Ownership of the RubyGems repository, which was suddenly hijacked and its maintainer kicked out, will be transferred to the Ruby core team.

RubyGems , a package management system for the Ruby language, has been experiencing troubles, including a forced name change by GitHub Enterprise and the expulsion of its maintainers. These developments have been criticized as a takeover by Ruby Central , a non-profit organization under pressure from the e-commerce site Shopify . On October 17, Ruby developer Yukihiro Matsumoto announced that he would transfer ownership of the RubyGems repository to the Ruby core team.

The Transition of RubyGems Repository Ownership
https://www.ruby-lang.org/ja/news/2025/10/17/rubygems-repository-transition/

Ruby Central Statement on RubyGems & Bundler
https://rubycentral.org/news/ruby-central-statement-on-rubygems-bundler/

In September 2025, a RubyGems maintainer renamed RubyGems' GitHub Enterprise site to 'Ruby Central' without prior notice, added Marty Haught of Ruby Central, who had not previously been a RubyGems maintainer, to the RubyGems maintainer list, and expelled all maintainers involved in the RubyGems project.

Following backlash from the community, Hort subsequently reinstated the maintainer privileges he had previously expelled, but he remained the owner of GitHub Enterprise, and on the 18th revoked all administrator privileges for RubyGems, the dependency and version control tool Bundler , and the RubyGems.org maintainer team. Ruby Central explained that these moves were necessary to protect the RubyGems ecosystem end-to-end. The entire turmoil is explained in the following article.

RubyGems' GitHub Enterprise was renamed to Ruby Central, resulting in the expulsion of existing maintainers - GIGAZINE

According to Freedom Dumlao, a member of the Ruby Central board of directors, the organization was asked by companies that use Ruby to ensure the security of their supply chains. The organization investigated and discovered that individuals with no formal affiliation or contract with RubyGems held the highest levels of authority over the company.

Ruby Central decided to sign contracts with those who wanted access to the supply chain and remove access from those who did not, and explained that fearing losing funding from sponsors, Ruby Central forced the revocation of maintainers' privileges without sufficient discussion with them.

Joel Draper, who used to work at the e-commerce site Shopify, points out that Shopify pressure was behind the whole incident. Ruby Central, which was in financial difficulty, was dependent on Shopify for funding, and Shopify pressured them to manage RubyGems and Bundler themselves. The following article provides a good explanation of Shopify's pressure.

Shopify Manipulated Ruby Central to Force Takeover of Bundler and RubyGems, Finds Published - GIGAZINE

In response to this, Matsumoto stated, 'In order to provide long-term stability and continuity to the community, the Ruby core team, led by Matz, has decided to take over management of these projects from Ruby Central. We will continue development in close cooperation with Ruby Central and the entire community.'

RubyGems and Bundler are essential official clients in the Ruby ecosystem and have served as standard libraries bundled with the Ruby language for many years. However, unlike other major components, they have been developed outside of the Ruby organization on GitHub, Matz points out.

Ownership of the RubyGems and Bundler repositories will be transferred to the Ruby Core Team, while they will continue to be managed by Ruby Central, in collaboration with the Ruby Core Team. RubyGems and Bundler will continue to be available as open source under their current licenses. Existing contributors will retain full copyright and authorship of their code, and their intellectual property rights will not be affected.

Matsumoto said, 'This transition demonstrates our commitment to ensuring the health, stability, and growth of the Ruby ecosystem for years to come. We thank Ruby Central for their dedicated stewardship over the years, and we look forward to working with all members of the Ruby community to build an even brighter future for Ruby.'