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   nixCraft 🐧 (nixcraft@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Oct-2025 21:55:03 JST nixCraft 🐧

   The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today announced "Librephone," a new project aimed at achieving complete mobile phone freedom for users from Google and Apple. The initiative will work to reverse engineer obstacles until its goal of a fully free mobile phone environment is realized. Can they be successful where industry leaders like Ubuntu failed previously?

   https://www.fsf.org/news/librephone-project

   #linux #opensource

   • Embed this notice
     Brodie Robertson (brodieonlinux@mstdn.social)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Oct-2025 21:54:59 JST Brodie Robertson

     in reply to

     • viq
     • Liam Proven

     @viq @lproven @nixCraft I wish them luck dealing with a cell signal, they're going to need a lot of it

   • Embed this notice
     Liam Proven (lproven@social.vivaldi.net)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Oct-2025 21:55:01 JST Liam Proven

     in reply to

     @nixCraft A Linux phone you say?

     Like a Furilabs phone?

     https://furilabs.com/

     Or a Fairphone with postmarketOS?

     https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Fairphone_5_(fairphone-fp5)

     Or a Jolla phone?

     https://jolla-devices.com/jolla-jolla/

     Or a Pinephone?

     https://pine64.org/devices/pinephone/

     Or any supported device with UBports?

     https://ubports.com/

     Seriously, there are multiple options out there.

     I didn't back the Ubuntu phone because it didn't offer anything to me that existing phones didn't already do. Like, say, a physical keyboard, which I'd happily pay for. (I own a Gemini.)

   • Embed this notice
     viq (viq@social.hackerspace.pl)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Oct-2025 21:55:01 JST viq

     in reply to

     • Liam Proven

     @lproven @nixCraft ah, but FSF doesn't like binary blobs and hardware not under control of user, so baseband, CPU and chipset are going to be "interesting".

   • Embed this notice
     nixCraft 🐧 (nixcraft@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Oct-2025 21:55:02 JST nixCraft 🐧

     in reply to

     If it was fucking AI, LLM, or crypto idea, they would have pumped billions into it. I’m not saying Canonical is perfect, but they did try, unlike Red Hat, IBM, and SUSE, who treat the Linux desktop as a 3rd class citizen because they make their money from the cloud and server markets. These companies have short sighted vision. But what the fuck do I know about running big business. LOL

     Ubuntu Edge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_Edge

   • Embed this notice
     nixCraft 🐧 (nixcraft@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Oct-2025 21:55:02 JST nixCraft 🐧

     in reply to

     Here is that email where I was refunded. I truly thought I was going to get a Linux phone. Oh, I was such a sweet child of summer.

   • Embed this notice
     nixCraft 🐧 (nixcraft@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Oct-2025 21:55:03 JST nixCraft 🐧

     in reply to

     The Ubuntu Edge was a high end smartphone proposed by Canonical Ltd. in July 2013. Canonical attempted to crowdfund a limited production run through Indiegogo with the ambitious goal of raising $32 million, the highest target in crowdfunding history at the time. However, the project fell short of its goal, raising $12,733,521. I remember getting refund for this project. At that time big companies with deep pockets like IBM, RedHat and other refused to support Canonical. Now we all pay price

   • Embed this notice
     Brodie Robertson (brodieonlinux@mstdn.social)'s status on Thursday, 16-Oct-2025 04:19:14 JST Brodie Robertson

     in reply to

     • Michael Kohne
     • viq
     • Liam Proven

     @mhkohne @viq @lproven @nixCraft I mean I wish them luck because that's not a problem you can engineer, if the carriers don't like you then you can't do shit about it

   • Embed this notice
     Michael Kohne (mhkohne@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 16-Oct-2025 04:19:15 JST Michael Kohne

     in reply to

     • viq
     • Liam Proven
     • Brodie Robertson

     @BrodieOnLinux @viq @lproven @nixCraft Not so much luck, just stupid amounts of engineer time. For as much as I tell my coworkers that RF is black magic, it's really just quite difficult engineering, that you need a lot of very expensive gear to do. And then get through the various approvals. Nothing that big bags of money and years of work won't fix.