Over 97% of the 'Linux' Foundation's Budget Goes Not to Linux (opens in new tab)

Reading through the list of projects that the Linux Foundation supports (via infrastructure, governance, events, etc) with the other 181 million is honestly shocking. They are supporting, among like a thousand others - NodeJS/OpenJS, PyTorch, Electron, K8s, vLLM, ONNX, PX4, GraphQL - plus the 'smaller' entries like Zephyr, Containerd, gRPC, KiCAD, ESLint, Fastify, etc. Their portfolio is literally insane. This is the BlackRock of the entire digital world.

Without bending over backwards to defend the Linux Foundation, I'll point out that the 97% number means very little -- the percentage that actually matters is the percentage that doesn't go towards funding open source at all. The Linux Foundation hasn't been solely about Linux for decades; they are (facially) responsible for hosting a very large number of open source projects.

8 million (~3%) towards the Linux kernel

180 million (~65%) towards ancillary project support, which includes a huge ecosystem of useful technologies around linux

Their 'corporate operations' overhead is like 5% of expenses. whoop.

2% on the Linux kernel. 1% on open hardware. 4% on blockchain.

I think that says it.

They do support many other projects and seem to be stewards of the Linux ecosystem in general, but... 4% on blockchain?! I also feel many other projects should have their own funding: they're key to many businesses and that the 'Linux' foundation sponsors them is (a) good but (b) misplaced in the overall messed up system that is open source reliance and sponsorship.

To be fair, you should say that over 97% of the Linux Foundation's budget goes not to the Linux kernel.

There's more to Linux than the kernel.

The executive compensation is pretty shocking

https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/460...

I see a whole boatload of fairly big and important open source infrastructure projects that run on Linux. Sure, maybe 97% of its budget doesn't go directly to the linux kernel, but they're supporting a lot of critical stuff.

What is the 181M$ mysterious "Project Support" in the graph means? Linux is labeled separately, so it cannot be the "Project".

My favorite part of this is when they say this

> Linus Torvalds is not in charge and is no longer compensated fairly, either. The highest paid people don't even use Linux. Torvalds is no longer in the top 10 (not anymore).

And then link to a filing that shows his “compensation” being lower than the others but also having an extra million dollars in the “other” column.

https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/460...

It kind of looks like if you count the extra million dollars earmarked for him he would be the highest-paid person on the list?

Another angle is that most donations to Linux kernel are in the form of paid employees doing kernel work. I wonder how much the kernel need besides that.

Still far better than most charitable funds.

As a 24 year linux user, linux foundation is cancer, they don't use linux themselves.

Well this is in line with the fact the LF has been quiet about these new Age Verification laws. The LF should be very vocal about how these laws will hurt Linux.

It is almost seems like the LF wants these laws :(

15M on corporate BS

16M on event services

only 8M on the kernel

Thanks for reminding me why i do not support nor respect this criminal foundation full of fraudsters

I have some experience with the CNCF and oh boy is it a huge powergrab with excuse of inclusivity, wokeness and all the stuff that comes with it. Rarely seen so many self serving people that are in it for themselves as in the CNCF.

Yes, downvote away.