3 ms·

This is an admirable effort, but unless tens of thousands of units are put into production it will be very difficult to get the attention of even the smallest C

by kepano 9y ago

This is an admirable effort, but unless tens of thousands of units are put into production it will be very difficult to get the attention of even the smallest Chinese OEMs. It appears they've pre-sold less than 2000 units. I wonder if it would be more fruitful to work from an existing phone with solid build quality and simplifying the process of jailbreaking it and installing FOSS on it.

chx 9y ago
Separating the CPU and the baseband is going to be a challenge when building this device and impossible on any other device. But, if you want a libre phone then you must because the baseband will be a black box that's unavoidable.
j45 9y ago
Having the ability to create the first 2 or 3 waves of prototypes is nothing small. iPhone 1-3 needed improvement, similar to the galaxy note. Maybe there's a Oneplus angle here where they can start small and lean with a partner.
wvh 9y ago
Jailbreaking and installing FOSS like Jolla is doing with Sailfish on Xperia X right this week, with some help from Sony Open Devices. Still, it would be nice to have some hope do be able to do it without relying on manufacturers' goodwill... If ARM gets sufficiently commoditised so it's cheap (both time and money) enough for smaller players to create hardware, surely there must be enough open-source and/or privacy-oriented folks around to come up with a profitable product?
- cameronhowe 9y ago
  Jolla/Sailfish is not FOSS, and they have no plans to be so in the future either.
  - jcelerier 9y ago
    It's still the closest option we have to "desktop linux stack running on a phone". Wayland, Qt, BTRFS, systemd, glibc...
  - Brakenshire 9y ago
    The major thing which isn't FOSS are the UI components, other than that it's the default apps, the home screen etc. And they are planning to open-source more, they effectively went bankrupt a few years back and the new investors were reluctant.

by kepano 9y ago

chx 9y ago

Separating the CPU and the baseband is going to be a challenge when building this device and impossible on any other device. But, if you want a libre phone then you must because the baseband will be a black box that's unavoidable.

j45 9y ago

Having the ability to create the first 2 or 3 waves of prototypes is nothing small. iPhone 1-3 needed improvement, similar to the galaxy note. Maybe there's a Oneplus angle here where they can start small and lean with a partner.

wvh 9y ago

Jailbreaking and installing FOSS like Jolla is doing with Sailfish on Xperia X right this week, with some help from Sony Open Devices. Still, it would be nice to have some hope do be able to do it without relying on manufacturers' goodwill... If ARM gets sufficiently commoditised so it's cheap (both time and money) enough for smaller players to create hardware, surely there must be enough open-source and/or privacy-oriented folks around to come up with a profitable product?

cameronhowe 9y ago
Jolla/Sailfish is not FOSS, and they have no plans to be so in the future either.
- jcelerier 9y ago
  It's still the closest option we have to "desktop linux stack running on a phone". Wayland, Qt, BTRFS, systemd, glibc...
- Brakenshire 9y ago
  The major thing which isn't FOSS are the UI components, other than that it's the default apps, the home screen etc. And they are planning to open-source more, they effectively went bankrupt a few years back and the new investors were reluctant.