Asahi Linux is a fledgling distribution founded with the specific goal of creating a workable daily-driver Linux experience on Apple M1 silicon.
Apple does not offer any community documentation for Apple Silicon, so Martin and cohorts must reverse-engineer the hardware as well as write drivers for it.
And this is especially difficult considering the M1 GPU—without first-class graphics support, Asahi cannot possibly offer a first-class Linux experience on M1 hardware such as the 2020 M1 Mac Mini, Macbook Air, and Macbook Pro.
Over the next few weeks, Martin and fellow developers will be working on an open hardware project to provide serial/debug connectivity—hopefully, including support for UART-over-USB-C setups from other vendors as well.Making it into for-next doesn't actually guarantee that Asahi's work will land in Linux 5.13.It's always possible that Linus Torvalds will see something he doesn't like and kick the can back to Linux 5.14 pending some necessary changes.
We're cautiously excited about the idea of first-class Linux support on the M1, but we absolutely do not recommend buying M1 hardware for that purpose unless and until the Asahi project gets much, much farther down the road than it's managed so far.