Manufacturing the Librem 5 USA Phone in the US

Post by renewiltord » Wed, Jun 02, 2021, 7:53 PM UTC

jolux wrote: post #45

ludocode wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think the answers “yes”, if the demand is there. It's not a question of demand. A negligible number of customers care where their product is manufactured. They care only about price, which is why manufacturing moved overseas in the first place. What is needed to manufacture phones in the West is protectionism and mercantilism. Our governments would have to subsidize domestically manufactured products, require the…

> It's politically unpopular for the same reason action on climate change is unpopular: it makes everything more expensive. You've got this backwards. Both taking action on climate change and buying American are popular [1][2]. Furthermore I don't know of much evidence that suggests taking action on climate change will raise prices. But you are right about protectionism in that way. That's the biggest problem here. I…

Post by jandrese » Wed, Jun 02, 2021, 8:02 PM UTC

fsflover wrote: post #6

stu2b50 wrote: post #3

For reference, the Librem 5 USA cost $2000 and comes with 32GB of eMMc on device storage, a SoC that can be generously called "slow", and 3GB of RAM. It's easy to see why phones are not entirely sourced from the US when it makes the iPhone look like impossibly good value for your money.

This is not just about the specs: https://source.puri.sm/Librem5/community-wiki/-/wikis/Freque... . By the way, there is also China-made version for $800.

Post by ahmedalsudani » Wed, Jun 02, 2021, 8:09 PM UTC

azinman2 wrote: post #92

ahmedalsudani wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, your own state has more of an incentive to control your behaviour. As with everything else, think through the threat model.

I’m more worried about the other state understanding the topology of my state in higher resolution than my own state does. The ramifications are endless, and I believe that to be the more grave threat (aka undermine society at its cultural fabric while stealing/undermining the economy and crippling the military).

Post by mPReDiToR » Wed, Jun 02, 2021, 8:28 PM UTC

yumraj wrote: post #28

yifanlu wrote: post #23

Yeah it’s 2021 and Chinese manufactured are more reliable and higher quality than anything American made. As an anecdote I build PCBs for a hobby and I’ve purchased PCBs and chips from both cheap Chinese fabs and suppliers as well as Americans ones. The only issues I’ve ever had were with American ones (which were many times more expensive) and I’ve stopped using them completely. I would be curious if librem will eve…

> Also after the Snowden revelations, I laugh at the idea that American made products are somehow more “secure”. Be that may, but as a US person I’d rather have US intelligence snooping on me than a foreign hostile entity. There are no ifs and buts about it. For folks in other countries, I leave it to them if they are more comfortable with a democracy, with relatively good relations with most countries in the world,…

Post by walrus01 » Wed, Jun 02, 2021, 8:38 PM UTC

sokoloff wrote: post #5

$800 (down from $900) for the Librem 5; $2000 for the Librem 5 USA edition. (Edit: I'm leaving this paragraph here as it attracted comments that would no longer make sense if I edited/removed, but it was a result of a flawed premise [bad math in my head]) That seems a significant premium over the actual cost differential, but they self-admit "this is for customers who have hard requirements on sourcing" rather than "…