4 ms·

I'm impressed and very much respectful of what the Purism folks are trying to achieve but I just don't think their business plan is viable as it is. As such I r

by simias 8y ago

I'm impressed and very much respectful of what the Purism folks are trying to achieve but I just don't think their business plan is viable as it is. As such I really don't really believe that getting a few geeks on HN to support the project will really make much of a difference. They need a much broader market share if they want to have a chance to survive in the long term and I don't see how they can get it. As it stands the only people who will consider buying this are principled FLOSS folks with a lot of disposable income. I doubt that's enough. It's not just about building the phone (which is already very difficult), it's also about maintaining the software and app ecosystem in the long term. Windows Phones and countless other smartphone environments floundered over the years even though they were backed by behemoths. What chances does Purism have? So while I have absolutely no hostility towards the project I just don't think it's worth donating money to what I consider to be a lost cause. I'd rather donate money to other Open Source projects who I think will make better use of it. I would be very glad to be proven wrong however, the current smartphone ecosystem is an absolute nightmare if you value privacy and having control on your hardware. If it turns out that the Librem 5 is not dead on arrival like I presume it will be (assuming that it even manages to arrive in the first place) I'll definitely consider buying one.

Already__Taken 8y ago
backed by behemoths with motives other than simply make a good phone.
abc-xyz 8y ago
I'd say it's a misguided comparison since Microsoft and Librem have very different goals. I'm sure Microsoft would've no problem making profitable phones, but if their goal is to obtain as many users as possible, as fast as possible, by spending millions upon millions on marketing and other endeavors then it becomes a lot more difficult.
AsyncAwait 8y ago
> . It's not just about building the phone (which is already very difficult), it's also about maintaining the software and app ecosystem in the long term. I doubt the Purism folks are unaware of this, but I think this running a standard GNU/Linux stack as opposed to what Ubuntu Touch/Firefox OS were doing, gives it at least a shot.
mlok 8y ago
The difference could be : a phone that you're not supposed to throw away after two years. Something that would be maintained over the long run. Lots of people would buy a phone that can last 5-7 years. I am one of them. My mother is one of them. My father too. Not everybody is fond enough of phones or tech to want to change often. If it runs apps and has a good camera, it's fine. A phone that lasts 5-7 years would also be good for the planet, and that's a bigger market share than FLOSS enthusiasts.
- simias 8y ago
  I agree with you on all counts but in order for the phone to be supported for a long time (both by Purism and by third parties) it needs to be reasonably successful. Otherwise nobody is going to even remember it existed two years from now, much less port and maintain apps for it. That's my main problem really, I have Spotify, WhatsApp and a couple other closed-source applications on my smartphone that I need in order for said phone to be useful. If there are no ports or alternatives maintained on the Librem I'd just be buying a very expensive paperweight. And I don't think I'm a heavy app user compared to most of my friends who often have a couple social network apps, games etc... Sibling comments mention that MS could probably make a profitable phone but they don't have the same objectives and I say that it's irrelevant. The problem is third parties and app supports. I need my phone to do more than calling and texting these days, I need decent driving directions, a multimedia player (ideally something that interfaces with Spotify, but I know that's asking for a lot), a chat application that can connect to WhatsApp (I won't convince all of my contacts to switch to Signal, Jabber or IRC) etc... I need that stuff to be maintained and updated for at least a few years. And ideally after that I'd like to know that I can count on a Librem n+1 being available so that I won't have to change ecosystem once again. I've bought a few open source/homebrew systems over the years, mainly handheld consoles to run emulators. It works but the software is often rather lackluster and very amateur looking. It's also generally maintained for a little while then the contributors move on to something else. It's fine for a toy emulator console, not so much for a smartphone. The hardware is not the issue, the ecosystem is.
  - jammygit 8y ago
    The ubports team developed something called halium to address this: its more or less an android emulator that has apparently been working for a couple of years now in testing at least. Its in the purism future goals to add this iirc.

by simias 8y ago

Already__Taken 8y ago

backed by behemoths with motives other than simply make a good phone.

abc-xyz 8y ago

I'd say it's a misguided comparison since Microsoft and Librem have very different goals. I'm sure Microsoft would've no problem making profitable phones, but if their goal is to obtain as many users as possible, as fast as possible, by spending millions upon millions on marketing and other endeavors then it becomes a lot more difficult.

AsyncAwait 8y ago

> . It's not just about building the phone (which is already very difficult), it's also about maintaining the software and app ecosystem in the long term. I doubt the Purism folks are unaware of this, but I think this running a standard GNU/Linux stack as opposed to what Ubuntu Touch/Firefox OS were doing, gives it at least a shot.

mlok 8y ago

The difference could be : a phone that you're not supposed to throw away after two years. Something that would be maintained over the long run. Lots of people would buy a phone that can last 5-7 years. I am one of them. My mother is one of them. My father too. Not everybody is fond enough of phones or tech to want to change often. If it runs apps and has a good camera, it's fine. A phone that lasts 5-7 years would also be good for the planet, and that's a bigger market share than FLOSS enthusiasts.

simias 8y ago
I agree with you on all counts but in order for the phone to be supported for a long time (both by Purism and by third parties) it needs to be reasonably successful. Otherwise nobody is going to even remember it existed two years from now, much less port and maintain apps for it. That's my main problem really, I have Spotify, WhatsApp and a couple other closed-source applications on my smartphone that I need in order for said phone to be useful. If there are no ports or alternatives maintained on the Librem I'd just be buying a very expensive paperweight. And I don't think I'm a heavy app user compared to most of my friends who often have a couple social network apps, games etc... Sibling comments mention that MS could probably make a profitable phone but they don't have the same objectives and I say that it's irrelevant. The problem is third parties and app supports. I need my phone to do more than calling and texting these days, I need decent driving directions, a multimedia player (ideally something that interfaces with Spotify, but I know that's asking for a lot), a chat application that can connect to WhatsApp (I won't convince all of my contacts to switch to Signal, Jabber or IRC) etc... I need that stuff to be maintained and updated for at least a few years. And ideally after that I'd like to know that I can count on a Librem n+1 being available so that I won't have to change ecosystem once again. I've bought a few open source/homebrew systems over the years, mainly handheld consoles to run emulators. It works but the software is often rather lackluster and very amateur looking. It's also generally maintained for a little while then the contributors move on to something else. It's fine for a toy emulator console, not so much for a smartphone. The hardware is not the issue, the ecosystem is.
- jammygit 8y ago
  The ubports team developed something called halium to address this: its more or less an android emulator that has apparently been working for a couple of years now in testing at least. Its in the purism future goals to add this iirc.