MOFO Linux.com Domain Sold; Project Archived

2026-04-07T09:47:34.563000Z

The MOFO Linux Project is being archived. Due to declining user interest in the MOFO Linux and increasingly unfavorable news, social media, and legislative environments, I have decided to get rid of the domain and wind down the project. It is an untenable situation and I am done with offering liberation to people who don't want it, and in an information environment completely enshittified by right wing techno fascists and Nazis.

When I first started bulding Linux systems with integrated anti-censorship and anti-surveillance tools, there were actually platforms and news sources worthy of the effort. I could enter a censored environment, easily break out, and have no limits on my access to social media platforms, news sites, or other gathering places.

Now, in the spring of 2026, the platforms themselves are the problems. Social media platforms, search engines, and news sites are all closing off to usage by people connecting through anonymity or censorship circumvention tools. Worse, the escape from one disinformaion-infested environment merely leads to the arrival in another one. Yesterday, I literally found both NPR and the BBC repeating far-right lies told by a head of state. On top of that, Linux distributions are caving to government pressure against anonymity on the internet. How often do I need to repeat that some things are no one else's business (NOYFB)?

As many distributions as there are, Linux is still too centralized. As with Microsoft, Apple, and Google, governments can take aim at distributions, or individual maintainers, then pressure them to install backdoors or surveillance. Operating system age verification is exactly that. Don't ever be dismissive about it; age verification is an opener into further intrusions. You may call it governance; I call it a game of "just the tip." Once you accept the tip, you become a player, sooner or later to take the whole length and girth.

The well-being of kids is just a pretext! Otherwise, something would have been done long ago to curb gun deaths of children. Or hunger. Or abuse. The real issues in contention are anonymity and governability of computer users. As Bruce Lee once said, "Be like water."

God damn all of the KYC being implemented against internet users. I will not use any Linux which obstructs my anonymity or freedom of use, nor will I ask you to use a compromised operating system. I will burn it all down before giving in. Rather than risk fines and prosecution from multiple formerly free countries, I am freezing MOFO Linux on SourceForge at its most recent release - version 9.7.0.

Bear in mind that recent MOFO Linux releases contain the Linux-Respinner scripts with which enable you, if you desire, to unpack the iso images, chroot into the filesystems, and do your own modifications. You can update to current Debian software packages and rebuild the iso images and continue using them.

I have a better suggestion: abandon conventional Linux and start using image-based distributions, such as Bluefin, Bazzite, Vanilla OS, or Nitrux. Install Tor, I2P, and Sshuttle, then whatever apps you prefer, for whatever purpose. You can do anything, and I mean ANYTHING, with Flatpaks, AppImages, and Docker containers.

In closing, let me say this: Linux needs to decentralize more if it is to remain free as in freedom. Governments are putting on pressure, down to the level of people who share distros, respins, apps, and users. Linux needs to be like water, my friends. You and I need to be like water too, or we are all done.

Thank you for riding along on this trip. Good luck and hang tough.

Cheers,
Philip Collier / MOFO Linux

MOFO Linux v9.6.0 Released

2025-08-30T04:45:31.723000Z

Hello Linux Users,

MOFO Linux has been upgraded to version 9.6.0 and is available worldwide for download. This update contains a kernel upgrade and bug fixes:

Kernel 6.16, with the Xanmod efficiency and speed tweaks. This upgraded kernel has improved EXT4 filesystem read and write performance and also faster OppenVPN throughput.
Adjustments to Tor-Remote and Tor-Controller scripts.
Manual adjustments to the Neovim color scheme.
Neovim plugins have been upgraded.
Set Radiostreamer and SuperSDR wrapper menus to case-insensitive.

Remember, there is no solution for self-censorship!

MOFO Linux is the bootable, self-contained live Linux environment which opens the internet and makes it "just work" for people, including those behind censorship barriers, reaffirming that censorship is dead. MOFO Linux is free as in "freedom" and free as in "free beer."

