Is Linux About Choice?

>no, seriously: Linux is a kernel, and has nothing to do with choice. It has, however, something to do with ethics in games journalism.

What?

For what it's worth, I completely disagree with this site. Even if you only look at Linux as a kernel, one can compile it with whatever combination of options one likes.

But Linux is an entire ecosystem, not just a kernel. One of the advantages to the openness of the Linux ecosystem is that there are usually at least two options for whenever there could conceivably be a choice. I like that opportunity for customization.

When people say Linux is not about choice, I usually find it's because they're defending systemd. I'll be the first to admit that systemd has some good ideas. But I don't like how it spreads like kudzu across the system until common, low-level programs depend on systemd and systemd depends on their own versions of those programs instead of relying on a commonly agreed upon interface.

Odd contrast between the garishly huge "no" and the flyspeck-sized body of the page

Redhat employee being against choice is somewhat expected. It's almost inevitable for big tech corporations to promote such attitudes into their culture. But choice is what makes Linux so much different from other desktop OSes. Like I was on Ubuntu distros for a decade, but was never really satisfied with all the bloat, change for the sake of change, release upgrades, outdated packages. Now I'm moving to Arch, pretty much the opposite of all that. And it would be impossible for Arch to exist without Linux being about choice.