611–620 of 668 posts
I know how much HN loves Urbit /s, but it's the only attempt to create a computer that you can own that I'm aware of and (1) shows the scale of the endeavor and (2) proves it's possible https://tlon.io/
I think that by "computer" most people mean a device that stores and processes information, not a cloud service that in some opaque way may allow users to share computational resources from such devices.
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Well it is early days but Librem and System76 (and several others like Pine64) are making huge headway in the open hardware space. I know there have been lots of failures in this area but I think we are getting to a threshold point where building on top of these companies acheivements is quite possible. Linux on Mobile and open EC and Coreboot etc. are all making rapid progress at the moment. I would still say we are…
The issue with open hardware is that DRM vendors don't support it. A fully open phone doesn't have hardware DRM keys so you won't get FullHD in Netflix. And now you've lost 90% of the market.
I have a similar feeling, but with modern smartphones. Owning my computer is still relatively possible. I can build a computer from parts which I can choose, and have a choice in which operating system to install on them. Laptops are slightly more closed, but even on those I can choose the OS myself. Modern smartphones however, seem like walled gardens in which I have no control at all. I cannot choose any of the par…
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If anyone is interested in an extremely secure linux distro: https://tails.boum.org/
Great for specific purposes, but not exactly a computer 'you own' and want to do things with. Tails always starts from the same clean state and everything you do disappears automatically when you shut down Tails. Ie, nothing persists, which means you loose everything each time. OpenBSD is also an extremely secure operating system. But also not terribly practical as a long term desktop environment. Plus it doesn't sol…
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The issue with open hardware is that DRM vendors don't support it. A fully open phone doesn't have hardware DRM keys so you won't get FullHD in Netflix. And now you've lost 90% of the market.
Yeah, even when you boot up into Netlfix in Epiphany browser or something and discover you can't. It's not a great OOTB experience for new Linux users, never mind being locked out entirely. But that said, I don't really know how to fix the DRM problem without first making progress on open hardware. Viability and market share in spite of the adversity is the only chance I can see. It still might fail. We try because w…
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So let's say I'm willing to pay double or triple rate or more if needed, then show me a flagship phone with the same capabilities as a normal Android flagship phone but without the loss of privacy and ownership. You can't and you never have been able to. No completely free phone on par with flagships have ever been released.
Not exactly same capabilities as Android phones yet, but getting there fast with software updates: https://puri.sm/products/librem-5 .
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Yeah, even when you boot up into Netlfix in Epiphany browser or something and discover you can't. It's not a great OOTB experience for new Linux users, never mind being locked out entirely. But that said, I don't really know how to fix the DRM problem without first making progress on open hardware. Viability and market share in spite of the adversity is the only chance I can see. It still might fail. We try because w…
Yea, it's not a great experience; fortunately, yarrr! thar be options, matey!
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Most of the tools we already have materialized out of no small degree of voluntary labor and charity... In fact, I think you havethe effect straight up backwards. It wasn't the ads or walled gardens that created those free tools you like... It was the presence of those tools and the cleverness of users that made the formation of ad networks and walled gardens a thing. I assure you, the Free part of Free Software is o…
No, I agree that the open source movement and free software has helped immensely with organizations that create these environments. However, the key thing is those environments still need to be paid for in order to keep them operational and pay for improvements, etc. This is why Facebook is inherently free except for the ads. Same with Google. People have not demonstrated a will to pay for a search engine, or for a s…
What do you, the customer, allegedly willing to pay, get from a search provider? Especially once everyone else piles on?
What you get is a simple tool, that then requorements bloats as soon as the rest of the economy notices you're a growing centralized control point.
You start getting DMCA pipelines. You start getting hosting amd analytics, and monetization. You get your supplier suddenly weighing everyone else's interests against yours.
You start getting manipulated results streams when all you wanted wss reasonably consistent and well organized search results according to your query.
And in today's age? You, the customer, will always lose. So people are willing to pay for search engines, they exist, but just aren't willing to pay for "someone else's" search engine. Many may even go as far as starting their own, and not advertising or commercializing it to minimize the number of entrenched filters between them and the Net. As impractical as it sounds.
Not a lot of normal folks grok it enough to articulate yet, but nevertheless I see the pattern starting to coalesce.
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I'll go further: when have you ever been able to communicate with guaranteed privacy? Telephone? Nope. Ham radio? Nope. Letters sent through the mail? Nope.
Letters sent with homing pigeons were mostly private...
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Please stop opining on what you have zero knowledge on. The Apple devices in Iran are never sold jailbroken (in fact, I have never seen a jailbroken Apple device in my life). They can usually connect to all the Apple services without a VPN. There are apps that use Iranian payment processors in the App Store itself (e.g., https://apps.apple.com/us/app/fidiketabi/id1464658470 is an app that sells ebooks and audiobooks,…
Nothing has happened in US-Iran relations in the past two years to suggest anything in this article has changed substantially: https://venturebeat.com/2018/03/15/apple-blocks-app-store-in... If your app is using any payment processor that's not Apple within the App Store that app is not in compliance with Apple's own App Store policies. Epic Games would be very interested to learn this is happening. If you're using s…
That Fidibo app is obviously not “compliance with App Store policy.” Said policy has never been followed consistently. Feel free to email Epic if you think this changes anything. My magic ball says the best result you can expect is that Apple says, “Oops, they lied, and we didn’t notice.”
Your article is also just an article. App Store is usually fine in Iran, but sometimes there are connection problems. This is not even always a ban from Apple, the Islamic Republic is all too happy to ban foreign services.
Instead of giving me all these made-up stories, give me a list of all the major sacrifices Apple has made for user security. I can’t think of a single one. The nearest thing to a sacrifice they have done is supposedly not selling your data to 3rd parties (except China and friends), but this isn’t that lucrative for them and the PR it generates translates directly into profits. Most privacy choices aren’t this PR-able.