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FSF announces Librephone project

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Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#381

Post by supermatt »

cookiengineer wrote: post #265

Why can't they just partner with postmarketOS here? Why do we have to have /e/OS instead of a better supported LineageOS, because /e/ is a 1:1 copy anyways? Why do we have to have a Librephone project now instead of partnering with say, Fairphone and the Pine64 people? Open source loses this war because proprietary devices are streamlined. The only thing that comes close to this is GrapheneOS, LineageOS, and postmark…

TLDR or something? They aren't making an OS.

The project is about opening up the closed blobs that mobile chipsets use:

"This project's goal is not another Android distribution, but a long-term project to better understand and reverse-engineer the nonfree blobs used by virtually all SoCs made today."

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#382

Post by arnaudsm »

This is exciting, exceptionally the firmware & binary blob foundations that are the biggest roadblock.

Concerning the UI, I wish we had another attempt at a web-based mobile OS. FirefoxOS was too early, but APIs are much more mature now, and WASM offers great performance for low-level stuff. I might work on this full time when I retire.

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#383

Post by oblio »

dandellion wrote: post #376
saagarjha wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stallman has historically done pretty poorly at getting people involved in the free software movement. Before someone goes "surely you are talking about women and other underrepresented groups" no I am not talking about them, although that is also important of course. I'm talking about the people who are not hackers, the people who are stuck using Microsoft Office at their job but want to know about better options, t…

Even if Stallman had only given given us Emacs and we ignored everything else he has ever done, he'd still have given us more and brought more people involved in free software than this new crop of MBA/communications degree CEOs that has taken over ever will.

We need more Torvalds and Van Rossums and Kawaguchis than Stallmans.

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#384

Post by oblio »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #368
padjo wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

[flagged]

LOL.

Compare and contrast this:

> Say what you want about the Stalleman type he was very inspiring and had real leadership. So a lot of hackers followed him in his crazy vision and that gave us a lot.

With this:

> It is very feminine and obviously doesn't work that well.

It's a super sexist comment. A comment born in the 60s, or I guess in our geek land, still in 2025.

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#385

Post by raverbashing »

t43562 wrote: post #350
j45 wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The options thinking they're an island retreat only for those who agree with their way while standing on the same continent. What's missing is building something that resonates with the user/consumer's experience backwards, not just personal preferences or interpretations, which is fine, but at that point it's a personal project, not a product, or much larger unless it really captivates both people who can contribute…

Either software is free or it isn't. You can't have single-vision-central control and freedom. Android is an example of an effort that took something free and made a usable mobile operating system ontop of it - but lead straight back to the problem that it isn't fully free.

> You can't have single-vision-central control and freedom

But that's how a lot of projects do: Apache for instance, nginx, or llvm.

The problem is not being OSS, it is the lack of focus, and a game where everybody brings their ball and are playing the way they want instead of an unified game

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#386

Post by fsflover »

supermatt wrote: post #381
cookiengineer wrote: post #265

Why can't they just partner with postmarketOS here? Why do we have to have /e/OS instead of a better supported LineageOS, because /e/ is a 1:1 copy anyways? Why do we have to have a Librephone project now instead of partnering with say, Fairphone and the Pine64 people? Open source loses this war because proprietary devices are streamlined. The only thing that comes close to this is GrapheneOS, LineageOS, and postmark…

TLDR or something? They aren't making an OS. The project is about opening up the closed blobs that mobile chipsets use: "This project's goal is not another Android distribution, but a long-term project to better understand and reverse-engineer the nonfree blobs used by virtually all SoCs made today."

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45589873

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#387

Post by oblio »

j45 wrote: post #329
cookiengineer wrote: post #265

Why can't they just partner with postmarketOS here? Why do we have to have /e/OS instead of a better supported LineageOS, because /e/ is a 1:1 copy anyways? Why do we have to have a Librephone project now instead of partnering with say, Fairphone and the Pine64 people? Open source loses this war because proprietary devices are streamlined. The only thing that comes close to this is GrapheneOS, LineageOS, and postmark…

You have a good point about things coming together, but open source often is a lot of design and development by committee, or interest. Librephone appears to be taking existing linux approaches, and specifically reverse engineering the SoC blobs to be completely free. I may have mis read, but it doesn't appear they are building another android distro for android phones, as they already have done that in the past. Jus…

Librem?

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#388

Post by hsbauauvhabzb »

notrealyme123 wrote: post #324
b112 wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can use an older pixel, thus not really giving money to Google, and also preventing that phone from landing in a landfill. Without all that Google and carrier excess junk on board, an older phone is fast. You can buy a new pixel, install GrapheneOS, and laugh thinking about how you're denying the enemy the OS level tracking they wanted with that device.

But you still support Google and the closed source Android ecosystem with that.

You could offset that by convincing others to use graphene, and by degoogling your device you’re also cutting off one of their other income streams

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#389

Post by FirmwareBurner »

oblio wrote: post #384
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

LOL. Compare and contrast this: > Say what you want about the Stalleman type he was very inspiring and had real leadership. So a lot of hackers followed him in his crazy vision and that gave us a lot. With this: > It is very feminine and obviously doesn't work that well. It's a super sexist comment. A comment born in the 60s, or I guess in our geek land, still in 2025.

>It's a super sexist comment.

Is it?

To answer this, just reverse the genders in the statement and see if it's still sexist.

"It's very masculine and obviously doesn't work that well"

Re: FSF announces Librephone project

#390

Post by nabla9 »

ZoomZoomZoom wrote: post #372
sunshine-o wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> The FSF is now under the leadership of a "Bachelor of Arts degree in Media and Culture and a Master of Arts in the Preservation and Presentation of the Moving Image" who probably hasn't written a line of code. This is an exceptionally poor argument. 1. Coders are biased and often not aligned with users whose rights FSF is there to protect. Just look at any OSS vs FS discussion on this site to see examples. 2. Your…

In free software those who write code decide what is done and nobody else matters in the end.
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