Linus Torvalds Calls NVIDIA The Worst Company Ever

This was an interesting article. Though I've always tried to make do with the open drivers, and generally felt vaguely uncomfortable with, and a little sceptical of, some of the enthusiasm over nVidia graphics drivers, I never realized it was this big an issue. I never imagined Linus Torvalds would be this aggrieved and openly hostile towards a proprietary, but Linux-supporting company.

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But I actually want to point out something else.

There was this very interesting link included in the article, leading to a story last fall which I for one hadn't seen before.

Gigabyte's ASPM Motherboard Fix: Use Windows http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTAwMjg

In light of the recent fuss over UEFI Secure Boot for Windows 8 -- and the facile claims that it's not really a problem, because the actual implementation of Secure Boot is entirely up to the OEMs rather than up to Microsoft -- I wish I had this link handy for earlier discussions.

<sarcasm>Our Dear Leader hath spoken, all hail Torvalds!</sarcasm>

No.... that would be His Exaltedness, Richard M Stallman. </more_sarcasm>

For Linus to express such open hostility to a proprietary actor is more remarkable. Try and follow the actual point, 'kay?

It is remarkable, because Linus has always been overly-tolerant of GPL violations, and pretty blase about closed code. Nvidia must have done something especially noxious.

Nowhere did he blame the drivers per se, rather the cooperation with the company. Also, if my memory serves me well, his official stance towards closed drivers is something in the lines of: "Go ahead, use those, but don't come back to us weeping when it bites you in the arse."

What tuxchick said. I wish I knew the history behind this.

The Phoronix article might help with understanding his outburst.