thelinuxexperiment
Andy Yen, the CEO of Proton (Mail, Drive, VPN, Pass...) answered a lot of the questions you, the community, asked, in an interview that covers basically everything!
He discusses security, privacy, the origins of Proton, how they operate, Linux support, future projects, products and features, quantum computing, passkeys, and more!
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#vpn #privacy #proton #onlinesecurity #protonmail
Timecodes:
00:00 Intro 01:16 How did Proton start? 03:24 Why start with email? 06:03 What is Proton's business model? 08:34 Why set up in Switzerland? 11:33 What data do you have on customers? 14:39 How is encryption important? 18:20 Do you always need to use a VPN? 20:47 Why focus on building an ecosystem? 24:55 Is an Office Suite planned? 26:29 What differentiates Proton from competitors? 30:26 Is Proton a viable alternative to big tech services? 33:31 Why expand to more products instead of finishing existing ones? 37:19 Does the general public care about privacy? 38:45 What's next for Proton services? 40:08 What are the plans for native Linux clients? 46:03 Will ProtonVPN offer dedicated IPs to everyone? 47:46 What's the environmental impact of Proton? 49:27 Proton on F-Droid, without Google Play notifications? 52:03 Why are code repos all separated and hard to find? 53:12 Why are addresses ending in ".me" ? 54:57 When will all apps reach feature parity? 56:24 Will SMTP relay be supported? 57:47 Will Proton focus more on businesses in the future? 59:50 Why put all your eggs in one basket with just Proton services? 01:01:00 Will Proton support passkeys? 01:03:21 Does E2E matter is the recipient isn't using it? 01:04:49 Will Proton disable port forwarding in VPN? 01:06:41 Is encryption enough to make email private? 01:09:06 What protects users from a change in Proton's code licensing? 01:11:14 How does Proton protect its infrastructure? 01:13:14 Impacts of Quantum Computing on privacy and security? 01:14:24 What's the future of Proton Bridge? 01:16:25 When will Proton photos be a thing? 01:17:17 Plans for Proton Notes? 01:18:20 Will VPN support the Apple TV? 01:21:12 Support the channel
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#Linux #OpenSource #TechNews #Ubuntu
Timecodes: 00:00 Intro 00:36 Sponsor: 10% off your first ebsite with Squarespace 01:33 Linus Torvalds talks about the future of Linux 03:58 Ubuntu might drop older CPUs 06:57 LXQt working on Wayland as well 08:33 Cosmic gets more improvements 09:48 GNOME & KDE updates 11:45 Gaming: Linux beats Windows, No Fortnite on Linux 15:17 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 16:24 Support the channel
Linus Torvalds talks about the future of Linux
Ubuntu might drop older CPUs
https://ubuntu.com/blog/optimising-ubuntu-performance-on-amd64-architecture
https://www.phoronix.com/news/Ubuntu-24.04-LTS-Desktop-Plans
LXQt working on Wayland as well
https://lubuntu.me/noble-alpha-featureset/
https://www.phoronix.com/news/Lubuntu-24.04-LTS-Plans
https://lubuntu.me/noble-alpha-featureset/
Cosmic gets more improvements
https://blog.system76.com/post/the-spirit-of-cosmic-december-updates
GNOME & KDE updates
https://pointieststick.com/2023/12/15/this-week-in-kde-un-flashy-important-stability-work/
https://thisweek.gnome.org/posts/2023/12/twig-126/
Gaming: Linux beats Windows, No Fortnite on Linux
https://steamcommunity.com/groups/SteamClientBeta/announcements/detail/3860211327585452520
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Timecodes: 00:00 Intro 00:51 Sponsor: ProtonVPN 02:21 Standardization and cohesiveness 05:31 Packaging formats and app distribution 07:17 Display, Wayland, HDR, and scaling 09:27 Drivers, graphics and firmware 11:40 Gaming 13:06 App support 14:31 More challenges? 17:02 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 18:00 Support the channel
#Linux #desktop #operatingsystem #linuxdesktop #linuxdistro
Unified theming between desktops is pretty much abandoned as a thing that should be pursued, but we're also seeing an accent colors standard emerge. And that's complimented by the work being done on portals. With portals for settings, screenshots, remote desktops, printing, sending email, creating shortcuts or transferring files, there's now a solid abstraction layer between your desktop and the apps it runs.
