3 ms·
> principles matter To whom, though? Everybody is praising Apple for their (admittedly quite excellent) M1 hardware and no one seems to take issue with that ei
by qayxc 6y ago
> principles matter
To whom, though? Everybody is praising Apple for their (admittedly quite excellent) M1 hardware and no one seems to take issue with that either.
You cannot have truly open hardware as long as (software-) patents and IP exist, simple as that. Companies need to protect their investment, since the days of comparatively simple CPUs are over and a lot of "secret sauce" is actually software and licensed IP blocks.
Since patent holders are free to select who their licensee is, they'll always target the ones with the biggest margins (see for example [1]) so mainly consumer products and thus those won't be free (as in speech) anytime soon.
[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-20/nokia-seeks-to-block-lenovo-sales-in-germany-after-injunction https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-20/nokia-see...
- core-questions 6y agoAll of that hardware would be just fine if we had a Bill of Rights for the Internet that ensured free speech rights and ability to host content (of any sort that isn't strictly prohibited already) is enshrined in law. Pity all these laws end up spending most of their time enabling obscenity instead of political speech.
- xg15 6y agoThis is all probably true, but doesn't change the point that the consequences of those perfectly reasonable business descisions will have massive effects on personal freedom.