I use alpine-based containers whenever I can just to keep the world safer from SystemD rotting Linux.

What is the argument against systemd?

Is it mainly that it is too big?

I feel like everybody still loves the unix philosophy, but the previous tools were too bad, systemd just filled user demand for easier tools.

The moment someone makes a pid 1 software that is good and still modular, open and pluggable I think that will be an instant success.

Parts of it are good, like systemd-boot, parts of it are horrendous, like systemd-logind.

But systemd is not a technical problem, it's Redhat (and IBM) having too much control over what happens to the init system.

And of course there is Pottering and his vile Microsoft stint, then another vile stint to enforce age verification on Linux.

[delayed]

Eh, HNers are just noisier and crankier than most. The silent majority are fine with (and even like) systemd. I have no desire to go back to SysV init.

but alpine famously does not use systemd but openrc?

That's their point. The software they want to use often assumes its being run on a platform with systemd, so running that software on Alpine which makes a point to not use systemd causes challenges for them compared to using a different distro.

Container images rarely ship with an init service of any kind (systemd or otherwise); the expectation is that your application is the root process. This includes Alpine-based images.