Cheers,
Phil Collier / MOFO Linux

No Solution for Self-Censorship

2025-08-19T06:38:06.991000Z

Friends,

Censorship has existed as long as communication and authoritarians have existed in the same space. People in power have always had a narrative about their existence and why their world was the way it was. Censorship was as simple as forbidding expression which challenged power and its narratives. With every advance in communication between humans, the information space grew in volume. We began by speaking person to person, creating sculptures, and drawing on caves. Then orators would speak to groups of assembled persons, or write texts by hand and distribute them. Then came the printing press, telegraphy, and the various forms of electronic communication.

Censorship evolved with every advance in communication, to resist the sharing of ideas which challenged power. With the word "ideas," I refer to not only creations spun up in the mind of a creative storyteller or artist, but also the people of science, mathematics, philosophy, law, religion, and politics, who attempt to understand our world and share what they have found. In democratic societies, it is the people who decide where to draw the line between what expression is permissible and what is considered harmful and warranting restriction. Authoritarian societies organize around obedience to leadership and restrict expression which is non compliant. Think of how the Catholic church fought the discovery of heliocentrism. Consider how puritanical and cultish people in the United States fought (and continue to fight) the teaching of evolution or genetics. It has been a century since the Scopes trial and a half century since the West Virginia School Book War, and tens of millions of people still cling to extreme religious ideas which we know are mythical.

Worse, yet, so-called democracies such as the UK and USA are mandating draconian measures against online anonymity and secure communications. American "red states" are foolhardily mandating restrictions against access to websites containing information about contraception, reproductive health, and options for pregnant people. They should know better, but they do not, as the lawmakers appear to have minimal awareness of facts associated with censorship. LOL, I guess they didn't read my entertaining yet hard hitting book, Censorship's Grave.

Censorship is dead. As mass communication advanced, so did the tools of censorship, such that for every measure, came a countermeasure. For every countermeasure, came a new advancement against censorship. We have paper and ink documents which are waterproof. We have optical and spinning-rust disks which can survive if an office or data center is flooded or burned down. We have encrypted communications which will are as likely to yield Shakespeare as to give up their true contents. We have vaults and online libraries progressing toward offering every work which has ever been published. In a real sense, censorship is dead and we are free - if it is our choice to be free.

Dictatorships are enraged and frightened by unhampered communications. They have learned to track internet usage and block websites and VPN protocols. They interfere with DNS queries. They choke crossborder connectivity until broadband becomes a trickle. Circumventionists figured out how to evade every, I repeat, EVERY form of internet censorship, save for cutting cables. I have personally experienced blocked and throttled "normal" internet while visiting countries considered to be non-free. In those same places, I have used encryption and multithreaded connections to enjoy blazingly fast file downloads, peer to peer file sharing, and media streaming. Everything the dictators can do to limit assembly and expression FAILS, as no barrier is perfect. Except for cutting the cables. MOFO Linux is my version of a toolset for exploiting flaws in censorship barriers and accessing online media. Yet now, the media does not want certain people to access it. There is a voice out there saying, in effect, "We don't serve your kind here."

There is a way to censor, which makes useless every circumvention method: self-censorship! All of the circumvention technology is useless one party to an act of assembly or expression opts out. That means Tor is useless if you don't use it. Tor is also useless if your forums or media platforms block it. VPNs and SSH tunnels are useless if the platform will not allow you to use it because you arrive from a known server address. I have seen these things happen in 2025, and the trend is increasing. Twitter / X, YouTube, Reddit, and various adult entertainment sites, are rolling out age verification systems which eliminate anonymous access to their content. It is getting down to a self-censorship where people cannot break out of a restricted internet bubble and use the large platforms because the tools which liberate at the origin are also the tools which provoke blocking at the destination. You can leave home, but you are welcome nowhere! If you have a server farm's IP address, _please go away! _

Platforms which surrender to authoritarian lawmakers and block access to people using circumvention tools will kill what remains of the internet we had a decade ago. They are going to screw it up for everyone, and why? Cowardice! Because they lack the spine to say no to authoritarians.

