And permissively licensed utils have been around thanks to BSD and it’s never been an issue.
The distinction is that BSD coreutils are not attempting to be a drop-in 1:1 compatible replacement of GNU coreutils. The Rust coreutils has already accomplished this with its inclusion into Ubuntu 26.04.
If I wanted a permissively licensed system, I’d use BSD. I don’t, so I primarily use Linux. I think citing a proprietary OS like macOS as a reason why permissively licensed coreutils are OK is kind of funny. It’s easy to forget that before before the GPL there were many incompatible UNIX systems developed by different companies, and IMO the GPL has kept MIT and BSD-licensed projects “Honest”, so-to-speak. Without the GPL to keep things in check, we’d be back to how things were in the 80s.
So what’s next on the docket for Ubuntu? A permissively licensed libc?
The student who wants to actually go learn something and become an expert in a field has to contend with the fact that universities are just gilded vocational schools. And at least in the USA you will go into a lot of debt if you don’t come from wealth just to get through it. And there are no promises of stable income and employment when you do get through it.
So, while I think this person comes out the other end functionally no more informed than before, and I would not want to work with her, I can’t fault her for recognizing the bullshit that is the American education system and exploiting it.
For my own part, I busted my ass through university and now I’m seeing all my efforts get gobbled up into AI, cheapening everything I’ve ever done and worked for, and possibly evicting me from my career sometime in the coming few years. That wasn’t a concern when I graduated, LLMs didn’t exist yet. But they do now for current and future students.