But, for now, we're not there yet. These standards are progressing, but they're not all encompassing, and they're not implemented equally across all desktops. The big ones, like GNOME and KDE, sure, but other smaller options aren't there yet.
Packaging formats, at the end of 2023, are in a bad state. Linux packaging has never been messier. As neither flatpak nor snap are fully ready for 100% of applications, some stuff simply can't be packaged using these, and they still have drawbacks that some users don't want to deal with. Which means a lot of app developers still can't say "hey, this is what we should be using now".
The display situation is much better though. X11 is now clearly abandonware, and work on Wayland has been stellar in 2023. Mostly all desktops now have plans for Wayland, everyone is in agreement.
Added to that, work on supporting HDR has moved by leaps and bounds, and we'll see a fully working implementation in 2024. Fractional scaling is now properly implemented on Wayland as well, meaning we can finally do non blurry scaling, with different scaling per monitor, and different refresh rates per monitor as well.
As per drivers, we've seen some solid progress as well. AMD now has solid drivers on launch day for their GPUs, Intel has finished their Xe driver, Arc GPUs are now well supported, and nvidia drivers have progressed a lot. We're also seeing very strong efforts for open source nvidia drivers.
As per firmware, the linux firmware vendor system, or LVFS has also seen broad adoption, letting you apply firmware updates on the fly and easily. This already supplied 100 million firmware updates, and Google is even pushing manufacturers to support that for their own Linux based Chrome OS.
Gaming has been incredible in 2023. Not only did Linux pass macOS market share for Steam, but we've seen great support for the Steam Deck, which, in turn, means great support for Linux. Sure, it's all driven by Proton and Wine, it's not native Linux ports, but my opinion is that it doesn't matter: if you can click install, and then play, and run the game with the performance you'd expect, things are good.
Non steam gaming has also progressed immensely, with Heroic becoming a really fantastic launcher for Gog and EPic Games, and Lutris still handling most of the rest.
Now for app support, I'd say we haven't seen many improvements in 2023. Sure, our own open source apps have progressed this year, but the usual suspects are still missing, that would let a lot more people move to Linux. Still no Office, Adobe apps, a lot of content creation software, or CAD software are still missing, with no indication that it will change.
The big challenge I can see is AI integration in the desktop. It's a move Microsoft is making with Windows 12, adding AI powered search, and automations throughout the desktop. Whether we should chase that trend on Linux, I'll let you decide, but what's certain is that once users have had a few years to get used to one click buttons that save 30 minutes, it will be hard to go back.
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#Linux #OpenSource #technews
Timecodes: 00:00 Intro 00:34 Sponsor: 10% off your first website with Squarespace 01:31 Zorin OS 17 beta 03:49 Mint 21.3 brings Wayland support 05:03 Giant AI alliance forming 06:33 EU regulates AI 08:00 systemd brings blue screen of death 09:38 Giant security flaw affects most Windows and Linux systems 11:18 GNOME improves scaling & triple buffering 13:25 Gaming News: Steam Deck, wine on Wayland 15:23 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 16:27 Support the channel
Zorin OS 17 beta
https://blog.zorin.com/2023/12/04/a-sneak-peek-at-zorin-os-17/
https://linuxiac.com/zorin-os-17-beta-unveiled-with-striking-improvements/
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/12/zorin-os-17-beta-released7
Mint 21.3 brings Wayland support
https://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=4604
Giant AI alliance forming
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/12/meta-ibm-assemble-open-source-ai-alliance
The EU regulates AI
systemd brings blue screen of death
https://www.phoronix.com/news/systemd-255
Giant security flaw affects most Windows and Linux systems
GNOME improves scaling + triple buffering
https://www.phoronix.com/news/GNOME-Shell-Better-Text-Scaling
https://thisweek.gnome.org/posts/2023/12/twig-125/
https://www.phoronix.com/news/GNOME-Triple-Buffering-Ready
Gaming News: Steam Deck, SteamOS, wine on Wayland
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Timecodes: 00:00 Intro Sponsor: Start securing your CentOS 7 fleet now 02:06 Slimbook Hero 03:32 Design & Build Quality 04:45 Specs and options 07:02 Performance & Gaming 09:25 Display 10:06 Keyboard & Mouse 11:20 Software Experience 12:36 Linux gaming laptop? 14:10 Support the channel
#Laptop #Gaming #Linux
It's a 15 inch device, with a 1440p display that refreshes at 165 hertz, with an aluminium chassis, a 13th gen Intel i7 CPU, an RTX 4060 GPU, as much RAM as you could cram into a laptop, and very solid I/O.
