Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

http://digitizor.com/2011/09/20/richard-stallman-android-free-software/

by dkd903 • 15 years ago

192 104 15 years ago

biafra3• 15 years ago

The original article by Stallman is here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-fre...

rodh257• 15 years ago

We get it, this has been discussed over and over, Android 3.0 is not open source because the source was not released, can we move on now? Google will be releasing the source code to Ice Cream Sandwich, but for now, Android 3.0 is not open source. We didn't need Richard Stallman to tell us that.

vixen99• 15 years ago

In view of the ensuing discussion here, that may not be so.

Beware the Royal 'we'.

"It is also called the royal pronoun, the royal "we" or the Victorian "we." The more general word for the use of we to refer to oneself is nosism, from the Latin nos. It is most commonly used to denote the excellence, power, and dignity of the person that speaks or writes.:"

RexRollman• 15 years ago

So long as Google keeps referring to Android as open, I think the point needs to be brought up.

vegai• 15 years ago

Which ones do, I wonder?

biafra3• 15 years ago

All those with a locked bootloader.

BTW: Is there a complete list which ones have an unlocked or unlockable bootloader?

I know about the following:

- Android Dev Phone 1 (HTC Dream)

- Ion (HTC Magic)

- Motorola Droid (unfortunately not the Milestone)

- Nexus One (HTC Passion)

- Nexus S (relockable) (Samsung Crespo)

josteink• 15 years ago

Samsung Galaxy S 1 & 2 (international versions).

vegardx• 15 years ago

I think we're moving towards unlocked phones. Both HTC and Samsung have sent signals that they want to open up their phones. And then we're talking about drivers and specifications. Everything that can get them one step ahead of Apple. Also, it seem to be deemed "cool" to be open, so they might just spin it to marketing.

Sadly I don't know if this will be the case for US, where the operators have way too much control over the devices. Luckily I live in Europe, outside of EU. :-)

danielhunt• 15 years ago

...Do Not Respect Your Software Freedom.

Note that (pretty important) word left out there? Yeah. Linkbait.

angrycoder• 15 years ago

Its Richard Stallman, did you really think the article was going to be about your freedom to eat tacos?

hetman• 15 years ago

Could you define freedom?

outside1234• 15 years ago

i want to like rms but you get the sense that he doesn't live in the real world whenever you read his stuff.

I mean, seriously, Android is about a lightyear more open than iOS and there are super good reasons Honeycomb is not out. An OEM in China would promptly put out some sort of crappy phone that uses it and wrecks the Android brand.

lurker192• 15 years ago

What has RMS written that is not real? He knows that some non-free software is compelling and profitable, but he argues that in the long run of is unstainable. And when you look at Lion and Metro and Google Apps' only half-baked Data Liberation Front and compare to what RMS wrote 20 years ago, it is clear he is very much in the real world, unfortunately.

Is Android the least evil? Probably. But it is still not free. And RMS doesn't say you mustn't Android and whatever else; he just days that you shouldn't if you want to protect and promote software freedom, and he is a living model of an example free software lifestyle, for better or worse.

sliverstorm• 15 years ago

he just days that you shouldn't if you want to protect and promote software freedom

So what phone do I use then? There's a couple select phones that might qualify, but they are fringe, expensive and impractical.

This is what your parent is referring to. When people talk about how rms doesn't "live in the real world" they are coming from a "people who, at the end of the day, have to get sh*t done" point of view. Both viewpoints have their merits.

0x123• 15 years ago

> An OEM in China would promptly put out some sort of crappy phone that uses it and wrecks the Android brand.

They're totally free to do that right now, they don't need a more open version of android for that.

It's not as if google is limiting who has or does not have access to the platform.

The issue that RMS is trying to address is one that matters to a small subset of those that buy the phones, your ability to modify the code and improve it.

The price of the lowest end android smartphones is dropping so fast there won't be any room left at the bottom for a hypothetical even lower end phone.

As for android being 'more open than ios' RMS makes that point in the article.

darklajid2• 15 years ago

Right. These chinese... Like - MIUI.

These guys sure ruin the Android brand with a cheap and beautiful phone after spending lots of time to make Android actually nice to look at and much more pleasing.

Disclaimer: I'm back running cyanogenmod now, but that's mostly because MIUI on my piece of kit isn't rock stable yet (neither is cyanogenmod, but..) and because I'm actually not that much into bling. But MIUI was definitely sweet and showed innovation.

bleakgadfly• 15 years ago

If we'd follow everything Stallman said we'd all be "surfing the web" one email at a time (http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.os.openbsd.misc/134336/focus=1...)

lurker192• 15 years ago

Are you trying to discredit him by making fun of the way he organizes his reading to optimize his productive time and spotty Internet connectivity when traveling?

Instapaper, much beloved in these parts, is a fancy modern take on the same idea as RMS's web-to-email system.

wmf• 15 years ago

Or you could see it as a symptom of how much RMS has isolated himself from the world and how that hurts his campaign. Years after AJAX had become boring, RMS finally discovered that JavaScript exists and wrote a rant about how evil it is. When someone suggested that Emacs switch to Git, RMS basically said "I'm not going to read any Git documentation, someone please explain it to me". I wouldn't be surprised if he discovered the whole Honeycomb debate just in time for it to be over. The world is moving on and he's paying no attention.

