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PINE64 has let its community down

drewdevault.com

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Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#21

Post by mpol »

cat_plus_plus wrote: post #17

I have no ties to these people, but say after a pandemic and recession, a corner restaurant raises prices, drops your favorite dish and the rest come in smaller portions and don't taste as good. Would you shout that they let community down and demand an apology, or would you just accept that running a small business is hard and many don't make it, or fail to cater to any customer. Non-Android Linux phone is already a…

Sure, the restaurant will change. But suppose the cooks are volunteers. You need them to make anything usable out of the food that was bought from the wholesaler.

What if, like Pine64, the restaurant only supports, communicates and negotiates with a few volunteers who serve the dish but not prepare it. All while not supporting, communicating and negotiating with the cooks in the kitchen. And now the cooks in the kitchen run away, what is there left to serve? Only ready made dishes, but no new dishes. And what will happen to the restaurant?

The Pine64 community makes the software. Manjaro only serves it to the enduser but doesn't help building it. Current devices are somewhat supported, new devices have big question marks hanging above them.

Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#22

Post by mpol »

emptyparadise wrote: post #13

What alternatives do we have? Don't mean this as a dismissal, genuinely want to know more about the state of open source hardware.

Librem 5 of course.

The Gigaset phones might be interesting. Built in Germany, rebranded by Volla among others.

Sony Xperia and Fairphone are far away from vanilla Linux I think (someone may correct me).

Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#24

Post by WhyNotHugo »

mpol wrote: post #22
emptyparadise wrote: post #13

What alternatives do we have? Don't mean this as a dismissal, genuinely want to know more about the state of open source hardware.

Librem 5 of course. The Gigaset phones might be interesting. Built in Germany, rebranded by Volla among others. Sony Xperia and Fairphone are far away from vanilla Linux I think (someone may correct me).

> Sony Xperia

Tried one with JollaOS. GPS doesn't work, and headphones didn't work. No idea about the stock experience tho.

> Fairphone

It's a pretty Google-centric Android experience.

You can't even get past setup without signing up with Google.

Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#25

Post by ocdtrekkie »

asdajksah2123 wrote: post #10
nominusllc wrote: post #3

Is drew pursuing being a pundit more these days? He always had a certain propensity for commentary, but it was usually about projects, but now seems to be more general commentary. This reads more like a disclaimer of someone who just saw the uproar around Pine64 and said "oh crap, I recommended those. better do some intellectual damage control". I like you drew, and I pay for your products. I make this post with a si…

He's given clear recommendations. Mobile FOSS is important. He has a position where a simple blog post by him can reach the HN front pages. It's a good thing that he's putting his opinion out there in a constructive fashion to help prevent mobile FOSS from decaying. It would be one thing if he went all Twitter and started telling everyone to leave Pine otherwise they would be morally equivalent to Hitler. That's not…

I think both Martijn and Drew have their hearts in the right place, but I strongly feel a giant blogroll of criticism posts headlining HN for three days is just going to kill the mobile FOSS ecosystem (or leave it only to Librem, which prices out most folks). And the complaint can't be separated from the fact that... people just don't like that Manjaro is the selected "default". Because a default was and is sorely needed, and of course, now that there is one, people have opinions on it.

Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#26

Post by frostwarrior »

shp0ngle wrote: post #12

I write it as someone who does not follow this space… …does “letting community down” matters? The phones and the open source seems to be open, can’t you just… put your own OS on there or whatever?

Also it's baffling how high the bar is for those who want to do good.

Most mainstream vendors will shit on your privacy and sell information of your entire life as a product and nothing happens to them.

But the privacy-respecting company is always a bad decision away from being crapped all over and cancelled as an option.

Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#27

Post by selfhoster11 »

mpol wrote: post #22
emptyparadise wrote: post #13

What alternatives do we have? Don't mean this as a dismissal, genuinely want to know more about the state of open source hardware.

Librem 5 of course. The Gigaset phones might be interesting. Built in Germany, rebranded by Volla among others. Sony Xperia and Fairphone are far away from vanilla Linux I think (someone may correct me).

