Slackware maintainer getting ripped off | Hacker News Reader

Slackware maintainer getting ripped off

linuxquestions.org

124 pointsrunamok15 comments

I'm glad someone posted this.

TDLR; Patrick Volkerding (BDfL and developer of Slackware) needs financial assistance to work on Slackware but the donation button and proceeds of sales of DVDs and merchandise do not go directly to PV at present, and he has asked the company to remove the donation link.

PV's statement is at post 8 in the thread, direct link below

https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/slackware-14/donati...

Oh man that's really terrible to hear. I remember starting my linux journey with Slackware and 13 years later I couldn't imagine using anything other than linux for my work!

So how would one go about donating to him?

That is exactly the problem. The statement from PV suggests that he has had the donate link removed from Slackware's web site as it pointed to the company, and PV is not receiving donations directly from the company.

All we can do at present is monitor the tail of the linuxquestions thread for the appearance of something like a direct Paypal account or whatever.

I would strongly suggest him to remove the DNS entries for the store, snd redirect to a cafepress or donation page instead.

I'll throw a bitcoin into this (1.0 btc.) I suggest people do the same. Please post the bitcoin donation address.

That's awful. I can't even find a link on store.slackware.com to slackware.com. :(

Reading stories like this is really disheartening. This shows how much trust you need to put into the company you're working with to get such a store running. It seems it took a really long time til he got the actual sales figures and could know that they ripped him off.

As much as one might despise big players like patreon, PayPal etc. For being huge players and probably also big in collecting user data they just don't pull shit like this. They might suddenly change policies and conditions which sucks in its own way but they're simply not just keeping your money without telling you.

I tried to understand what slackware is from it's homepage, without much help. Can someone please explain what it is

Slackware is an historically important (and actively maintained) linux distribution (like Debian and Ubuntu)

The article below may help...

https://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20160725#slackware

Back when CDs were a thing and VERY slow modems were the norm you could find Slackware in bookstores, places like CompUSA, RadioShack, Circuit City, etc.

This was many folks' first exposure to Linux, Open Source Software, etc. and led many to pursue computer related professions.

For instance you can see this CD has Patrick's signature: http://www.cdaccess.com/html/pc/slack.htm

Awful. This needs to be voted up.

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