GNU manifesto GNU, which stands for Gnu's Not Unix, is the name for the complete Unix-compatible software system which I am writing so that I can give it away free to everyone who can use it. Several other volunteers are helping me. Contributions of time, money, programs and equipment are greatly needed. BetterStack Things look, work, and mostly *feel* the same. This is trivial at first when you’re the only developer but almost impossible later as your engineering, design, and product teams scale and new colleagues join.