So, this thing is chunky: it's not meant to be an ultrabook, it weighs 2.1 kilos, or 4.6 pounds, and it's pretty damn sturdy. Not much give or flex to this chassis, thanks to the aluminium.
The hinge is really solid as well, with minimal wobble when typing. It's a 16:9 form factor. Of course you can open the laptop, and access the 2 M.2 slots for SSDs, the 2 DDR5 RAM slots, and the battery, which is 62 Wh. You can also buy spare parts from Slimbook, including the bezel cover, touchpad, lid, battery, keyboard palm rest, display, and more.
Now, in terms of specs, this laptop is well equipped, with a core i7 13620H, and an Nvidia RTX 4060, with 8 gigs of VRAM.
You can spec the rest up to your liking, with up to 64 gigs of DDR 5 RAM, at 5200 Mhz, and up to 4TB of PCIE4 storage.
You can also choose to dispose with the gamer branding and use a more unified black keyboard instead of having the white accents on the WASD keys, and you can pick any keyboard language you want.
As per I/O, on the left, you get a kensington lock, a USB 2.0 port, probably for a mouse, a mic jack, and a headphone jack. On the back, you have a mindisplay port, USB C 3.2 gen 2 with dusplayport support, HDMI 2.1, a gigabit ethernet port and the barrel charger, since charging this thing over USB would be a challenge. And on the right, there's an SD card reader, and 2 type A USB 3.2 ports.
On top of all that, you get Bluetooth 5.2, Wifi 6, a basic webcam and onboard mic that won't blow your socks off, dual speakers that are pretty decent, and a backlit keyboard with RGB, because, gamer.
In terms of benchmarks, the CPU get a score of 2733 in single core and 11625 in multi core on Geekbench 6.
https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/3787232
Battery life is decent, with about 7h of generic office work with wifi on, 50% brightness, and using the silent mode.
In Horizon Zero Dawn, at the native 1440p resolution, without any upscaling, and at the ultra preset, the Slimbook Hero managed a super smooth 60 FPS.
For Shadow of the Tomb Raider, also at 1440p without upscaling, and the ultra preset, I got 99 FPS on average, sometimes going down to about 80, or up to 120.
The display is really solid, it covers 100% of SRGB, it has a refresh rate up to 165hz, and it's 1440p.
The keyboard is solid enough. The keys are very stable, and they have good travel. They're quite clicky, and the sound is pleasant, and they bounce back super fast, it's very nice to type on.
The touchpad is ok. It's smooth enough, and precise, although it's very off center, which I find annoying in day to day use.
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00:00 Intro 00:59 Sponsor: Proton 02:17 Data grabbing 05:07 Why this data matters 07:41 Laws make it worse 11:11 What you can do 14:04 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 15:07 Support the channel
Playlist on how to De-Google your life: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqmbcbI8U55EfYUVdZfjrfyJyNHD-Bly8
#Privacy #anonymity #private
Virtually everything online now collects data. And this data doesn't just stay at the company that collected it. This data is a giant repository for governments to use and track or monitor their citizens.
See, in a LOT of countries, governments have the right to ask a company to provide all the data they've collected on their users. Companies have no choice but to comply with these, which is also why using end to end, and zero access encrypted services is crucial.
For example, the US can request any company to give them data on a specific user, they've done so more than any other country in 2020. But other countries do the exact same: Germany, Denmark, South korea, France, virtually ever country does this.
If you want even more scary numbers, in 2022, Meta, the parent company for Facebook, Instagram, or Whatsapp, got 827K requests for data. They complied with 76% of these requests.
There are a lot of legal offensives being planned, or already implemented in various countries, so let's look at a few.
In Russia, recent laws from 2017 banned anonymous use of online messaging apps, and prohibits the use of tools that would circumvent government censorship. This means that while VPNs aren't exactly banned, if they let people access banned websites, then they'll also be banned. This has happened to at least 15 VPNs, including NordVPN, ProtonVPN, and OperaVPN.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/08/01/russia-new-legislation-attacks-internet-anonymity
In Australia, in 2021, a law was proposed to force people to attach their real name to their social media posts, apparently to fight online trolls, bullying and harrassment. Users would have had to provide an ID before opening any social media account, which would obviously open the door to surveillance, monitoring, and censorship.
