@rappscal I tend to agree, put it in the settings app, *and* I'd argue that the best behavior would be to only disable it on fresh installs, not change it on an upgrade (I don't know how feasible that is, I'm not a GNOME dev).

@glent what?

@glent "its role in the failure of desktop Linux"

That's a GIGANTIC assumption. And is insulting to the hard working people who work on GNOME, many of whom had nothing to do with those so-called "insular design choices".

It's open source, you can't force a team to do things your way. GNOME's foundation led to wonderful projects like Cinnamon, and I'd argue that the diversification has been a strength.

IMO it's all needless harping on folks who have different opinions.

@thesaigoneer lolol

@bruce sorry I misread you, I have folks actually being kind of jerks in some of these replies so it's hard to filter facetiousness from everything else.

@bruce is that what I said? How are you reading any of that from what I said?

It's a proposal to change a setting which is known to trip folks up and cause issues. To make something "opt-in" instead of foisted on folks. Many, many mice put the middle click in the scroll wheel and it causes headaches for some.

It's a reasonable proposal to be debated, and making it sound like GNOME is some sort of anti-user cabal is just silly at best, malicious at worst.

@zoeyTheWitch ugh, I'm sorry for the crap you all put up with. FWIW I love GNOME and use it regularly.

@scy big same. I mostly alternate between Plasma and GNOME based on what task I'm doing on what machine. Both are great, both have rough spots.

@bruce I really don't think it can be "done away with" logistically, more likely would be hidden behind an extension or a Tweaks toggle (which IMO is a reasonable compromise).

Too many people like the feature for it to be in any real danger.

@dcbaok I don't understand why you fear it being disabled entirely?

In GNOME at least, there's a billion extensions for fixing things, and a feature this popular almost certainly can't be gotten rid of completely.

I think that fear is irrational considering the actual proposal and the reality of how Linux is made.

@theodric it's just a desktop, no need to get insulting

@scruss no. Don't get emotionally charged about it.

It's a design choice. Your emotions shouldn't matter, just choose something different. Run a command to add the feature back.

I'm not saying don't have opinions. I'm saying, emphatically, that getting emotionally charged about it is, in fact, a bad thing.

Anyway, if you like GNOME and their design concepts, you're awesome and totally a valid user of Linux.

Sick of the absurd nonsense that says otherwise.

The way the article is written. The way the comments talk about it.

Why do people make it sound like GNOME is some sort of secret cabal of Linux haters?

It's a freaking desktop environment, they have every right to build it however they want, and you have every right to use something different. There's zero reason to get emotionally charged about it.

Hot take: good riddance. I dislike the middle click thing. Trips me up all the time as someone who accidentally clicks it when scrolling.

I think the right move is to make this (undoubtedly useful to some) behavior opt-in, not opt-out.

A lot of the gripes I see are just people being mad because GNOME makes choices they don't like. I don't understand why people write like this about GNOME, if you don't like it don't use it, your emotions make you look petty, etc etc.

https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/07/gnome_middle_click_paste/

@mcbaumwolle @admin I use Fastmail which integrates it.

@dacmot I routinely use RSS but not on every device, frequently enough I come across a link organically and run into these messes!

@admin I use a service to generate fake emails for this sort of thing, it's awesome! I can always tell *exactly* who sold my email to folks, or where email leaks came from.

I almost never give out my real email to anyone other than a human I know in the real world.

@james @404mediaco oh I didn't even think of those folks who are using this on their work device and *can't* or *shouldn't* log in to personal email. That was me a couple of years ago!

That's a big barrier! Password auth would be so helpful to those folks!

@bearmine especially for something less-than-critical like my login to a news outlet. It's one thing for a financial institution to do frequent confirmations, but stuff like this just prevents me from clicking links.