[fidotron]

There was a reimplementation of SuperH as https://j-core.org some years ago and AFAIK it didn't really go anywhere, sadly.

One of the things you get when dealing with OEMs, and IP licensors like Arm, is a huge amount of paperwork about patents, and I used to believe this was annoying, but have come to believe it is vital. The alternative "open" "free" approach leads to something like the cloud world, where in practice it's AWS/GCS/Azure and some others in lower tiers, because of the complexities around the open/free stacks and IP tarpits that result. Just look at how AWS behave. We must be able to pay to develop and license these pieces, or you will end up with all IP being trade secrets and the vertical monopolies will get utterly entrenched.

There are definitely patent trolls around but the free case would be much stronger if financially viable open source software development were a thing.

[crote]

So rather than getting stuck in potential future tarpit of AWS or GCS or Azure, or probably a dozen other companies, we should voluntarily put ourselves into the IP tarpit developed by ARM? How exactly is that a win?

Over the last two decades ARM has developed a stranglehold on the non-x86 world, and they have already considered abusing this position to increase their profit margin[0]. As a chipmaker you're essentially stuck with ARM, as getting rid of them means you not only need to redesign your chips, but you also need to completely overhaul the entire downstream ecosystem.

With RISC-V there's at least the possibility of switching to a different IP vendor. That might not practically happen with bleeding-edge SoCs, but that kind of flexibility is quite important for the far larger dime-a-dozen MCU market. It's exactly why companies like Western Digital are investing in RISC-V and even developing open-source implementations[1]. Compute is essentially a commodity already, so why not tear down the walled gardens and force it to be one?

[0]: https://www.techpowerup.com/300385/arm-could-change-licensin...

[1]: https://blog.westerndigital.com/risc-v-swerv-core-open-sourc...

[fidotron]

Arm didn't develop the IP tarpit, they're one of the few players that learned how to operate in it.

The SuperH example is relevant because what Arm did was "that's neat, let's license it" for some of the Hitachi innovations, and then licensed it to other people too. This is a positive development, and how trade and innovation has worked through the most successful periods in history.

There is a respect in which they are more comparable to the MPEG-LA than a conventional company, but they do not have a reputation for shady antics, unlike some of their customers!

[calf]

ARM exists because of the tarpit's ecology. The ecology permits an IP monopolizer to become entrenched in it and to suppress other players.

[kmeisthax]

MPEG-LA is a very bad example. For starters, it's not MPEG; and furthermore there isn't a single MPEG patent pool anymore. There's like three of them, plus patent holders that haven't actually joined a pool, and that's made H.265 licensing a living nightmare.

Don't take my innovating-hating Stallmanite commie ass's word for it. Leonardo Chiariglione himself - a man who is adamantly opposed to royalty free formats being the superior standard[0] - has pointed out significant problems with the ISO MPEG licensing model of "we use whatever's best and let the patent pools sort it out". See: https://blog.chiariglione.org/a-crisis-the-causes-and-a-solu...

Since he posted that article, ISO cut MPEG into a bunch of tiny pieces and Leonardo was pushed out of the organization he founded, presumably as retaliation for airing the dirty laundry. He now runs a competing organization (MPAI) with very specific licensing requirements specifically to ensure patent pools don't go nuts screwing over users of patents.

[0] To be clear, he doesn't hate royalty free, he just wants it to be deliberately inferior so that research labs can make money off the patent royalties to fund more research.

[eschaton]

You don’t actually believe patents and other licensing regimes are good, do you?

[bee_rider]

Amazon also, of course, designs ARM cores. But they do seem a tad less “locked in via complexity” than their cloud stuff. I wonder if that is a result of the license situation. Alternatively, Amazon may just not be very good at coming up with hardware extensions, and also trying to commoditize their complement.

[lizknope]

Amazon does not design ARM cores. Graviton uses Neoverse cores licensed from ARM

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AWS_Graviton