https://ia.acs.org.au/article/2021/govt-wants-to-end-online-anonymity.html
In France, we have the recent SREN law. This thing would give the telecom watchdog powers to block websites, and require tools for age verification. On top of that, the law will give the government capabilities to demand web browsers and DNS providers block certain websites.
https://adguard.com/en/blog/france-web-browser-dns-blocking-law.html
in the UK, the Online Safety Bill of 2022 allows the regulatory agency Ofcom to force websites to collect people's personal data, and they'll be able to scan, restrict and remove content that is considered harmful. The bill also mandates online communication services to be moderated, which basically means end to end encryption can be enabled there anymore.
https://datainnovation.org/2022/05/the-uks-online-safety-bill-undermines-encryption-and-anonymity/
So, what can you do about this? For protecting your data, there are plenty of things you can do. First, stop using privacy invasive operating systems. If you can't move to something like Linux, try at least to disable all the telemetry you can in Windows or macOS, in Android and iOS. You can try using a degoogled, privacy focused Android ROM on your smartphone.
Leaving Chrome for a more private browser is also pretty much mandatory. Same goes for your online services: stop using Google as a search engine, Gmail, or stuff like Outlook, OneDrive, iCloud, and the like. Using a VPN is also a solid option to at least try and blur the lines.
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#Linux #Systemd #opensource
00:00 Intro 00:42 Sponsor: 10% off your first website 01:36 Init systems and SystemD 03:21 SystemD is bloated? 05:48 Everything depends on it now? 07:01 It's a Red Hat project? 08:44 It restricts choice and modularity? 09:51 It makes Linux less secure? 10:59 Why use systemD? 12:37 Parting thoughts 13:52 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 14:52 Support the channel
All Linux based systems use an Init system, short for initialization: it's the first process that starts after you boot your OS, and it runs in the background while you're using your computer, to manage system services, and various processes. For many, many Linux distros, SystemD is this init system.
SYstem D is a relatively recent project, at the scale of Linux anyway, it started in 2010, and was spearheaded by Red Hat. Its goal was to replace the existing solutions, like SysV or Upstart, to make things faster and more resilient.
It quickly became the default on Fedora, obviously, then on Arch Linux, Debian, Ubuntu, SUSE, and many, many others.
The famous Bloat argument is one advanced most often. System D, as time went on, encompassed more and more features that were generally handled by individual services, not the init system itself, like device management, login, or network management and creating logs.
This can be perceived as going against the Unix philosophy, where a piece of software is supposed to do just one thing, and to communicate well with other small systems.
What's certain is that most distros that implement it are general purpose distros, that need to provide as many systems as possible, and so they tend to use most of systemD's features and modules.
SystemD also "hides away" certain configurations with its own tools, like systemctl, instead of exposing everything as a config file. Whether these things are important or not, though, depend on the person.
Another criticism levelled at System D is the fact that it has become so pervasive that a lot of other components are created with a hard dependency on it: without SystemD, they can't work at all, or will have a limited featureset. This results in some extra work for distros that don't want to use systemD, as they have to use an alternative implementation of these features.
Another regular criticism of SystemD comes from the fact it's mainly a Red Hat project, or at least was started by Red Hat. The fact remains that while systemD was started at Red Hat, it IS an open source project, and it is receiving contributions from a lot of people that aren't at Red hat.
Another criticism of SystemD is that it's making Linux based systems uniform and that it restricts choice. I'd argue this isn't really true, since there ARE other alternatives, like OpenRC, Dinit, SysVInit and more.
One final problem people identify with SystemD is system security. First, there's the fact that having one single system that powers the init and service management of most distros is a security risk: an attacker can target many, many systems by targeting systemD.
Second, some people would say that since SystemD is huge and does a lot of things, it has a very large attack surface.
But why would you WANT to use it, exactly?
SystemD is a unified project, which means you don't have to learn 20 different programs if you need to interact with something: you learn how systemD works, and you can manage everything.
Compared to other init systems, it's also simpler, as it opens various sockets that services can plug into, and services can start in mostly any order. And finally, systemD is written in C, and isn't the usual compilation of bash scripts, so it tends to be faster and more efficient than many other init systems.
