Only if they specifically seem fascist, because that's the one political group that likes to know everything you do and censor any dissenting opinion.
this post was submitted on 03 Sep 2025
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Who's out here trying to figure out the political or other beliefs of developers? I've got around 50 docker containers running on my server, there's no way I'm going through people's profiles to see if they're morally aligned with me.
I mean... I used reiserFS for years and that guy killed his wife, I'm not too keen on that.
I guess its fine as long as its not actively malicious code, its not like I'm letting them into my brain.
On that though, I find it unlikely someone who differs from me politically would have the same priorities, and as such their projects are much less likely to show up on my radar.
Edit: spelling correction, Autocorrupt, ykwim?
no.
IMO conservatives are untrustworthy and can't identify fact from fiction.
would you run software from a dev who has a problem discerning reality? do you think a schizophrenic person writes stable maintainable code?
mental health is an important part of gaining trust in your product. ironic that they continue to trust and support a geriatric nazi-wannabe, but goes to show how compromised conservatives are when it comes to their decision making skills.
TempleOS?
technically the guy went crazy because of the project.
Yes, since not liking or disagreeing with someone isn't the same thing as likelihood they are pushing malicious code. If something is open source that's a really good sign, because they could also push closed source code and be more likely to get away with it that way. More points if it clearly has other eyes on it; even if I am not checking over the code myself, someone probably is for a lot of projects.
It's like "separate art from artist" except even more so because software tends to be even more quantifiable as its own independent thing than art is.
if it is open source and sources I trust approve of it, sure
it depends entirely on the context, what the software is, alternatives... etc
No. If I disagree with someone politically it's likely because they want me and anyone like me dead. Those people are dead to me.
I'm pretty sure we'll disagree politically on many issues but I don't want you or anyone like you dead. I hope people in the US will stop viewing politics as cults and start to communicate with people disagreeing with them.
For the first 40+ years of my life, sure. For the past 10...we are suffering from a cult.
Do you support trans rights? Do you support immigration? Do you support the demilitarization of police and complete restructuring of the current US "justice" system? Do you know why credit scores exist? Do you support using taxes to provide for our most vulnerable? Do you know what diversity, equity, and inclusion are?
If you said no to any of those, then I doubt we share common ground
I doubt many people outside the US have any clue about whether the US justice system needs to be restructured, so there goes ~95% of the global population.
Excluding people from discussions because they don't agree with 'one' point is setting yourself up for failure.
You aren't winning anyone over with an all-or-nothing attitude, you're cutting off many potential allies.
it depends on what the software is doing i guess
Really depends on the level of disagreement. If its total idiocy like maga or monarchist or something I would likely stay away. If they don't think ubi is a good idea I can get passed that.
past, not passed
no um I mean like I can't get the political philosophy passed to me so like I would drop it and not run to the goal line and..... ok I did it wrong.
I'm assuming this is a dig at Lemmy? The author is a tanky, the software is Janky and we are all having a fun time anyways.
Not really directed at Lemmy.
I was thinking about the time Louis Rossman (who used to advocate for using Graphene OS) said he stopped using GrapheneOS because he didn't trust the former lead dev.
Also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XZ_Utils_backdoor comes to mind.
In this situation, any closed source developer/project manager would never disclose such issues, if they caught them at all.
I trust open source code a hell of a lot more then close sourced stuff because anyone can look at it/test it and see if somethings fucky.
He lied about stopping use of GrapheneOS. He can be seen in videos long after still using GrapheneOS on his Pixel. Also, the reasons he stated for not using/trusting it were nonsense. There was not, and is not, a technical way to target a user with malicious OTA updates.
He was also one of 3 owners of a for-profit telecom that included Nick Merrill (Founder of Calyx). https://sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/2009536/000200953624000001/xslFormDX01/primary_doc.xml is the SEC filing for shares issued in February 2024 .
I don't see how any of this is an excuse to what has been said in the chats. Micay also lied about stepping down from GOS.
Ok first of all: GrapheneOS is great, probably the best alternative Android OS, but their PR skills are rock bottom. Still, many ignore that due to how good it is.
With that said, I don't believe their claim that it's impossible for them to target a user with a malicious OTA: their reason is basically that the update server never even knows who is downloading, and so it can't send a different file to just one user. That's true, but thet could, in theory, make a single OTA that everybody gets, but checks for a specific IMEI or other device ID and only there enables some malicious payload.
I trust them not to do it, for many reasons, but technically they could. I also don't think they'd do it to Louis, despite the beef they have with him.
Depends on the software. I'd not trust a vpn that was made in an authoritarian state. I'll play a game made in one.
As for the developer if they are more famous for their political views than the software I'd probably not install it.
Most of the time : Yes
But it depends on a lot of things :
Is there any viable alternatives ? What's the nature of the disagreement ? Is there a possibility of a fork emerging ? Etc...
I hate google but I can't replace Android studio at work or ask my employer to stop releasing updates on google play. If the disagreement is about project governance, I would support forking, see CoMaps or Forgejo. I will avoid projects for a variety of reason, two good examples are Manjaro and Hyperland, I avoid the former because of their collaboration politics and the later because they are plain bigots.
Politics can encompass a lot of thing and open source is a very political subject.
I know you do.
Well, you're here, aren't you?
Tbf, accessing a a software running on some server (which is not my machine) over Tor isn't exactly the same as, say, installing a software with admin privileges on my computer.
True that...
Then lemme try to give the answer you were asking for.
Let's start with Linux. The kernel itself has hundreds, if not thousands, of contributors. Next there's the pieces of software that run on it, each with its own set of contributors.
There's no way you can do anything meaningful by going thru this huge list just to see what their political backgrounds are. I'm sure there are controversial people contributing to the very pieces you are running right now.
