Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Bullshit

marco.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 233 posts

Re: Bullshit

#161

Post by hub_ »

nl wrote: post #114
KeithMajhor wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In all seriousness. What does "open" even mean? I've noticed that no one is saying "open source". Not that I know what that really means either. Android isn't developed in the open they just release the source code. That's the only real difference from Windows 7. So is this all just relative to the phone market? It's "open" as far as phones go? I get the feeling "open" is not something you can be . It's a continuum.…

Android is Open Source[1], which has a real definition[2] that means something. You can fork it, and create your own distribution (as Amazon has shown). It is open in other ways, too - Android phones can load applications from sources other than the Market (unless that feature has been disabled by your carrier - which goes back to the first point). Most Android phones have a sdcard slot, too, which allows you to get…

But Android is not an open source project. Because Google does not open its development to external contributors, nor do they develop it in the open. They only do code drops. They don't take patches.

Re: Bullshit

#162

Post by hub_ »

smackfu wrote: post #92

Did marco make his blog much more link-baity, or has it always been like this? It seems like he is playing to the crowd now.

He got Fireballed. He is often linked by DF too.

Re: Bullshit

#163

Post by ootachi »

drivebyacct2 wrote: post #154
ootachi wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Replace "some Android devices" with "the vast majority of Android devices". That is Marco's point.

All HTC devices since September, most devices from And if that's Marco's point, it's pretty damn poor. How does what Motorola does with the bootloader of their phone have to do with the code that Google puts out exactly?

As has been explained many times in the past, Android's relative openness compared to iOS at the source code level does not translate to measurable benefits for the majority of users because of carrier/manufacturer lockdown.

Rooting is a security exploit, and I don't consider it relevant to whether the OS is practically open.

Re: Bullshit

#164

Post by jbjohns »

rmoriz wrote: post #9
smokinn wrote: post #3

I would like to see a list of Amazon's bullshit.

"There are two kinds of companies, those that work to try to charge more and those that work to charge less. We will be the second." — Jeff Bezos "We expect all our businesses to have a positive impact on our top and bottom lines. Profitability is very important to us or we wouldn't be in this business. " — Jeff Bezos "We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It's our job every day to…

I don't know about the other two, but the first one is a huge steaming pile of BS. First of all; Apple could have also charged less if they made such a limited device. And second, they do charge about as little for the iPad as they can, which is why no one has been able to make a tablet of similar specs with a compatible price all this time.

Re: Bullshit

#165

Post by zobzu »

notatoad wrote: post #153
jballanc wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity, would you call OS X "open"? You can find enough of the source for OS X to create a booting OS here: http://opensource.apple.com/ . Obviously, this isn't all of OS X, but then not all of the Android OS is "open" either. I'm not trying to be contrarian, but I think the people criticizing Adroid for not being "open" are primarily picking on precisely the vagueness that you have highlighted. There are w…

no, OSX is not open. you can't take the published source code and compile it into a useable copy of OSX. you can take the published android source code and create a useable copy of android from it. the entire operating system is there. android is open source. the people criticizing android for not being open are either lying, or have forgotten that we have moved on from the 3.0 branch which was not open.

No, the drivers are generally not open. Wait, they're almost never open.

So, you can make a useable copy of Android that run in.. an emulator. Woot.

That's the major "Android is not open" gripe I have.

Besides, we might have "moved on" from the closed source Android 3.0, but that doesn't mean much. Android 5 could be closed for all we know. In fact, it could be forever closed, at any given time.

And now, Google has history were they actually have closed it. Which changes, well, everything. They won't be afraid to do it if they have an interest into doing it.

Re: Bullshit

#166

Post by jballanc »

notatoad wrote: post #153
jballanc wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity, would you call OS X "open"? You can find enough of the source for OS X to create a booting OS here: http://opensource.apple.com/ . Obviously, this isn't all of OS X, but then not all of the Android OS is "open" either. I'm not trying to be contrarian, but I think the people criticizing Adroid for not being "open" are primarily picking on precisely the vagueness that you have highlighted. There are w…

no, OSX is not open. you can't take the published source code and compile it into a useable copy of OSX. you can take the published android source code and create a useable copy of android from it. the entire operating system is there. android is open source. the people criticizing android for not being open are either lying, or have forgotten that we have moved on from the 3.0 branch which was not open.