Marwy• 15 years ago

He states that he does this for personal reasons. To me it sounds like: "I know it's slow, but I don't want to waste my time sitting on HN all day long, so I'll just download what I need to".

jarin• 15 years ago

Stallman never misses an opportunity to bring up the Linux vs. GNU/Linux distinction.

arkx• 15 years ago

Carthago delenda est.

biafra3• 15 years ago

I think Stallman raises some interesting and valid points (in his article in the guardian. It is worth reading it to the end). For example this:

"On most Android phones, this firmware has so much control that it could turn the product into a listening device. On some, it controls the microphone. On some, it can take full control of the main computer, through shared memory, and can thus override or replace whatever free software you have installed. With some models it is possible to exercise remote control of this firmware, and thus of the phone's computer, through the phone radio network."

I think we need phones with free and open source GSM/UMTS aka Baseband stacks.

One project helping with this is OsmocomBB http://bb.osmocom.org/trac/

leoc2• 15 years ago

See also: UEFI.

russellallen• 15 years ago

The rise of Linux on the server and desktop was wonderful to watch and I find it depressing that increasingly it looks like a single moment in time, a 90s thing like John Perry Barlow and uncensored net feeds.

And Richard is right - the real threat to open systems is not so much the obviously closed systems like Apple but the almost open systems like Android that are open enough to release the valve on community pressure but that aren't open enough to give us real freedom and control.

On the plus side, things are still in flux. For example, Inferno is now available to run on top of the free Android Linux kernel: http://www.android-dev.ro/2011/09/17/hellaphone-inferno-os-f...

spot• 15 years ago

> the real threat to open systems is not so much the obviously closed systems like Apple but the almost open systems like Android

bullshit. this is factionalism and letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Tichy9• 15 years ago

Are there Android phones with Android 3 (Honeycomb) yet? Because the article talks only about Honeycomb, so I think it is simply incorrect...

As for locking the devices, unfortunately "free" also means that device vendors are free to lock the devices. If you care, don't get such a device (my philosophy: stick to the Nexus line to be safe).

darklajid2• 15 years ago

No, locking down stuff like that is not 'freedom' in his (and mine) book. Locking down a device so that the _owner_ of said device cannot mess with it as he likes after paying you is not related to freedom. It removes freedom.

Tichy9• 15 years ago

Yes, but it is not Android doing the locking down, it is individual vendors. So Android is not to blame for that.

Edit: so your complaint is that Android id not on the GPL? Or why the downvotes? Indeed, the GPL would be more free in a way, more restricted in another way.

0x123• 15 years ago

This thread has some people attacking RMS as a person without taking on the (guardian) article on its merits. Please read the article http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-fre..., the man raises some interesting points and is not just about your inability to inspect the source.

The points that were specifically made (for those that want to rail against the article but that refuse to read it for some reason):

- "Google's Andy Rubin put up a proof that Android was open, then subsequent releases of android were put out in a way that this proof no longer held, so by googles own definition android is currently not an open platform"

- "Google has said it will never publish the source code of Android 3.0 (aside from Linux), even though executables have been released to the public. Android 3.1 source code is also being withheld. Thus, Android 3, apart from Linux, is non-free software, pure and simple."

- "Android is a major step towards an ethical, user-controlled, free-software portable phone, but there is a long way to go. Even though the Android phones of today are considerably less bad than Apple or Windows smartphones, they cannot be said to respect your freedom."

- "The phone network firmware comes pre-installed. If all it did was sit there and run, we could regard it as equivalent to a circuit. When we insist that the software in a computing device must be free, we can overlook pre-installed firmware that will never be upgraded, because it makes no difference to the user that it's a program rather than a circuit.

Unfortunately, in this case it would be a malicious circuit. Malicious features are unacceptable no matter how they are implemented.

On most Android phones, this firmware has so much control that it could turn the product into a listening device. On some, it controls the microphone. On some, it can take full control of the main computer, through shared memory, and can thus override or replace whatever free software you have installed. With some models it is possible to exercise remote control of this firmware, and thus of the phone's computer, through the phone radio network."

Take issue with what the man said, not with the man.

My personal take on all this is that if you base your offering on a huge amount of open source that you should keep the spirit of those whose code enables you to run your business alive and respond in kind.

enjo• 15 years ago

The 3.0 thing is a really interesting case. Android's open source model is that the code is primarily written and managed by Google, and then released all at once "when it's ready". So the only pushes are version releases and related bug-fixes.

It was pretty clear that Google never considered Honeycomb to be "complete". It was pushed out in a hurry to deal with the fact that manufacturers were pushing out terrible experiences on tablets using older Android versions. Honeycomb is merely a stop-gap to the next version (the upcoming ice-cream sandwich).

