Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#1

Post by dkd903 » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 4:44 AM UTC

Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”
digitizor.com

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#2

Post by biafra » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 5:40 AM UTC

The original article by Stallman is here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-fre...

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#3

Post by rodh257 » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 5:46 AM UTC

We get it, this has been discussed over and over, Android 3.0 is not open source because the source was not released, can we move on now? Google will be releasing the source code to Ice Cream Sandwich, but for now, Android 3.0 is not open source. We didn't need Richard Stallman to tell us that.

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#4

Post by vegai » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 5:46 AM UTC

Which ones do, I wonder?

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#5

Post by danielhunt » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 5:47 AM UTC

...Do Not Respect Your Software Freedom.

Note that (pretty important) word left out there? Yeah. Linkbait.

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#6

Post by biafra » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 5:49 AM UTC

vegai wrote: post #4

Which ones do, I wonder?

All those with a locked bootloader.

BTW: Is there a complete list which ones have an unlocked or unlockable bootloader?

I know about the following:

- Android Dev Phone 1 (HTC Dream)

- Ion (HTC Magic)

- Motorola Droid (unfortunately not the Milestone)

- Nexus One (HTC Passion)

- Nexus S (relockable) (Samsung Crespo)

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#7

Post by outside1234 » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 5:50 AM UTC

i want to like rms but you get the sense that he doesn't live in the real world whenever you read his stuff.

I mean, seriously, Android is about a lightyear more open than iOS and there are super good reasons Honeycomb is not out. An OEM in China would promptly put out some sort of crappy phone that uses it and wrecks the Android brand.

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#8

Post by bleakgadfly » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 5:52 AM UTC

If we'd follow everything Stallman said we'd all be "surfing the web" one email at a time (http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.os.openbsd.misc/134336/focus=1...)

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#9

Post by jarin » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 6:03 AM UTC

Stallman never misses an opportunity to bring up the Linux vs. GNU/Linux distinction.

Re: Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

#10

Post by lurker19 » Tue, Sep 20, 2011, 6:08 AM UTC

outside1234 wrote: post #7

i want to like rms but you get the sense that he doesn't live in the real world whenever you read his stuff. I mean, seriously, Android is about a lightyear more open than iOS and there are super good reasons Honeycomb is not out. An OEM in China would promptly put out some sort of crappy phone that uses it and wrecks the Android brand.

What has RMS written that is not real? He knows that some non-free software is compelling and profitable, but he argues that in the long run of is unstainable. And when you look at Lion and Metro and Google Apps' only half-baked Data Liberation Front and compare to what RMS wrote 20 years ago, it is clear he is very much in the real world, unfortunately.

Is Android the least evil? Probably. But it is still not free. And RMS doesn't say you mustn't Android and whatever else; he just days that you shouldn't if you want to protect and promote software freedom, and he is a living model of an example free software lifestyle, for better or worse.