None of this dumbassery will solve any problems with obscene content or its access by minors. To stop that problem, parents need to do better in raising children who grow up with healthier minds. I mean this in all seriousness, that we worry about what our kids eat, or that they follow safe practices when crossing streets. But not enough care that they develop healthy minds, learn to handle stresses of life, and have a respect for other people and living things. It is the job of parents, not legislators, to make it so. Addictions, substance abuse, violence and abuse against people and creatures ALL have something in common, and it will never be solved with censorship.

Anti-censorship operating systems will always exist, one way or another. It is a silly fantasy to think a day will come when Tails, Qubes, or MOFO Linux will be unavailable. It is true that Twitter / X, YouTube, Instagram, or the many adult content sites may close down. However, they will be replaced by alternative services which meet the demands of internet users. Until internet users are no longer interested in such services. Because it is the users, not the dictators, which control the bottom line.

Good luck with all of that. Have fun. Don't get hurt.
Phil Collier / MOFO Linux

MOFO Linux v9.5.0 Released

2025-07-28T19:12:02.040000Z

Hello Linux Users,

MOFO Linux has been upgraded to version 9.5.0 and is available worldwide for download. This update contains a kernel upgrade and bug fixes:

Kernel 6.15, with the Xanmod efficiency and speed tweaks, runs this Linux very nicely on new and old hardware.
Neovim plugins have been upgraded.
Zram's memory compression algorithm has been changed to zstd.
Wezterm tab styling adjusted for the current dark theme.
Fixed a bug in the Neovim launcher which had prevented text files from properly opening if clicked from the file manager as root.

LOL, the mission objective for this upgrade was, "Make it more shiny and don't let Sid break anything!"

Cheers,
Phil Collier / MOFO Linux

MOFO Linux v9.4.0 Released

2025-05-02T03:12:08.707000Z

Hello Linux Users,

MOFO Linux has been upgraded to version 9.4.0 and is available worldwide for download.

It is the fifth release in the 9.x series. Although it retains a similar look and feel to its predecessor, there is significantly more firmament in the system:

A more reliable sequence for starting the window manager, based on systemd.
- Debian upstream appears to be tweaking the Debian Live package, upon which this live computing environment is based, and they changed something which caused some problems getting the Xserver and DWM started.
- Using systemd service units to initiate the desktop / window manager works like a charm.
Kernel 6.14, with the Xanmod efficiency and speed tweaks, runs this Linux very nicely on new and old hardware.
To make things easier for any of you who want a persistent system, which remembers changes in files or settings, I have set the persistence boot parameter. To work, it requires you to have a Linux partition labeled "persistence," containing a configuration file named persistence.conf. Look online for more information about persistent Debian Live setups.
Most of the utilities and scripts associated with MOFO Linux, such as the wrappers for SuperSDR and Sshuttle, are based on originals stored in my Github repositories. The binaries or scripts are now cloned from the repos to /usr/local/src and symlinked to /usr/local/bin. Maintenance is easier, as they can now be updated with a simple "git pull."
The Element Messenger and chat application was adding a lot of size to this iso image, weighing in at more than 460 MB, so I have switched it to use the online web interface, working through the web browser.
The Telegram Messenger and chat application was also adding a lot of size to this iso image, weighing in at more than 180 MB, so I have switched it to use the online web interface.
Discord has been added as another chat application, also working through their online web interface in the browser.
Some tools have been changed for efficiency and to use data files in csv format, instead of odd mixtures of spaces and quotations.
- Csv data can be more easily edited, parsed, and otherwise managed.
- The Internet Radio Playlist no longer needs a template, and can handle thousands of stations.
- SuperSDR-Wrapper now also uses csv files, loading parsed SDR server and station data into Pandas dataframes.
Note-taking is better now in MOFO Linux:
- Obsidian now gets its own keybind: Super + O.
- I crafted a nifty terminal-based note sorter and editor, available with Super + Shift + O. Hit the F key for deep, recursive searching through all subfolders.
Python-Tgpt accompaniess the older Golang-based Terminal GPT.
- This new AI chatbot can use more than 40 models.
- Quality and speed are quite good.
Wezterm multiplexing is set up and running smoothly. Therefore, pop-up terminals available on keys Super + Enter and Ctrl - Alt - T are now set to open a clean Wezterm, with no Tmux. Split your panes with the same key combos: Ctrl + A, \ or Ctrl + A, - (that's the pipe key or dash key, with no shift needed).
Separately from the bootable iso file, I have created a converter script which transforms Debian (or its derivatives) into an equivalent MOFO Linux operating system. It can install the scripts, utilities, fonts, and configuration files. If you want to try it on a minimal Debian, Xebian, Mint LMDE, or MX Linux rig, look for it locally within the directory /usr/local/src/circumventionist-scripts. Also find it in my Circumventionist-Scripts repository on Github, or in the downloads section of this project on SourceForge.