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#Linux #OpenSource #TechNews
00:00 Intro 00:47 Sponsor: Thunderbird 01:40 Microsoft has to open Windows 03:22 FSF calls to the EU for more open source 05:06 AMD is teasing some FOSS work around AI 06:36 Peertube's roadmap looks pretty awesome 08:21 Desktop Environment news 10:47 Kernel 6.7 is full of good stuff 12:39 Gaming: Deck OLED, SteamOS update, Wine on Wayland 15:40 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 16:36 Outro
Microsoft has to open Windows
FSF calls to the EU for more open source
https://fsfe.org/activities/upcyclingandroid/openletter.en.html
AMD is teasing some FOSS work around AI
https://www.phoronix.com/news/AMD-Advancing-AI-Open
Peertube's roadmap looks pretty awesome
https://framablog.org/2023/11/14/lets-regain-ground-on-the-toxic-web-framasofts-2023-report/
Desktop environment news
https://thisweek.gnome.org/posts/2023/11/twig-122/
Kernel 6.7 is full of good stuff
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/11/linux-6-6-kernel-confirms-long-term-support
https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.7-rc1
https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.7-USB-Thunderbolt
https://www.phoronix.com/review/bcachefs-linux-67
Gaming: Deck OLED, SteamOS update, Wine on Wayland
https://9to5linux.com/steam-deck-oled-is-now-available-to-order-with-hdr-display-and-bigger-battery
https://www.phoronix.com/news/SteamOS-3.5.5
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#internet #ads #marketingdigital
00:00 Intro 00:44 Sponsor: Learn how to deal with ransomware attacks 01:32 The ad-based internet 04:08 Twitter: anything but the kitchen sink 05:46 Reddit: shooting themselves in the foot 07:14 Youtube: nickel and diming 08:58 Alternative platforms won't save us 11:43 Three possible outcomes 14:41 The Ad Based internet is on its way out 15:13 Sponsor: Get a PC that was made to run Linux 16:02 Support the channel
Google has shown that with enough scale, just running ads on a website is enough to keep the content free of charge. But of course, as with everything where money is involved, it went way too far. This limited the ad revenue, and so websites decided to add more ads.
To compound that, ads started paying less and less, so websites started chasing profits by making the internet worse for everyone.
Twitter's revenue is 89% ads. It has existed for more than 10 years, and has never made any money. So even at that scale, ads are just not working to sustain a company.
All the changes Musk is making to Twitter, like firing most of the workforce, charging for the API, limiting the number of tweets, Twitter Blue, it's all to try and turn a profit. So, the experience of Twitter is now ten times worse, because ads don't work.
Now let's look at Reddit. Reddit is about as popular as Twitter. And Reddit isn't profitable either. They're kept afloat by raising money from investors. And so Reddit charges for their API now. Reddit made their site worse for everyone: the regular users, and also everyone browsing the internet and landing on reddit to see a "this subreddit is private" message, making any web search ultra inefficient.
And we can also look at Youtube. Youtube is HUGE. And it's hard to know if youtube is profitable or not. The consensus seems to be that it is, but the actions of youtube seem to indicate that maybe it's not THAT profitable. For example, youtube seems to be planning some moves against adblockers. Youtube is also taking steps against third party frontends, like Invidious. They wouldn't do stuff like that if profit growth was awesome.
I love alternative platforms, but they'll probably never replace the giant ones: they don't offer a business model for people to create content on them.
As a user, you probably don't care about that. And the person running the instance of said platform maybe is ready to fund it out of pocket, but the people creating the content on these platforms? They're not making money from them.
And so as ad-based internet models start dying off, I have a feeling we're going to be faced with 3 options
First, the big platforms survive as-is with the ads, you can still have ads on your own website, but the platforms will start keeping more and more of the ad revenue.
This is where we're heading now. People are tired of ads and their privacy invasion, and the over abundance of them, but platforms seem to think this is the way to go.
Second option, the big platforms and websites evolve to another model, like paywalling everything behind a paid subscriptions like Youtube Premium.
It would basically kill off an entire portion of the internet, but it probably wouldn't be the worst portion to lose.
Third option, the big platforms and the internet as a whole can't find a new model to replace ad based ones, and big platforms and big websites die off. Content creation becomes a hobby mostly.
This is probably the best outcome for the internet as a whole, as it would probably kill off most clickbait, disinformation, AI generated crap. We would have far less things to read and watch, but a lot of if would be higher quality.
