Flock to Fedora is more than a conference – it’s where the Fedora community comes alive. As part of the In the CommitHistory campaign, we sat down with confirmed Flock 2026 speakers to hear their stories: what brought them to Fedora, what Flock means to them personally, and what they’re hoping for in Prague this June. This is one of those conversations.
Jaroslav Reznik has been part of Fedora longer than most people remember. This goes all the way back to Red Hat Linux 5, before Fedora was even known as Fedora. After a brief detour to another distro, he joined the KDE SIG days and went on to build a long career in Red Hat’s Program Management team. But it was the EU Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) that brought him back to the Fedora community.
The moment that changed everything? A scene at FUDCon North America in 2009 watching Fedora’s Program Manager command what looked like a sci-fi control room, scheduling Fedora 13. Jaroslav looked at that and thought: I want that job. Years later, he got it.
On the CRA, Jaroslav is clear and passionate. The regulation is the first to formally acknowledge the existence of open source software in legislation. Thanks to an enormous community effort, it’s actually open-source friendly. Non-commercialised community projects are fully exempt. For a project like Fedora, the concept of open-source stewards formally recognised in the regulation opens up a powerful new model for governance.
The program management team is working to build a stewardship governance model around Fedora. They are making it a welcoming place for anyone who wants to support the project. They are clear about what stewardship should and shouldn’t be: it’s not about monetizing open source or adding burdens, it’s about helping the community raise the bar for security together.
Flock holds a special place for Jaroslav; he co-organised the very first Flock held in Prague back in 2014. Now, more than ten years later, he is returning to Prague for Flock 2026 with Roman Zhukov to not only talk about the CRA but run a hands-on workshop on it. His message is simple: you can’t do things from behind a desk.
Flock to Fedora 2026 takes place June 14–16 in Prague. Registration is at capacity but you can join the waitlist. Can’t make it in person? Follow along live on the Fedora YouTube channel.We hope to see you there!
Note: AI (Google Gemini) was used in drafting this article. The content was reviewed and verified before publishing.