On Monday 22 March 2010 09:10:21 Carsten Munk wrote: > We have to make a proper and competitive end-user product with MeeGo > in the short term. We can create world peace in the long term. Time to > strike with a open source platform is now, not in 5 years. Or we'll be > run over by 20% open source platforms on closed devices.
I agree with Carsten. My, personal, reason for compromise is that I believe any efforts I put in will go to waste unless the devices built on this platform are truly successful -- amongst the top smartphones. But the really high-end smartphone market is critically dependent on leading edge hardware: some of the most sophisticated hardware development today is aimed at that market. Displays, radios, displays, chipset integration, processors, batteries -- all have to be small, cheap, power efficient and extremely performant -- an imposible demand! This is leading edge stuff and there is little competition for the most innovative vendors. That leading edge hardware is provided by companies who, for various reasons, are not interested in producing open source drivers. We can, and should, continue to emphasise to them how their own business can be improved by going open source, but they have less incentive to do so than a Nokia -- they are looking at small amounts of software and they are very worried that their competitors will learn some of the secrets of their hardware designs if they were to open their software. I think they are wrong and that, on balance, it would be a win for them to open their code but I acknowledge their worries. In the meantime, I recognise that any device which chooses not to use their hardware will not be a successful top-end smartphone. That is an unfortunate fact of the phone business. > I don't personally believe militant open source is the way to go. I > think practical open source is the way to go, seeing the big picture. > Changing the world piece by piece instead of revolution. I'm not interested in contributing to a project which fails, because it is not capable of building a successful device. So, I am much more concerned that MeeGo has an open process, that open software can be added to any MeeGo device and that as much of MeeGo as possible is open, than in stopping its use with proprietary software. I realise others may have different priorities. That is fine. But please accept that some of us do not share them. Graham _______________________________________________ MeeGo-dev mailing list [email protected] http://lists.meego.com/listinfo/meego-dev