Fairphone and Librem are alternatives to Pine64 hardware in the same way that a Lamborghini may be an alternative to a Toyota Yaris. They aren't even remotely in the same pricing band.

Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#28

Post by cat_plus_plus »

mpol wrote: post #21
cat_plus_plus wrote: post #17

I have no ties to these people, but say after a pandemic and recession, a corner restaurant raises prices, drops your favorite dish and the rest come in smaller portions and don't taste as good. Would you shout that they let community down and demand an apology, or would you just accept that running a small business is hard and many don't make it, or fail to cater to any customer. Non-Android Linux phone is already a…

Sure, the restaurant will change. But suppose the cooks are volunteers. You need them to make anything usable out of the food that was bought from the wholesaler. What if, like Pine64, the restaurant only supports, communicates and negotiates with a few volunteers who serve the dish but not prepare it. All while not supporting, communicating and negotiating with the cooks in the kitchen. And now the cooks in the kitc…

Volunteer kitchens also close all the time. But a lot of times an appropriate response is to start your own volunteer kitchen and try to sustain it better long term rather than yelling at founders of the failing one who may simply not have time or resources. Especially if they gave you a lot of free recipes so that you don't have to figure everything out from scratch.

Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#29

Post by jraph »

selfhoster11 wrote: post #27
mpol wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Librem 5 of course. The Gigaset phones might be interesting. Built in Germany, rebranded by Volla among others. Sony Xperia and Fairphone are far away from vanilla Linux I think (someone may correct me).

Fairphone and Librem are alternatives to Pine64 hardware in the same way that a Lamborghini may be an alternative to a Toyota Yaris. They aren't even remotely in the same pricing band.

They are still alternatives… with different pros and cons, the price being one of them.

But the Fairphone is not an alternative to the Librem 5 and the PinePhone, and those are not alternatives to the Fairphone. They target different things.

Re: PINE64 has let its community down

#30

Post by em-bee »

jraph wrote: post #9
dewey wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He recommended it before, and now he wants to give some context to his other posts so people know he changed his opinion. I don't see anything wrong with that. It seems to be the right thing to do. The alternative is deleting the posts so people don't get mislead by him recommending PINE64 even though he maybe wouldn't anymore at the current point in time.

I don't read his post as him changing his opinion on recommending Pine64, but as a request to Pine64 to fix the situation, in which he expresses his expectations. I'm rather happy he did: he is read, and I share these expectations. I want Pine64 to succeed (actually, the mobile Linux ecosystem but I think they have a major role in it and can keep having a positive influence) and I think they need to do what Drew wrot…

unfortunately, the last thing ANY project needs in order to succeed is DRAMA!

no matter how we twist and turn, this kind of fighting is not helpful. drew may be right in what he says, but being right doesn't matter. collaboration, support and good will matter. if we want to help a project that is making mistakes, they need to be able to fix those mistakes without being denounced.

as drew says, it’s difficult to acknowledge our mistakes, and exactly because of that, we as a community need to create an environment where acknowledging mistakes is possible without embarrassment. those asked to acknowledge their mistakes need to be sure that they will be forgiven. unfortunately, with both pine64 and manjaro seemingly being pushed into a corner, i don't know if that can happen.

drew is exactly right when he describes the three outcomes, where the only successful outcome will be for pine64 to acknowledge their mistake with grace and humility.

but, this is going to be very difficult if everyone keep putting pressure in them, because for sure there will be some who will not recognize if pine64 responded with grace and humility. instead everyone else needs to deal with this problem with equal grace and humility too.

those with a stake in this situation need to get around a (virtual) table, and work this out amongst themselves, and come up with steps to move forward where everyone of them can get something positive out of it. it may be difficult, but i really wish that this is going to happen. (my son is waiting for that pinetime i ordered, and the pinephone with the external keyboard is still on my shoppinglist as my next portable server and emergency laptop, so really i am rooting for their success)

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