Even if you did find some problematic backgrounds, what are you gonna do anyway? Stop using it? Do you think it would affect them? It's not like you're paying them. On the contrary, you're probably just gonna make your life harder.
I trust the Lemmy developers enough to use their platform hosted on external servers despite them being Marxist clowns, but I wouldn't self host without a thorough code review.
And I'm seriously just waiting for a decent piefed app in order to ditch the platform altogether. So far voyager is the most functionally complete one, but doesn't look very appealing.
Depends heavily on application (access required, sensitivity of data handled, etc) and nature of disagreement as it pertains to trustworthiness.
Example A: I use Lemmy even though I disagree politically with the original devs because the design appears sound and it doesn’t require access to sensitive data.
Example B: I won’t use anything from the Proton Foundation because the founders’ personal comportment and political leanings have led me to suspect that they intend to sell user data.
While I am... suspicious of what the CEO (?) has spouted recently, I am unaware of how that connects to user data. Can you ELI5/summarize/point me in a direction?
That was largely gut-level analysis for my personal decision-making but here are a few of the things I considered:
- Value proposition in the context of acquisition, featuring a heavily-marketed privacy brand and a base of privacy-conscious users (harder to profile, more expensive data)
- Obfuscation of funding sources via ‘venture philanthropy’ non-profit (a la OpenAI) housing closed-doors for-profit operations
- Rapid expansion to full-coverage consumer productivity cloud platform alternatives (vpn, mail, drive, calendar, wallet, passwords, etc)
- Weird pattern of being blocked then let through without future contest by numerous data-hungry entities including thiel, and generally just allowed in a few too many privacy-unfriendly places for my taste
- And the usual reservations re: privatized privacy and commercial OSS
Again sorry that’s all hand-wavy. Probably shouldn’t have thrown shade without something more concrete.
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I presumably already do. Am I expected to know every single maintainer of every single piece of software I boot up? That is a LOT of homework to run an application.
Genuinely can't tell if this a real question or some weird reductio ad absurdum thing on the not separating art from the artist trend in modern society.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ReiserFS
Reiser was convicted of the first-degree murder of his wife, Nina Reiser
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It depends:
If the software is neutral regarding the poitical topics, then yes of course.
I know one who makes "opinionated software" and says so, openly. If I would strongly disagree, then I would probably not trust the software. Fortunately I agree with his opinion :)
I'd see it as a seal of quality if the developer is a crank.
Yes because it can be verified by others even if you don't understand
Everyone else, in unison: "yes, someone else will say something if this is a bad program"
Someone Else™: wind gently blowing, as a tumbleweed goes by
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You use so much open source software--often indirectly--that it's almost impossible to avoid every asshole with an opinion.
That said, there is one dev where I disagreed with his actions so much that I actively avoid his stuff. It's not really political, but he's one of those devs who can do incredible work on his own, but has the social skills of a moldy sandwich. You may have used his work in the past indirectly, as his event library (libev) used to be the basis for Node.js. (The Node.js devs moved elsewhere many years ago due to technical issues such as Windows compatibility).
Anyways, he had a Perl event library known as AnyEvent. It has a bit of a weird, inside-out interface compared to most other event libs, but it works really well once you get the hang of it. The problem that came up was that he didn't like the way a certain extension module used AnyEvent. He threw a tantrum and had AnyEvent detect if that extension was loaded, and die() with a big error message about his personal opinion on the matter. This broke perfectly functioning systems when they upgraded AnyEvent.
That's when I stopped using his stuff and urged my coworkers to do the same. Can't risk that time bomb going off. Wasn't a small matter, either, as he also wrote the most common way to parse JSON on Perl.
One my neighbors is a highly skilled craftsman. I dont use that label loosley. I'm a very competent DIYer but his work is in a class above mine. He built a metal railing around his deck and it is immaculate. Clearly constructed by someone with years of welding experience and a keen eye for detail.
We don't really talk politics but I know for a fact that there are at least a few things we disagree on.
That said, I would absolutely hire him to fabricate something for me if I needed it. I really doubt he does his day job because of his political beliefs. I assume he takes a lot of pride in his work and would do the same quality job for me as he would for anyone.
It's a serious error to constantly try to distill people down to their politics. That's a divisive tactic intended to devalue and dismiss "the other side." Whoever that happens to be at the moment. Don't misunderstand what I'm saying. Politics are important and the way our governments and societies operate affects all of us. But, people are complex and multi-faceted beings with a wide variety of experiences that shape who we are. Our lives are highly contextual and consequently, so are our dealings with others.
I already do, I disagree with a lot of foss devs
Sure. Brave and GrapheneOS are two that I trust but have misgivings about their project heads.
If it has lots of independent eyes on the code and provides a service I need and can't find a superior solution to, sure, as I will not be needing any services that disagree with my political opinions and as long as I'm not financially supporting said developer.
There's such different views on life that I don't think its possible to get software designed close to what you or I believe in.
If the source is open, the code is viewable. So yes I think I can trust, at least the code.
Also there's a saying "trust but verify". So actually check to see if the binaries your getting actually behave the way you think.
If there's no alternative that has the feature set that software has, the alternatives are ultimately worse, and/or I cannot find a fork from another less egregious dev, then it's like I'd have any other choice if I need the software. If I don't need the software, good chance I might just stop using it and just uninstall.
It's why back when I heard that the people in charge of Audacity, back a few years ago, had potential plans on adding telemetry, I stopped using it all together. Of course I kinda moved back because, as far as I know, all the forks are basically dead and the team went back on those plans due to community uproar. Now I just keep it unable to connect via firewall to be safe.
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