You don't need to convince me systemd is doing it wrong! I'm in the process of switching to FreeBSD because I don't want the default system to contain something

You don't need to convince me systemd is doing it wrong! I'm in the process of switching to FreeBSD because I don't want the default system to contain something that hasn't been well tested. (Yes, it's a stupid thing, but I've been toying with switching for other reasons and this kind of made me do it :) I've also drunk the jails kool-aid for my next project.) The "systemd concept", from what I understand (and is by no means specific to systemd), is to have a smarter init system for starting processes in order and better process management. Additionally, all the IPC "stuff" that's been happening and being touted reminds me a lot of microkernels where you could write small, simple services that do a single thing over a common, programmatic interface. Systemd however feels much too integrated and makes no effort to make it easy to swap components. I'm also sort-of shocked that almost all the major distros just switched within a year or two of each other. Especially distros like RH and Debian (yes I know systemd is deved at RH) who bill themselves as "stable." So there is nothing wrong with wanting a better init system and a common IPC platform, but that doesn't mean systemd is the best we can do.