http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/info-gnu/2015-08/msg00010.html
If you have been following the latest kernel and technology in general the
past month or so, there have been plenty of stories about how hardware is
becoming more locked down.
1. Intel's Skylake will not offer free/open source firmware
2. AMD's cards work best with non-free firmware and are pushing blobs into
the 4.2 kernel
3. Nvidia's cards work best with non-free firmware and like AMD, are pushing
blobs into the 4.2 kernel. Also, the 900 series doesn't play nice with
Nouveau and to solve that, the team may consider requiring non-free signed
firmware from Nvidia as Nvidia is not giving in.
4. An older story, but we heard about how the FCC in the US will not allow
custom firmware for WiFi devices in fear of tampering of signals. It is now
forbidden.
5. Where are the 802.11ac devices that support free firmware? I haven't seen
them!
With all these stories (and I am sure there are more), things are actually
worse off now than before with regard to new hardware. When people build
computers and want to use new hardware, we are finding out that this new
hardware isn't as freedom friendly as the hardware we may have bought years
ago. This is for the people that actually want a traditional PC. Phones and
tablets are about as non-free as it gets and are a growing trend.
What will change this? Are we going to have to start building our own
processors, motherboards, and video cards to keep the dream alive? Or are we
going to have to deal with it and when it gets to the point of no return,
just give up on computers in general?
