[alichapman]

I'm not usually the most idealistic when it comes to FOSS, but it's stories like this and Apple's stance of "trust us, we promise we know what we're doing and that nothing is going to go wrong" that makes me think all software should be legally required to be open source.

[dcow]

It would be if y’all slapped the AGPLv3 on your code instead of Apache/MIT/BSD.

If we were to perform a cyber analog of what the founding fathers did for the USA 250 years ago, it would be something along the lines of declaring all software free from the tyranny of corporate control and state oppression. Free in perpetuity so that our digital projections onto hardware shall reside comfortably each in their own pursuit of happiness.

[cinquemb]

> If we were to perform a cyber analog of what the founding fathers did for the USA 250 years ago, it would be something along the lines of declaring all software free from the tyranny of corporate control and state oppression.

… and then proceed to conduct asymmetric warfare against state and corporate cyber systems alike.

[dcow]

If we use servers in China and Russia it’s essentially legal, right?

[bnt]

How would OSS help in this case? Someone can run a hash, find an “offensive” photo and jail you. Shit, if someone is out to get you, they will dig up any photo on your phone, put it in the “bad hashes” database and just wait for Apple to catch you. And then you’re effed, because no court will want to publicly display a photo that may contain child pornography, so you’ll be jailed without a fair trial.

OSS won’t help here. This system must be shut down, and the gov should deal with pedos in a different way.

[dcow]

They said FOSS, not OSS. F means free as in freedom. As in you’re free to modify the software running on your phone at will and to your liking and Apple or some government can’t get in your way.. not even for the kids.

[nicce]

Processor microcode is closed source (Intel/AMD), including most of the BIOS code. You are having hard time to build your devices. Maybe we can see change in the future.

[neolog]

FOSS is expanding down the stack.

> coreboot is a Free Software project aimed at replacing the proprietary BIOS (firmware) found in most computers. coreboot performs a little bit of hardware initialization and then executes additional boot logic, called a payload.

https://github.com/coreboot/coreboot

[easygenes]

* enter RISC-V *

[hulitu]

RISC-V is "nice to have". I do not know of anybody who sells RISC-V computers or boards at a reasonable price.

[kilburn]

Maybe it does not seem a reasonable price to you, but for people who don't know, the HiFive Unmatched [1] sells for 679$ [2].

This is the most powerful RISC-V platform you can buy today. It comes as a Mini-ITX board including 16Gb of DDR4 ram, 1Gbps ethernet, usb 3.2, PCI Express and NVMe.

Of course it is less powerful than an x64 machine at the same price point, but it should work reasonably well when paired with an SSD and a graphics card.

[1] https://www.sifive.com/boards/hifive-unmatched

[2] https://www.crowdsupply.com/sifive/hifive-unmatched

[bnt]

So we force Apple to migrate away from ARM? Or should the next iPhone have a swappable CPU?

[dcow]

I’m not sure I understand how microcode is a problem here. Microcode isn’t an OS. I can compile for arm 8.3 and execute those instructions on apple silicon just fine. The kernel is the only thing that gets in the way, not the microcode…

[NotChina]

Force? Apple can continue to mistreat their customers, and they'll beg for more.

[bnt]

So all 12 people in the world who know how to read, modify and install and OS can run their paranoid versions of iOS?

[arp242]

Personally I'm hugely in favour of phrasing it in terms of "Right to Repair". Most people don't know how to repair their car or John Deere tractor either: and that's where the experts come in who do it for you.

In this case, you or me might be the expert, who can provide solutions for other people such as an "installer" to do whatever.

I personally don't really have a problem with Apple's plan here by the way; I think the way they're doing it is actually quite balanced and reasonable. But other people should be free to make a different personal decision on this. What I would like is to modify some other aspects of my iPhone though, like some things on the keyboard that still bug me after several years.

[pydry]

If it were FOSS one person could build a paranoid version and everybody else could use it.

[fragileone]

Just buy a device with it already installed, Calyx and Fairphone offer these for instance.