Over the last two months, I have divided my time equally between Python-Tgpt and Go-Tgpt chatbots. The quality of responses varies somewhat between the models used, but they are each useful in exploring different topics and working on software programming. Even their mistakes can teach something useful, if you have enough expertise to discern when an AI is just wrong and you can give scrutiny to the error.

Cheers,
PC / MOFO Linux

MOFO Linux v9.2.0 Released

2024-10-07T23:51:57.395000Z

Fellow MOFO Linux users,

MOFO Linux is now upgraded to version 9.2.0, bringing Linux kernel 6.11 and several software updates and bug fixes. Most important for some users is the bug fix in the Wireguard connection manager. Also, the SDR streamer has been worked on, so it runs smoothly, bringing you live radio from KiwiSDR servers all over the world.. Kodi Media Center has also gotten some updates - not only for the main interface, but for the audio / video addons too.

You might notice that Streisand (VPN manager) is gone. It was a prudent to remove it, as its Github repo had not been updated in years. Worse, it was no longer working with the Python version on the system. Keeping it running with its own dedicated Python package would have added too much weight to the iso file, and didn't seem worth the bloat and extra effort to keep it going. Algo accomplishes the same functions and is still actively maintained by its developers.

Alacritty, the terminal emulator also got the axe. It is a fine terminal, but it was also redundant, as Wezterm is also performant and has better features. LOL Wezterm is a little bit slower when opened for the first time, but after that is just as fast as Alacritty. The configuration in Lua is a positive feature too.

Cheers,
PC / MOFO Linux

Happy 10th Anniversary to Signal (Meredith Whittaker Interview)

2024-08-30T04:55:31.285000Z

Signal is among my most favorite of apps with strong privacy protections. Signal has now been around for a decade, and media outlets are featuring articles about it. I cannot imagine a better person being Signal's president than Meredith Whittaker. She has the smarts and the courage to make Signal be all it can be. She is an interesting person too, on her own merits.

Brew up some good coffee and have a read of Whittaker's interview in Wired. Beware of the pretenders out there who will collect information on you and sell it, or would allow it to be used to block your access to info or interactions you seek. For more on that, see Surveillance Watch, which Whittaker has cited as a great resource, covering the connections between surveillance companies, their funding, and their unsavory clients.

MOFO Linux Updated to Version 9.1.0

2024-06-04T03:56:32.578000Z

Linux Enthusiasts and Anti-Censorship Advocates,

MOFO Linux v9.1.0 is available for download.

This update brings a fresher kernel, Xanmod 6.8, and some other software updates and tweaks.