You can take the published source code and compile a useable copy of OS X. In fact, for many years the OpenDarwin project did just that. What you could not do is run the Aqua GUI or many of the default applications that come with a Mac bought in the store.

But that's the point. Sure, you can compile and run "Android", but is it the same as the OS that runs on a phone I buy from Verizon? Android phones sell with proprietary software that is most definitely not open. Macintosh computers sell with proprietary software that is most definitely not open. But enough elements of both are open to the point that you can boot a device and accomplish real work.

Re: Bullshit

#167

Post by zobzu »

nl wrote: post #37
padolsey wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sentence from Google is a falsehood. It claims that the tracking is done for the user, and implies that this is their only intention. The actual truth is that Google only does what's "good" for the user as long as it improves their market position and/or makes them money. To have a position of "well, they do care about theirs users, even if it is to make money off of them" is intellectually dishonest because you'…

Now that is Bullshit. Yes, Google makes money from their advertising. But Google does things that directly limit their ability to make money from advertising, when those decisons are in the interest of consumers. Take the whole design and UX of Chrome. There are many, many ways Google could have changed the design to make more money from it, and yet they haven't because they aren't in the interests of the users. Addi…

I think there's always a fine line between the users and the company's interest. That's because if the users have 0 interest, the company will not succeed.

So it's always about finding the right balance between "keeping enough user interest" while "maximizing company's interest".

That's what Google does. They do that well.

Many companies maximize the company interest too much and fail due to that.

Few companies maximize the user's interest (I wont dare saying too much, because I'm a user), and fail due to that (unfortunately).

Re: Bullshit

#168

Post by funkah »

edw519 wrote: post #102

You forgot the biggest bullshit of all, Marco. Hacker News users: I'm so mad that the government is doing ! I'm so mad that big business is doing ! I'm so mad that venture capitalists are doing ! I'm so mad that angel investors are doing ! I'm so mad that got funding! I'm so mad that language doesn't do ! I'm so mad that I can't jailbreak ! I'm so mad that I'm actually expected to pay for ! I'm so mad that more peopl…

If you think Hacker News sucks that bad, you're free to go read reddit and bitch about the users there. This comment is shitty and cynical and you should feel bad about it.

Re: Bullshit

#169

Post by jballanc »

bad_user wrote: post #152
jballanc wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity, would you call OS X "open"? You can find enough of the source for OS X to create a booting OS here: http://opensource.apple.com/ . Obviously, this isn't all of OS X, but then not all of the Android OS is "open" either. I'm not trying to be contrarian, but I think the people criticizing Adroid for not being "open" are primarily picking on precisely the vagueness that you have highlighted. There are w…

You cannot build and sell / distribute your own devices with OS X on it. Apple has been very aggressive with companies that tried that, in particular with Psystar, the first company that sold "hackintosh" computers [1], which they sued into oblivion. So no, OS X is not open and there's nothing vague about it. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psystar_Corporation

Hold on there. Psystar was attempting to sell copyrighted software in violation of a EULA by breaking encryption, which is specifically prohibited by the DMCA. I'm not saying that I agree with that specific case, but I think a great many open source advocates would take issue with you comparing the actions of Psystar with the desire to have a fork-able OS (which, BTW, OS X is).

Had Psystar sold computers with OpenDarwin running X, Apple wouldn't have batted an eye (couldn't, even, since it's all BSD).

Re: Bullshit

#170

Post by blinkingled »

hub_ wrote: post #161
nl wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Android is Open Source[1], which has a real definition[2] that means something. You can fork it, and create your own distribution (as Amazon has shown). It is open in other ways, too - Android phones can load applications from sources other than the Market (unless that feature has been disabled by your carrier - which goes back to the first point). Most Android phones have a sdcard slot, too, which allows you to get…

But Android is not an open source project. Because Google does not open its development to external contributors, nor do they develop it in the open. They only do code drops. They don't take patches.

They do take patches on the drops that they have open sourced - http://source.android.com/source/submit-patches.html
Post reply on HN