At what point is a Linux OS a distinct distro? I assume they use Arch repos. But they also have their own repos.
And from what I read, they also developed a few things and didn’t just assemble already existing things. Like the agentic stuff where AI can solve an error message.
This doesn’t sound too much different from Mint, for example that use Ubuntu add/remove some things and still use Ubuntu update. Or MX Linux using Debian and their repos.
I’m mouse-centric, not a developer, and don’t care about AI. So I won’t test it nor would I be able to judge it. Besides hype reviews, I found a single bad review. It is un-dated, which isn’t great. But it seems to refer to a v3. So it may not be relevant here.
To signal what? Assuming those $1 million each person are their private investment or donation (and not from the companies). They could signal anything in a different way with that money. And outside the Linux nerd community, there is zero chance any living person (voter??) cares about Omarchy or who donates to it.
All of them seem to be tech people that are rich. Is anyone of them a controversial person (more than a tech millionaire would be)? Even if one is, I find it hard to believe there is a conspiracy of all of them. It isn’t like it is 100% AI CEOs. It seems to be a diverse tech pool. Dell is “old industry” in Tech. Shopify is old.. Coin base is crypto, OK, that may be a weird one.
What Omarchy seems to stand for:
None of those features alone seem unique, but it being in one distro might be new. However, tomorrow someone could step forward and use Arch or Fedora, or a different base, and do a similar thing.
I meant, a business case for him/Omarchy/investors. Not it being a product to sell to businesses. The target may be freelance developers, or home users. But since it is free, I don’t see the revenue (regardless of if a business would use it)
FWIW, the website claims they are at close to $15 million now.
A user just going to Omarchy website and installing Omarchy would never know who DHH is or what other people think of him. His bio linked from Omarchy website does not link to his blog posts (that people seem to not like). Unlike Lunduke, for example, DHH doesn’t put his personal opinions anywhere near the Omarchy project. And expanding use of Linux seems to be the only goal. They don’t even have a mission statement making some sort of societal claims. It is 100% Linux and nothing political, religious or ideological.
Just for comparison, I read the Debian Philosophy. They basically promote FOSS and welcome everyone who interacts constructively. That sounds exactly as un-political as Omarchy
I even researched and found where DHH even turned down Lunduke’s praise and says everyone is welcome and specifically tells people to leave politics outside. DHH specifically says that Omarchy isn’t anti-anything (Since Lunduke called it anti-woke). This is much more neutral than many projects. He literally said Communists and Capitalists can cooperate on making great Linux. How can he be more inclusive and non-political in regards to Omarchy? He has a personal opinion, but I see zero evidence of that being dragged into Omarchy (unlike Lunduke, for example, who basically makes his political beliefs the reason for his distro - and he is free to do that)
OK, now I have to wash my eyes since my search lead me to Twitter. The only crime DHH committed is to waste time on Twitter.
I have zero knowledge of the developers of all the distros I tried and still use. Nor do I care. I’m pretty sure the fewest will 100% match my opinions.