Pheef. I'll just say my piece on these current events, among other things in the hopes of getting some perspectives to people, perhaps calming some storms a bit if lucky.
850 MHz: 1) Sucks for NA people, for sure. Luckily I have no intention of traveling there (well, maybe Canada sometime), but I feel the pain of those stuck there. 2) It _does_ seem like a big blunder on the part of FIC. 3) Hardly screws up the whole project, even if it is a blow. 4) No use crying over spilled milk. (Exception: Those who cry direct to FIC, and not on lists, about returning phones should IMAO be accommodated; they bought a quad-band device, even if it was a development one. However, in the interest of expediency, it'd be nice if those devices could find new homes directly instead. A wiki-page for "I'll buy your triband GTA01 off you", perchance?) 5) Let's hope they can make a 850-capable triband in some reasonable timeframe afterwards. (Or of course full quad, but seemed from Michael's comments that the former was somewhat more likely, even if it's not guaranteed either.) Gphone/Android: 1) Gphone/Android is still vapor, Neo/OpenMoko works as a rudimentary phone already at least (using it as my daily phone myself since my ages old phone died a week ago or so). The vapority of Android also makes any statements (including mine here) about it very much guesswork. 2) The Open Handset Cabal isn't really very open in its attitudes as witnessed http://www.openhandsetalliance.com/android_faq.html 3) Google's actual phone product seems likely to not offer users the benefits of an open platform, just the system developers. This is indicated by the FAQ above and Google's interest in pushing ads to users. 4) Android-using system developers seem to also otherwise be pretty much encouraged to go proprietary as much as they like (and partners like NTT DoCoMo do like). Also considering the presence of parties like Nvidia, proprietary drivers are probably very much in game. 5) I would personally like, and expect, the OpenMoko team to push on; the people here have earned my trust with respect to trying to maximize freedom also for the indie developers and users, even if there have been other sorts of issues on the way. 6) That said, if the core of Android will indeed be free, it should be possible to grab useful stuff from it over to OpenMoko (for instance the announced VM plus libraries) for compatibility and all that jazz, if the platform will reach relevancy. Integration work would be required, of course; it'd not be gratis. 7) Also, if/when there is a free core Android system to speak of available, it shouldn't likely be overly difficult to port to the Neo. Thus a Neo purchase is protected in relevance even in the case that Android is all that it's hyped up to be and blows OM out of the water. (Not implying anything about the likelyhood of said occurance, merely pointing out that purchasers of the designed to be Linux-friendly Neo aren't really threatened to "lose" anything here.) 8) In the same spirit as above, in the event that at some point in the future FIC/OM would see Android rather than OpenMoko as the way to move forward, I would hope and expect them to continue making sure there are as free and open as possible mobile computing solutions available. Meaning, they'd hopefully would continue the good work they've done in designing the Neo, more spesifically the GTA02, not require (or ship with) proprietary stuff on the Linux system side, with many in-house developed free drivers to boot. If Android takes off, there will certainly be largely proprietary offerings based on it (as there are ones based on Qtopia). It is crucial that there will also be freedom-maximizing products, be they OpenMoko or Android based. (Heck, one could imagine an OM-branded 100% free Android system. But that's getting ahead of things again; let's reiterate that Android is vapor, and I'm still rooting for OpenMoko, merely not fanatically so.) The road ahead will perhaps be more interesting than especially those with heavy personal investments on OpenMoko would like. Let's try and make the best of it. -- Mikko Rauhala - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - <URL:http://www.iki.fi/mjr/> Transhumanist - WTA member - <URL:http://www.transhumanism.org/> Singularitarian - SIAI supporter - <URL:http://www.singinst.org/> _______________________________________________ OpenMoko community mailing list [email protected] http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
