[Community] Growing the Community

[Dr. H. Nikolaus Schaller]

Hi,

Am 17.06.2013 um 20:10 schrieb kardan:

> Dear open hardware community,
> 
> Am Sat, 15 Jun 2013 09:39:11 +0000
> schrieb Bob Ham <rah at settrans.net>:
> 
>> Here is the acid test I think any phone needs to pass in order to be
>> successful: you must be able to take the phone out of the box, stick a
>> SIM card in, charge the phone, start using it fully, stick it in your
>> pocket, and never, for the entirety of the life of the hardware,
>> update any software on it to a newer version.

I think you can do that it with any phone. You do not need to upgrade it.
You only have to accept that communication protocols change and you
will not be able to use all services over that long time. Some of them
will disappear or start to be broken. You may also not (yet) have the
time zone database for the next 10 years etc. It may also happen that
the network where your SIM card is for will not be available any more in
10 years...

So IMHO it is a nice dream!

>> 
>> When we have a phone OS that's solid enough to be used for 10+ years
>> without an update, we'll be in a position to produce a free phone that
>> will be a success.
> 
> Sounds appaeling to me. During my travels during the last 5 years I
> would have sold dozens (at least a lot of people were interested in
> this uncommon kind of phone), but it didn't make that elegant
> figure when they tried to use it due to my lack of patience crawling
> into it to make it a shiny phone.
> 
> Where are we now? Full featured qtmoko with automatic
> adressbook and email synchroization with outlook? No. "Our customers"
> dive into their mails via mutt or cone, or just hang out in irrsi? But
> honestly, I can not image to chat or write emails with this kind of
> phone. So if even I cannot do (its lying on my table), who makes
> anybody believing, that this is a cool phone, a musthave, the key to a
> new world of software...stability, usability, custamizabilty, security -
> what are the values this phone should be referred to?

IMHO: security of your data, customizability, stability (being supported
even in 3 or 5 years). Usability is a tough topic.

Maybe slide 6 gives some answers:
http://projects.goldelico.com/p/openphoenux/downloads/get/OpenPhoenux.pdf

> 
> People who want to have geeky apps, have plenty of them already
> in existing stores. This is not the point. One key feature, that
> separates OM from the rest is the unlimited control to disable any
> hardware component with the confidence, that there are no backdoors or
> remotely triggered hidden updates. This is a plus in privacy no other
> phone has. What about a StrikePhone crowdfunding campaign in analogy to
> the StrikeBike and the onelaptopperchild project - pay two, get one
> and support an activist in turkey or syria! ,)

> 
> Regarding advertising, I don't expect the community to become
> annoyingly extroverted, showing "linux boot screens" on the frontpage,
> but - please excuse me, as this maybe unfair - if only [1] and [2] out
> of 11 entries in the videolog are available, this is no marketing. ;P

this was an unknown accident by YouTube. Not in any way intentional
and noticed until you told us. All these videos were reset to a publication
status of "Private". I have fixed it now.

> (i would put the bottom links to the left and any cool media
> eyecatcher in the middle [3])
> 
> Anybody thought of an OM with preinstalled Skolelinux or Edubuntu as
> memory aid for tests? Give me 5 working phones (hardware+software) and
> we start a school project with 100 new faces for the community. Yea.

Well preinstallation is  just Device + inserting preformatted SD card.
So it is very easy to make devices with many different "preinstallations"...

It should also be quite simple to modify the Debian SD image to Edubuntu.

> 
> Let's talk about the benefits of having an android
> on my OM - should I do it or not. Which features should I miss to buy
> such a cool feature? I am seriously curious.

Well, Android gives access to a lot of new developers since not everybody
is experienced in programming Qt, Xlib, etc.

Bt if you don't need the applications for Android, you don't need an Android
image as well.

Generally the idea of the GTA04 devices is to be OS agnostic. And supporting
this by providing all information needed to port new OSes, even non-Linux
based ones.

> 
> BTW I would never sell my open hardware phone as it is a status
> symbol. I missed that point in the discussion so far :)
> 
> kindle regards,
> kardan
> 
> 1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHqA3SaZ5oQ&feature=youtu.be
> 2] http://blog.slyon.de/2012/03/18/gta04-booting-shr-in-17-seconds/
> 3] http://www.openphoenux.org/
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-- hns