January 3, 2026
Open-source soap opera
System76: A Case Study on How Not to Collaborate with Upstream
GNOME vs System76 turns into a messy breakup, commenters grab popcorn
TLDR: A GNOME developer accused System76 of poor teamwork and stoking fear over a community firmware service, reviving years-old tensions. Commenters are split between “call-out justified” and “stop yelling misinformation,” with jokes about GNOME’s complexity and plenty of popcorn over the open-source drama.
Drama alert: a GNOME designer dropped a long post accusing Linux PC maker System76 of bad behavior and poor teamwork, and the internet lit up. In simple terms, GNOME (the desktop you see on many Linux computers) says System76 kept going rogue instead of working with the original teams (“upstream”), especially around firmware updates—the tiny software that makes your hardware run. The flashpoint? System76 ditched a community firmware hub (LVFS) and warned it might collect data, which the post calls misleading. Cue the comment brawl.
Onlookers split fast. Some cheered the call-out, saying this is classic corporate chest-thumping in open-source. Others fired back that calling things “misinformation” is overused and makes the accuser look biased. One commenter deadpanned that the politics are now “as confusing as GNOME itself,” and memes flew about “open-source soap operas” and Team GNOME vs Team System76. Folks dragged in an old HN thread like court receipts, while others begged everyone to stop relitigating 2018.
The hottest vibe? Exhaustion mixed with popcorn. People want good updates without drama, but they’re also here for the spectacle. Whether you think System76 was protecting users or picking fights, the crowd agrees on one thing: it’s messy, it’s public, and it’s peak open-source reality TV.
Key Points
- •The author alleges System76 employees contributed to fear, uncertainty, and doubt about GNOME and hostility toward contributors.
- •In 2017–2018, Richard Hughes worked with System76 to support their firmware via LVFS and fwupd.
- •System76 announced its own firmware update infrastructure and suggested Hughes use their system instead.
- •Richard Hughes publicly expressed surprise and disappointment regarding System76’s move.
- •System76’s public response warned about LVFS data collection and third-party server risks, advising companies to host LVFS themselves.