Thanks for an excellent post. It gives me an even better insight into OpenMoko's vision.
Thanks for all of the hard work! Cheers Alex. Sean Moss-Pultz wrote, On 28/07/08 19:22: > Dear Community > > > Design. > > Many people seem to expect an explanation of "design" from Openmoko. > This isn't going to happen. At least not today. Design isn't something > static that I can stop and say here is exactly what Openmoko wants. 1+1 > = 2. We try not to talk so much about features or design styles of > future products. For the simple reason that we’re not so sure what they > will look like ourselves. Design, for us, is the process in which we > start by pursuing a few essential ideas and allow for the final result > to come into being. Notice that I am not talking about moving pixels. > Nor I'm not talking about colors or fonts. Design, in my opinion, is not > about technical skill. It's about personal struggle. It's the process by > which you relentlessly force yourself to focus on exposing your > essential ideas. This cannot be patched and merged like source codes. > Imagine Malevich and Monet each painting half of the same painting. The > result would surely depress them both. Being open doesn't mean we put > the essential ideas behind each product to a public vote. Being open > means we provide you with the tools to change our decisions. > > Like anything highly creative, design is always highly subjective. Even > if I would explain the essential ideas of our products to everyone, they > would not make sense in the way I want them to. Because you are only > seeing one part of a very intricate long-term plan. You would need to > work with us, full time, for many months before Openmoko's vision would > really make sense. I can only show you the tangible pieces -- products. > Our company is open. You are always invited into this space. Don't > forget you are watching serious people work their ass' off. We are > mechanics and will certainly yell, "Fuck!" when we smash our fingers or > break things. All engineering is public from day one. It is humanly > impossible for us not to show you things that are unfinished, > inaccurate, flawed, and even self-destructive at times. But we have > faith in what we're doing. Openness is our foundation. It's not a > marketing buzzword. So my only question for you is, "Do you want to > watch, or help?". Because if you want to just stand around and criticize > our work, I will have to ask you to leave the shop. People are working > here. We're trying to "Free your Phone". Stop bashing things like ASU. > This is our work and we are in the earliest of stages. We want to share > it with you. Understand that we are not even close to satisfied with it > in its current state. But we can see the direction and we love how it's > coming together. This is the design process in full effect. > > Think of our products as museums. We're building the environment. Each > one different from the next. You'll get all the free art supplies you > could imagine because we want you to add your own meaning. You choose: > consume, create, or both. Either way you create your own meaning. It's > about you. Our design is more like non-design. We try to "remove" > anything obvious. And focus on what's meaningful. We're not trying to > launch a carefully crafted message with a bling-filled user interface. > We're building an empty vessel for you to fill with your ideas. We focus > on making products that are open and simple. Only products that are open > can grow as you grow. Only something simple can be used by everyone. > > My mom can install Firefox plugins. Can your mom personalize your > FreeRunner? > > Like Will already said, by removing a manual keyboard button we are > forced to self-organize using the resources in our environment. > Resources such as our wiki and our Installer are still badly broken. We > need to fix these. We need to make them accessible for "normal people". > Every element "removed" is a chance to organize information in ways that > are meaningful for others. Whether you like our design or not isn't even > the question. You have all the tools you could possibly want to change it. > > At Openmoko, we're trying as hard as we can to not over design. Could > you imagine walking into a museum where the museum itself looked better > than the artwork? We're trying to give you the environment to > self-organize. Your code. Your ideas. Your emotions. And then share them > back with others. The entire point of our "Installer" is to provide a > simple way to bring the excitement and energy of our community into the > Neos of normal people. Why else would we invest so much time and money > into things like our framework? Or even the little things like opening > our CAD files and our schematics? We're building you a museum to > showcase the wonderful diversity of this community. It's a foundation > for you to stand on. We want your applications. Your ideas in the form > of packages of what the buttons can do. Change anything you want to our > interface and we will gladly deliver it to everyone. Your music for > sound events. Your themes. Speak with your work, not so much with your > emails. Let's organize the best parts of mobile FOSS as packages easily > installable for the world. We're not going to build yet another App Store. > > We must end these unproductive arguments about whose design ideas are > better. Should the keyboard be manual or automatic -- this so misses the > point of Openmoko! The "killer app" of tomorrow is not going to be > software or some hardware device. It's going to be the social practices > they make possible. > > We each have our own ways of understanding and making meanings. You are > free to create your own meanings. Organize your ideas into our wiki and > our Installer. Make a package that somebody can easily install for a > manual keyboard. Show people the power of open. Let them make their own > meanings. For if we cannot organize our ideas in ways non-developers can > understand, why even bother? Why struggle so hard to make totally open > devices when you can already download thousands of random hacks and > applications for an iPhone? > > This is Openmoko. We are different. We are open to life. We are never > closed, perfect or complete. We embrace diversity. Open means we are > free to change the fundamental way information is processed in the > mobile world. Let's do this! > > Now is the time for our work to speak for itself. I'm out of words. > > -Sean > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Openmoko community mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community > -- Alex Kavanagh Home: http://alex.kavanagh.name, [EMAIL PROTECTED] Work: http://www.tinwood.com, [EMAIL PROTECTED] MSN : [EMAIL PROTECTED] XMPP: [EMAIL PROTECTED]/Gaim _______________________________________________ Openmoko community mailing list [email protected] http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