Remember, these version 9 isos are set up as live computing environments. Upon creating a live USB device and booting it, your first actions are likely to be:
1. Connect to the network (keys SUPER + N).
2. Connect Bluetooth (keys SUPER + B).
3. Copy in your home directory and ssh settings, if saved elsewhere.
4. Copy in or download some Wireguard or OpenVPN configs, if you use them.
5. Establish your ssh tunnel, VPN, or Tor connection.
6. Go out on the open internet or into cypher spaces (Tor, I2P, etc).

I must emphasize the effectiveness of ssh tunnels to a server with unrestricted internet, especially if a strong key is used. Use a size of 3072 bits or larger. If you set up a distant server which also has Tor or I2P installed, you can go just about anywhere and have a friction-free experience.

For the life of me, I cannot understand the rants of people in forums and on social media complaining that they are being censored. Censoring regimes, as long as they exist, will never relent on blocking any proxies or VPNs they can find. Permanent but permeable barriers don't matter, though, as circumvention is the solution. If you happen to be in the dream that authoritarians will see the light, know that they won't. Ever. Vote them out, if you can. If you can't vote them out, there is an option to wait them out. Another option is to forcibly remove them, if you dare and have the power.

In the mean time, know that censorship is ineffective in this era; you can easily circumvent barriers. Authoritarians know that, and their countermeasure is information warfare (flooding all media with disinformation so that you cannot discern or no longer care what is true). So when you use MOFO Linux or any other anti-censorship systems, know what you're about and be mindful so that you don't get washed away. What is true will always matter.

Cheers,
PC / MOFO Linux

MOFO Linux 9.0.0 Released Today!

2024-03-07T15:32:23.133000Z

Linux Enthusiasts and Anti-Censorship Advocates,

MOFO Linux v9.0.0 is presently in the release process, with uploading expected to be completed by time 2024/03/07 - 1700 UTC.

Migration from its base of Ubuntu LTS to rolling Debian Sid is complete. The new system contains freshly updated apps and scripts to keep you ahead of any barrier between you and the people, information, and media of the global internet. See the latest highlights of this release on the MOFO Linux summary page.

Cheers,
PC / MOFO Linux

MOFO Linux v9.0 in Development

2023-10-29T05:26:31.597000Z

Friends,

It has been some time since the most recent release of MOFO Linux; here is an update on the next version release. Sometime in the next couple of months, hopefully before the start of winter, MOFO Linux version 9 will hit the wires. It is being switched from an Ubuntu base to a rolling Debian Unstable / Sid. If you have tried Catbird Linux, you'll know what a lightweight and responsive system can be built on Sid. Generally, it will work much like the latest version 8 release, but better.

A key goal of version 9 is to showcase applications hardened against the current internet censorship and surveillance environment. That means end to end encryption and as much decentralization as possible, so that connectivity is still possible up to the minute the internet cables are severed. It is with a bit of rage that I note the degradation of social media and information services on the internet. As censorship dies a slow and ugly death, information warfare rises to take its place. This could not have happened at the rate it has, without the phenomenon described by Cory Doctorow as enshittification, where platforms strip away value and serve neither the users nor creators, but only the shareholders.

At the bottom line, if online media becomes worthless, you'll still have one hell of a nice Linux system in MOFO Linux, with peer to peer networking and cypher spaces still available.

Cheers,
PC (a.k.a. Cap'n Thermobaric) / MOFO Linux

Recent posts to blog

MOFO Linux.com Domain Sold; Project Archived

MOFO Linux v9.6.0 Released

Hello Linux Users,

No Solution for Self-Censorship

MOFO Linux v9.5.0 Released

Hello Linux Users,

MOFO Linux v9.4.0 Released

Hello Linux Users,

MOFO Linux v9.2.0 Released

Happy 10th Anniversary to Signal (Meredith Whittaker Interview)

MOFO Linux Updated to Version 9.1.0

MOFO Linux 9.0.0 Released Today!

MOFO Linux v9.0 in Development