[HN Gopher] Daniel Micay publicly steps down from GrapheneOS
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Daniel Micay publicly steps down from GrapheneOS
Author : joemazerino
Score : 41 points
Date : 2023-05-26 20:23 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (github.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
| buzzy_hacker wrote:
| Twitter thread:
| https://twitter.com/DanielMicay/status/1662212227561308160?c...
| JackGreyhat wrote:
| A statement from the man himself:
|
| https://twitter.com/DanielMicay/status/1662212227561308160
| JackGreyhat wrote:
| For those of you that want to stay on HN, and not visit
| twitter:
|
| From @DanielMicay:
|
| "I've stepped down as lead developer of GrapheneOS and will be
| replaced as a GrapheneOS Foundation director. I'll be ending my
| use of public social media. I'm unable to handle the escalating
| level of harassment including recent swatting attacks. There
| will be a smooth migration."
|
| "I'm confident the project will be in good hands with the rest
| of the development team. I'll be training them to handle
| everything I used to do myself. I haven't been a particularly
| active developer for a while now and there will be little
| impact on ongoing feature development."
|
| "One of our veteran developers will be taking over
| administration of the server infrastructure. Local
| infrastructure for official builds, signing and testing will be
| replicated in multiple locations and verified against each
| other to reduce trust in any particular location."
|
| "I'm going to focus on recovery from everything that has
| transpired since 2018. I have not been doing well, particularly
| in the past few weeks, but there has been no break from it
| since 2018. The police know about the swatting situation and
| are preventing it happening again."
| danjoredd wrote:
| https://grapheneos.social/@DanielMicay
|
| He is also posting the same to his Mastadon
| jet_32951 wrote:
| Daniel, I am sorry your efforts caused you pain. I hold you in my
| utmost respect and hope you will master the pain your efforts
| have cost you.
| pshirshov wrote:
| I hope that there would be less drama but the quality will remain
| the same.
|
| I'm in his (extremely long) black list, but I really admire the
| project and use GrapheneOS. And I would prefer to keep the drama
| if that helps the quality to be high.
| NoImmatureAdHom wrote:
| I have similar sentiments...
|
| Whatever's happening now seems to work, in that it results in
| the best we've got for privacy-respecting phones. Obviously
| Daniel's communication style isn't what most people would like,
| but we all have our difficulties in life.
|
| I wish him and the project well.
| CodeCompost wrote:
| I'm out of the loop. What's up?
| neilv wrote:
| Daniel Micay has been a rare powerhouse, founding and leading a
| great project.
|
| From the little I'm aware, it sounded like he was being harassed,
| and some of his public comments sounded like he was powering
| through stress.
|
| (PSA: Bad stress is bad. No matter how strong and resourceful and
| outwardly cool you are, the stress is not only unpleasant, but
| it's also secretly taking a toll. The smart move is to keep
| stress low.)
|
| I wish Micay all the best for health and happiness. I hope that
| he doesn't let recent stresses get him down, and that he gives
| himself a chance to recharge.
| dingusdew wrote:
| Please don't tell me we're having a CopperheadOS repeat. Not a
| lot of info is provided, so it's got me slightly worried.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CopperheadOS#License_change_an...
| orblivion wrote:
| So long as he doesn't have an internal conflict that leads him
| to delete the signing keys. So far I've only heard about him
| claiming to have issues with people outside of the
| organization.
| orblivion wrote:
| Actually he specifically said that he feels confident in the
| team taking over. I don't think this is like Copperhead at
| all.
| dtx1 wrote:
| Heads of to you Daniel, I am sure you are reading this. I still
| believe GrapheneOS to be the best custom rom out there by a mile
| and a half and I hope you will find a little more peace in your
| private life without social media! Thank you for all the work!
| [deleted]
| danjoredd wrote:
| I am unaware of the drama surrounding GrapheneOS, though I have
| been using it on my Pixel phone for a while now. What happened? I
| understand that there was some SWATting, but I know nothing else
| of what caused it or why people are upset
| kzrdude wrote:
| "some swatting" sounds horrible enough as it is, it seems to
| me.
| theothertimcook wrote:
| This is informative, and unfortunate...
|
| Hope the dude finds some peace.
| sremani wrote:
| I am not sure, but some context about Daniel's failings in
| communication may have contributed. The following is link to
| Louis Rossmann's video about his interaction with Daniel
| published today.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4To-F6W1NT0
|
| This is speculation of course on my part and I do not have any
| evidence connecting the video with the event itself.
| chantok wrote:
| I'm speculating that it is 100% because of that video. He got
| called out in a much larger audience this time and is unable to
| control it like in the project's forum and matrix channel.
| [deleted]
| bubblethink wrote:
| Wish Louis hadn't made this. The drama just detracts from the
| project. Louis is not really a stakeholder in any of this. He
| could have just moved on and forgotten about it.
| Kwpolska wrote:
| Louis' employer (FUTO) did donate to GrapheneOS.
| orblivion wrote:
| Seems to be some combination of inner and outer demons. Given
| what and how he's communicated, I'm really not sure what to think
| about what others have actually done to him at this point. I used
| to hold a grudge against him given his handling of the Copperhead
| situation, but now I have a lot more sympathy for him. Best of
| luck, and thank you for what you've built.
| sendfoods wrote:
| The whole saga is tragic. There are so many details that I don't
| know about, which probably makes me unable to judge the whole
| situation fairly. I am a very happy Graphene user, for what it's
| worth.
|
| Thank you for your contribution. All the best, Daniel.
| Lyngbakr wrote:
| Can someone provide a CliffsNotes version of what the "whole
| saga" is?
| gos_user wrote:
| It's been sad to watch. GrapheneOS really is an amazing
| operating system. From a technical perspective, it absolutely
| is the most private and security-focused phone OS out there.
| Daniel is an amazing developer with an incredible
| understanding of AOSP and security concepts, as is obvious to
| anyone who's read the materials on the GrapheneOS webpage.
|
| But the social negativity has been building for a long time.
| As lead developer (until today) of a prominent security-
| focused open source project, Daniel receives constant
| harassment, including from what are likely organized
| campaigns. I fully believe his statements that he recently
| got swatted, something tantamount to attempted murder. But he
| reacts very badly to the anonymous trolls, ascribing their
| actions to unrelated people. For instance, he's been fixated
| on Techlore (a relatively unimportant Youtuber) ever since
| Techlore posted a video about GrapheneOS that was mildly
| positive but overall critical. Daniel drew a connection
| between Techlore and trollish harassment he received around
| the same time--falsely, IMO--and ever since has consistently
| accused Techlore of organizing any harassment he receives.
| And the story repeats itself in Daniel's relationship with
| other groups in the privacy space (such as CalyxOS,
| r/privacy...). The fallout continues to expand, as any
| observer who expresses any nuance is accused by Daniel of
| toxicity, supporting harassers and harassment, etc.
|
| I'm willing to grant some leeway to people in Daniel's
| situation. It's tough to handle aggressive harassment and
| stalking and behave correctly every time in response. But
| there's a limit to how much you can get wrong, and Daniel has
| exceeded it. He can't keep drawing false connections between
| unrelated people and the real harassment he's receiving.
| Doing so won't stop the harassment, and it's going to torpedo
| GrapheneOS if something isn't done.
|
| My hope has been that someone close to him that he trusts
| would set up an intervention. Maybe that's what resulted in
| him stepping down today. I hope this will improve the
| community situation around GrapheneOS (whose _technical_
| reputation remains, I think, totally unscathed), and I really
| hope Daniel will now get the mental health relief that he
| needs.
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