Did Gentoo just die?
Posted by 
January 12, 2008 •
While no official body has yet to confirm or spread news about it, Daniel Robbins, creator of Gentoo Linux, confirmed that the Gentoo Foundation’s charter has been revoked for the next several weeks. In layman’s terms, as of this moment the Gentoo Foundation no longer exists.
Apparently this happened because the people who are supposed to be in charge of keeping this alive have mostly resigned or are MIA. Aside from neglected online duties like publishing newletters, updating the site, etc, they didn’t file routine paperwork with the proper authorities, which puts the legal status of the Gentoo foundation in jeopardy.
No one has explained why to the community, or said much of anything until Daniel stepped forward.
What will happen to Gentoo now?
Referring to the foundation, Daniel is offering to return to his post as president of the foundation (as posted on his blog) so things at the enterprise end will remain stable. On the distro end, even with the dissolution of it’s legal entity, developers are still putting up support for their beloved Linux distribution so it’s still business as usual. Looking at the front page of Gentoo.org though, a latest update of October 2007 does not look very promising but I’m keeping my fingers crossed for some changes once they’ve patched things up.
On that note, hopefully no one gets behind their backs and revives the Gentoo foundation as a different company. Gentoo has a special place in my heart because of all the headaches it gave me on my early days with Linux so it’ll be a shame if things didn’t go well for this distro. Linux newbs will be missing all the “fun.” No really.
What is Gentoo anyway?
Gentoo Linux is a special distribution of -UX that has one of the deepest levels of customizations around. How? You can compile your own fully customized Gentoo from source code up. That in mind, Gentoo is NOT for Linux newbs because of the steep learning curve and it’s pretty easy to mess things up the first to the -nth time. Gentoo is for advanced to expert -UX users looking for a levels of deeper customization If you’re a linux noob, go for Ubuntu.
Tags: Getoo, Linux
gentoo is not about newsletters and management.
“Linux newbs will be missing all the “fun.” No really.” 🙂 That’s it 🙂 Really good distro if you want to know “how it works”.
@mieses
yes but on the frontend, it’s really nice to see updates no matter how small, like a newsletter.
@x86xlat
Ah yes, it’s really rewarding once you’re able to build it from the ground up but it’s a darm long process that everyone should experience. Takes care of the noobs and it welcomes the willing. Definitely a win-win.
It was revoked as a legal nonprofit entity in the State of New Mexico but there is a process to get the charter reinstated in any state. The Gentoo Foundation is still the legal owner per their Bylaws.
I would like to see Daniel take the helm again so his supporters can return to Gentoo. If not, fork Gentoo, combine with Sabayon, or create a new distro, Funtoo, and watch his community grow.
I’d like to see him back at the helm again too, it’ll be interesting to see what’s in stored for us when that happens.
“gentoo is not about newsletters and management.”
Why thats all I see, bureaucrats. Where are the real brains? in the basement?
Gentoo Is Dead, not the concept, but the “name” and thus the distro. May we learn from this lesson and expire developers that do not contribute and be extremely wary of individuals that aspire for personal gratification via some superficial status such as a IRC operator or @leetdistro.org email – don’t be so desperate for such immature developers, it will come back to bite you (as it has gentoo).
Furthermore, always be on the look out for talentless individuals that only have “diplomas in psychology” or some warped “Public Relation” experience – that deviantly aspire to test “game theory” on a simple and innocent linux development community.
Thus destroying it.
Live and learn.
Time for new concept (WIP).
Gentoo will be superseded, by a far superior concept. Its just a matter of time.
dan robbins doesn’t care. gentoo is gentoo.
It’s not like Gentoo can completely die anyway. I’m sure that there will always be enough of a user/developer base to at least keep it intact until it starts coming back. There are plenty of smaller distros that are more than surviving.
I’m not sure what you mean when you say the front page of the Gentoo Website was last updatad in October of 2007. There are articles all through 2008, up until December 20.
I’m sure Gentoo the distro will survive, even if the company doesn’t. I’m thinking that the company may very well get its act together and revive.
I’d certainly hate to lose Gentoo, though. Their distro, as you said, gave me plenty of headaches and long, sleepless nights – and lots of fun, too.
@Chiron613
errhmm I wish you checked on the date of this post though.