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An Open Letter to Intel

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191–200 of 379 posts

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#191

Post by ramshorns »

laythea wrote: post #102
rbanffy wrote: post #89

> this bit of news reaffirms my view that the Berkeley license provides the maximum amount of freedom to potential users I'm sorry, but I don't feel free because of that. What I see is that I have proprietary code I never saw, never vetted and which I don't (and shouldn't) trust that's running on all my computers (not all, but you can get it) and that I don't have the freedom to remove, examine, modify or replace. Th…

I completely sympathise, however your argument is based on a horse that has already bolted. Un-audited binary blobs already exist and run on your computer. Now off course, there is still an argument that you may not want even more un-audited binary blobs running, but security is about the lowest common denominator. We have passed that point already. Resistance is futile!

The management engine is one of the hardest binary blobs to remove though. Other ones like wireless and graphics firmware can be avoided by picking the right hardware, but the CPU doesn't have as many competitive options.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#192

Post by kodablah »

josteink wrote: post #136
colejohnson66 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why the GPL is so great IMO. It would force Intel to either release the source code or use something else.

It would also force Intel to give us a means to replace ME with something else which ultimately puts the user in control.

Nope, because they wouldn't use it then. I am not sure why people think the GPL had so much leverage over larger companies that will just build something in house.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#194

Post by _0w8t »

jhasse wrote: post #166
_0w8t wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MIT license only states: > The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. This is weaker than what is in a BSD license: > Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. That is, BSD li…

So ... Intel violated the BSD license?

That is a good point and explains the letter better. Apparently Intel cannot fulfill even minimal attribution requirements and the letter is a polite reminder for the company of its duties.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#196

Post by lmm »

wolfgke wrote: post #167
lmm wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The notion of the GPL is that end users are poorer if they don't have source available and can't fix bugs in the code they're using. Intel ME, meaning people are running systems with exploitable vulnerabilities that they can't fix, is one of the clearest arguments in favour of it.

One can also fix bugs without source code available (it is just harder). The Intel ME's problem rather is that one perhaps can fix bugs, but not upload the bug fixes back to the chip because of the required signature.

Both those things are problems (it's possible to work around the signature issue, but it makes it a lot harder, just as with not having source code). And both are addressed by the GPLv3.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#197

Post by ddalex »

arximboldi wrote: post #2

> If nothing else, this bit of news reaffirms my view that the Berkeley license provides the maximum amount of freedom to potential users. Interesting conclusion, considering one of the "features" of the Intel ME is precisely to limit what the final user can do with their computer.

> to limit what the final user can do with their computer

I've never seen a source on the net where anybody claimed that ME limits their work with the computer they own. Any references? ME offers some additional management features at enterprise level, but where does it block things ?

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#198

Post by ddalex »

josteink wrote: post #132

> If nothing else, this bit of news reaffirms my view that the Berkeley license provides the maximum amount of freedom to potential users. The Berkeley license gives software publishers (which are not users) maximum amount of freedom. As an actual X86 user who cannot remove or change this unwanted piece of code running on my machine, I politely disagree about the freedom given to me.

Intel is the user of the software here, not yourself.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#199

Post by zymhan »

muninn_ wrote: post #176
rdslw wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope. His letter point is clearly about widely(1) known debate(2) between him and Linus Torvalds, and ego massage. (1) widely, if you arent 25 years old proverbial "javascript developer" ;-) - as the debate took place in 1992. (2) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanenbaum%E2%80%93Torvalds_deb...

Speaking of ego: "if you arent 25 years old proverbial "javascript developer" ;-)" Why is this necessary?

Gotta stroke that grey beard

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#200

Post by kodablah »

Radim wrote: post #115
pulse7 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Minix's license wouldn't be BSD, they would use some other BSD licensed OS or develop it's own...

Does this argument have a name? "If I didn't do [SOME HORRIBLE THING X], someone else would, so I might as well do it myself?" When googling, I only found this: https://www.reddit.com/r/askphilosophy/comments/3wclk6/even_...

Bad phrasing. The argument is more like "If [this awesome thing X] wasn't available, people would have to find a maybe-less-than-desirable alternative." The name for it is practicality.
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