Why are popcon submitter counts falling?

[bariumbitmap]

The number of popularity contest submitters appears to be decreasing rapidly since May 2015.

http://popcon.debian.org/stat/release-1year.png

You can see it in coreutils and dpkg as well:

https://qa.debian.org/popcon-graph.php? ... beenhere=1

https://qa.debian.org/popcon-graph.php? ... beenhere=1

I could only find old discussions about a possibly related topic here:

https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2 ... 00349.html

Did the jessie release cause this, or was it something else? Just curious.

[millpond]

Jessie broke things, and systemd probably made alot of people unhappy.
If not for systemd-shim, I would certainly be outta here.

Anything that breaks scripts should be forbidden.

In short, Debian has pizzed off old users, and wont attract new ones to a system that cant reliably even find a bloody CD drive without hours of painstaking research, and a working knowledge of the Unix file system.

[somebodyelse]

There was this guy. He was an administrator for a huge server farm; the biggest server farm I ever saw. All his machines ran Debian and on every one he had installed Popcon. They say it was something to do with wanting to have emacs included with the default installation but I don't know if that's true. Then one day systemd came along and he didn't like the change. Debian just didn't feel the same anymore. So with a heavy heart, he switched off all his machines and left the server farm a broken admin. No one knows what happened to him. Some people say they saw him in Tulsa, asking strangers for money. Other people say he went to the Old World to start an old life. Others still say he went down south to Mexico. No one knows for sure.

Anyway, that would probably account for it.

[somebodyelse]

This kind of "insinuate what you know you cannot prove" video from May could also have done a lot of damage.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TmRHd27_ww

The same guy had no problem with systemd in Arch Linux and openSUSE over the last couple of years but as soon as it became the default for Debian he does a video like this and insinuates a Debian NSA contamination.

[twoflowers]

systemd exodus - well, I left myself.

[TomHirst]

If you follow the thread on popcon-devel it sounds like an issue with overloading on the popcon servers. So if anything that would suggest there are more users with Jessie (hence the extra load), not less...

[golinux]

Hmmm . . . first-time poster come to do damage control . . .

[millpond]

This kind of "insinuate what you know you cannot prove" video from May could also have done a lot of damage.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TmRHd27_ww

The same guy had no problem with systemd in Arch Linux and openSUSE over the last couple of years but as soon as it became the default for Debian he does a video like this and insinuates a Debian NSA contamination.

Its not an insinuation, its a statelemt that special logging streams built into the kernel for systemd were an NSA demand that Lannaert himself was not too happy about.

The government and its spy agencies are a prime Redhat customer, so what they want they get. Redhat is a corporate enterprise.

Debian is not, and allowing such clearly corporate crap to contaminate not only its archives, but to destroy its credibility - is beyond me.

I guess the next step is an obfuscated registry.
If we can take marching orders from Redhat, why not Redmond.

[somebodyelse]

^No - he was never bothered by that sort of thing before Debian had systemd as default. It is insinuation because he says "it's probably nothing" or something like that but suggests through its inclusion and the title of the video that it is an issue. This is a similar technique to Bryan Lunduke's double bluff Windows-promoting-posing-as-ironic "Windows is awesome" video.

[Randicus]

It could be as simple as fewer people caring about it and not choosing "Yes" during installation.
Or maybe systemd broke the Popcorn software.

[millpond]

^No - he was never bothered by that sort of thing before Debian had systemd as default. It is insinuation because he says "it's probably nothing" or something like that but suggests through its inclusion and the title of the video that it is an issue. This is a similar technique to Bryan Lunduke's double bluff Windows-promoting-posing-as-ironic "Windows is awesome" video.

The point is that the designer of systemd admitted NSA involvement, and that Debian went along with a compromised package.

The only arguable point is whether he was totally lying about it. I think not. (Hopefully, I'm wrong)
Argue the issue, never the man. Logic isnt always useful, but it mostly is. Connect the dots.

Becuase he was using systemd with arch does not imply he knew what it was until he investigated into what it was.

Hells bells, technically that makes *me* a supporter since I have the spawn of the devil installed here, where it will stay until I can finally I find a way to toss it into the pits of hell. Without compromising my system. (shim was a good start).

Just remember, users come to Linux to get away from the locked in crap.
Right now, I am trying to stabilize at 8.1 and then I'm off the grid - no updates, no garbage - until either Debian gets its act together, or I wind up building my own distro from disparate pieces.

I will not be recommending Debian to anyone, and in fact will warn against it for new users. If they want commercial crap then go to Ubuntu. On the Machine I am now building I will probably put LMDE Betsy, and scrap that after the dust settles.

Its one thing for commercial Linux distros to take their marching orders from korporate Amerika, but another when a planetary co-operative group starts to march lock-step with it. Lets just hope RMS can come up with an alternative.

mod-heartbeat was a wake up call. I am no conspiracy theorist.I believe the 'simple' versions of JFK, and 911. Occams Razor.
But the deeper I looked into that mysterious apache addon, and then 'bash-bleed' - the more I am convinced that DARPA is still here exerting its influence, however subtly.

Some folks may be desensitized about it. But for those that are - why bother with Linux, and especially, Debian?
The youtube poster was a hobbiest, so that is certainly a valid reason.
Perhaps popcon is indeed tring to send a message.

[buntunub]

I recall that the Popcorn counts were used during the systemd TC debate, and was one of the deciding factors. Now that the DDs have gone full capitulation mode with systemd, there is no further need to manipulate the Popcorn counts of systemd installs, so it makes sense that the counts are probably going back to normal.

[bariumbitmap]

Seems to be back to normal now.

https://qa.debian.org/popcon-graph.php? ... beenhere=1

https://qa.debian.org/popcon-graph.php? ... beenhere=1

[somebodyelse]

Actually, I'd like to know a bit more about this:

auditing: implemented for when your application needs to be NSA approved (that appeared to be the main reason, Lennart himself said he's not a big fan of it). Can log all system calls made to /etc/passwd etc to the audit log. Auditing is integrated with journald, audit-tools to read the logs have been improved.

My understanding is that auditing is there for the user to use when he needs to make sure his app is NSA compliant. It isn't a little NSA tracking thingy. Does anyone know how this works in practise?