It's the people - not Ubuntu

Why do tech journals like iTWire always end up hiring abject morons like Sam Varghese to write columns for them?

For some reason, Mr Varghese has decided to reiterate this old proverb to the rest of the world in his opinion piece – and I quote – that “it is better to say nothing and let all presume you are stupid than to open your mouth and prove it.”

This is what people call “painting yourself to a corner”. In his previous work, Varghese pointed out that Canonical had to “turn a profit” and it was only reasonable for them to make changes in Ubuntu despite vocal opinions. Well, that’s fine and dandy. However, when now one of his fellow Linux enthusiasts Caitlyn Martin comes out and says, on an apparently unrelated note, that Ubuntu is “garbage salad”, Varghese feels that it is somehow rational for him to use the exact same damned argument again in order to justify the obvious shortcomings of the distribution in question.

Given what Varghese has laid out for us, now we are faced with a logical conundrum – yes, Canonical needs money and they need to modify their distribution in order to flog it off regardless of opinions from unpaid users, but when they decide to put the same shoddy crap in Landscape-supported infrastructures and end up risking having entire business operations tethering on the edge of spontaneous combustion, you still have no rights to complain because Mark S. is the “benevolent dictator for life” and your plights with his distribution are simply unworthy of his attention. In other words, as far as Varghese can see, Mark S. is always right and Canonical is fine for ignoring – in his own word – “reliability” wholesale even though at the same time they are selling support to potentially paid users for the exact same thing that they release for free.

Poet Epimenides once said, “The Cretans [are] always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies.” Sam, I know you love old proverbs, but, please, for your own sake, don’t live them out too!

Update: Apparently, at one point even Varghese himself did complain about Ubuntu. Good grief – can anyone introduce this man to a therapist?