83a97d0f2678da290e5ec/resignation.md>
* Emīls Piņķis's article <https://gist.githubusercontent.com/pinkisemils/39d4ded8b1639b6f39dcab15618649f5/raw/89e3f6f1088176c03e623b01d70fe760e00811c3/resignation.md>
* JonathanD82's article: <https://gist.githubusercontent.com/JonathanD82/6518b93708e0aaf4b8f92c8e7200816d/raw/70b20cfb8b599216e7702f013282eeb8c4288c24/gistfile1.txt>
* mniip's article: <https://mniip.com/freenode.txt>
* Svante Bengtson's article: <https://swantzter.se/freenode-resignation/>
* This article is in French: <https://coevoet.fr/freenode.html>