Committing to Rust for kernel code

Don't forget that in the F/OSS setting you're much more likely to be (very) decoupled from the end-users of a given bit of code. Sure, you remove something today, but your general userbase is using LTS-type distros it could easily be years before they notice.

I suppose the more generalized way to put it is that this "take ownership of X" only really applies if the code in question is under active development, as opposed to simply being ignored because "it works and there's no need to mess with it"