I know, systemd is being embraced by the siduction team. Nonetheless this opposing view is worth reading.
More interesting these answers:
A) about Debian perspective:
https://lkml.org/lkml/2014/8/13/235B) Alpinelinux:
https://lkml.org/lkml/2014/8/13/623Since long (ca 2 years) on Gentoo forums there had been such emotional posts as C. Barry delivered. His connotated arguments I evaluate the other way round:
1. all of systemd is opaque
But: never there had been so much documentation of Linux as a system
2. all of the distributions will become obsolete
Yes: I said this about the "coreOS" agenda of systemd long ago. But Linux for me as an advanced user becomes transparent in a way I can configure kind of my "own distribution" .
3. all of us are forced to use systemd.
Reality: see Debian(A), Gentoo and alpinelinux (see B)
While users love choice, developers of applications love to have a fixed and stable ground they can build upon. That is what drives projects like Gnome direction systemd. But the main reason why Debian choose systemd wasn't Gnome as Christopher Barry suggested, but the ability to debug the init. That was the main argument pro systemd early this year!
Though, a smarter transition for Debian would have been
SysV - openRC - systemd
But that should have happend one release earlier. Instead of wasting years with an inconsistend workaround called "insserv".