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#Linux #OpenSource #TechNews
00:00 Intro 00:38 Sponsor: Regain control of your internet connection 01:35 Ubuntu's new app store favors snaps over debs 03:36 GNOME 45 alpha is out 05:09 Fedora plans to add telemetry 06:59 Canonical takes control of the Linux Container Daemon 08:13 Ubuntu will let you pick the apps you want at install 09:39 Solus 4.4 and Budgie 11 news 11:24 Gaming News: Steam Deck wins Linux gaming, Steam beta 12:44 Sponsor: Get a PC that was made to run Linux 13:43 Support the channel
Ubuntu's new app store favors snaps over debs
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/07/ubuntu-23-10-new-app-store-deb-support
GNOME 45 alpha is out
https://9to5linux.com/gnome-45-alpha-is-now-available-for-public-testing-heres-whats-new
Fedora plans to add telemetry
https://linuxiac.com/fedora-40-plans-to-use-telemetry/
https://blogs.gnome.org/wjjt/2023/07/05/endless-oss-privacy-preserving-metrics-system/
Canonical takes control of the Linux Container Daemon
https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd/
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/07/canonical-takes-full-control-of-lxd
https://linuxiac.com/lxd-containers-project-goes-under-canonical-wing/
Ubuntu will let you pick the apps you want at install
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/07/ubuntu-new-unified-install-plans-sound-meh
Solus 4.4 and Budgie 11 News
https://linuxiac.com/solus-os-4-4-released/
https://blog.buddiesofbudgie.org/wayland/
Gaming News: Steam Deck wins Linux gaming, Steam beta
https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/4397053/view/3666541770799548342
https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/07/nearly-40-of-linux-gamers-on-steam-are-on-steam-deck/
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#Linux #linuxdistro #operatingsystem
00:00 Intro 00:35 Sponsor: Stream any OS, desktop or app to any PC 01:29 The Classic Linux Distro Model 02:57 Why it's broken 04:25 Distros are moving away 05:52 The new model isn't perfect, but still better 08:31 All other OSes do this 09:22 Why distros package apps in the first place 10:14 Universal Packages 11:40 You don't have a choice 13:32 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 14:27 Support the channel
This video was inspired by the following blog post, which echoed my sentiment and ideas exactly: https://www.ypsidanger.com/the-distribution-model-is-changing/
The distro packages the software for their users. Not the developers of the software, the distro itself. So the distro has a decent amount of control over what they offer, but the users of the distro don't, and the developers of the apps also don't. And this model doesn't really work.
On the surface, for users, it does work. You get a lot of applications from a central repo, and the system is generally pretty stable, depending on the distro you pick. But in the background, you have the thousands of orphaned packages that are still in the repos but aren't maintained. The old apps that can't be packaged at all anymore. The maintainers spending a lot of time repackaging and recompiling software that has already been packaged.
One might not like Ubuntu's snap packages, or Flatpak, or AppImages, but it's undeniable that most distros are moving towards them.
When Ubuntu moves Firefox and Chromium from a deb package to a snap, it's a GOOD THING. For Ubuntu. Because instead of having to package each new version of Firefox or CHromium for all currently supported versions of Ubuntu, they only have to package them once.
Same thing when Red Hat drops the LibreOffice RPM in favor of the Flatpak. Not having to package that behemoth of an app will free up time for Red Hat developers to work on HDR, improving Wayland, and supporting color management.
And moving the packaging of an app from the distro to the app developer means less time spent debugging stuff, and more time spend on improving the app.
So why did Linux distros start packaging software instead of app developers?
It was because there were so many different systems using the same packaging formats, deb or RPM or whatever else, but different libraries, kernels, drivers, and everything else, that app developers simply did not have a way to distribute their own software to every distro.
But nowadays, we DO have formats that let you distribute applications everywhere with one single package.
They lack some features, especially due to the sandboxing they tend to use, that limits how they can interact with other apps. Thing is, these formats are still under heavy development.
But the real question is: do you prefer staying on the current model where we stagnate, duplicate work, and where developers and users have no control over which version of the software is used, or would you rather face a few teething issues, but let developers improve their apps, and the whole of the Linux software ecosystem?
I know what I choose, and it's not these old packages. And presumably, if you stick to mainstream distros, like Fedora, Ubuntu, or their main derivatives, chances are you're not going to have a choice either. Because whether you like it or not, we're moving to Flatpak or Snap on most distros.
It's more efficient, and their current problems can and will be fixed. The duplication of work that legacy packaging creates is unfixable, it's a structural problem.
And of course, if you hate these universal packaging formats, I'm sure you'll still be able to find a lot of distros that will not move to them even in the future. You'll just be running the non official version of an app, just like what you're doing right now when using a distro's package.