Google has been resistant to release the source precisely because I think they want to control (as much as possible) the proliferation of that code into devices that it can manage the bug fixing and release constraints on. That's why basically Google partners are the only ones with access to Honeycomb.

If the new version is released and the source code isn't, then I think RMS has a point. Ice cream sandwich better be "complete" and see a commiserate source-code push to go along with it. If not, Android has lost it's open source credibility. I think it is too early to make that call, however.

*disclaimer: I have no inside knowledge or any way to verify that my speculation is accurate:)

redthrowaway• 15 years ago

RMS has a singular killer point, which is that the source code for neither 3.0 nor 3.1 has been released. Google seems to be trying to straddle the fence here, maintaining the appearances of OSS while not actually providing a development trunk. Google may claim openness in the face of this, but open without source is closed. You can't claim to be FOSS while only releasing bins.

demallien• 15 years ago

The whole point of software being open is that you aren't left at the mercy of a corporation. Honeycomb is widely considered to be ait lacklastre (as you mention, it was pushed out in a hurry). Wouldn't it have been nice if that code had been truly open-sourced so that other companies and individual hackers could have scratched their various itches, getting the software up to speed faster? Instead of that, Google has sat on the source so that they can maintain control. 'Control' is antithetical to 'open'. I can see why Google want control, and I think those arguments are valid, but they need to stop claiming that the software is open. It is tangibly not open, and the situation only seems to be getting worse as time goes by.

leoc2• 15 years ago

The timing of this opinion piece - just after Google annouces that Ice Cream Sandwich will ship on October or November - may be significant. Could it be that it's mainly intended to send a message to Google - a warning shot to encourage them to think twice about holding back the ICS source? Certainly other FSF people are ... actively managing the Google relationship http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL7BaJFotnU , so I think it's quite possible.

bad_user5• 15 years ago

Normally I take issue with people claiming that Android is not open. However, Google disappointed me with their 3.0 release.

I understand that they want to control the proliferation of 3.0 devices, and I understand that it is their work and that they should get at least some control over it -- but they are taking way too long to release the 3.x version.

I also understand the need for a closed development model, but when you've got "partners" that have access to source-code, and you do not; well, that's not a free ecosystem that enables real competition.

Android is also based on Linux, and on Eclipse, and on Apache Harmony, and on other open-source software without which Android wouldn't be what it is today, and without which they wouldn't have been so fast to market and possibly losing the critical window that they had. Android's appeal is precisely its openness -- no mobile maker would have jumped on board with another Windows-wannabe without getting paid for it.

Hopefully Google doesn't forget that.

barista• 15 years ago

I don't get this. Google is in this to make money. They are not running some kind of a foundation where people contribute and together they make software. Google has all the right to hold the code back and only share it with the partners that adhere to its demands and use their services so that the development is paid for.

Of course its another thing that doing all this they come out looking like a hypocrite preaching things like open and do no evil while practicing the exact opposite. But hey...

ZeroGravitas2• 15 years ago

I understand that they want to control the proliferation of 3.0 devices.

The stated reason was that 3.0 code was somewhere between broken and terrible on phone form factors. That's a much more understandable motivation for keeping things closed, both from a developer not wanting to embarrass yourself and as a platform builder not wanting to give the over-enthusiastic (or their customers) a bad experience of Android.

I've not actually heard of a single device maker that was denied access to Honeycomb, they were just given access in a non-open source manner, one that presumably involved signing a contract that prevents them using it on phones.

Not that I really want to be defending Google, I'm keen to see what happens when ICS is fully open and am disappointed that Honeycomb hasn't been released (yet). But "open" has become a battleground between Apple and Google and the quality of discourse has plummeted as a result of the ensuing misinformation an partisan sniping.

I find it bizarre that so many pixels are wasted examining exactly how open source Android is when the iPhone platform briefly made it acceptable for you not to be able to install apps on your own smartphone. A feature (or "freedom") that's been taken for granted since the devices were invented.

cube132• 15 years ago

This statement confuses me:

>On most Android phones, this firmware has so much control that it could turn the product into a listening device. On some, it controls the microphone. On some, it can take full control of the main computer, through shared memory, and can thus override or replace whatever free software you have installed. With some models it is possible to exercise remote control of this firmware, and thus of the phone's computer, through the phone radio network

There are a few things that I find odd about this argument:

1. Phone network firmware is supposed to control the hardware. That's it's purpose. It's supposed to be able to turn the microphone on and off. On CDMA networks like Verizon, it should stop the user from attempting to access data when they're making a call. It should be able to be updated when the carrier makes changes to the underlying protocol(s). I don't see how this is "malicious" use, especially if it's a technological restriction on the carrier.

2. Also, Stallman seems to be attacking the OTA update capability, which one of the main features of the Android OS. I can understand why he's ideologically opposed to it, but as a practical matter, it's a great feature of the OS. Plus, this is only done at the user's request.

ajross• 15 years ago

I don't see how your points are responsive. The fact that it's "on purpose" (of course it's on purpose!) doesn't changes RMS's argument that it's unethical and abusable. Your examples aren't "malicious", but it seems awfully naive to believe these are the only applications of that technology.

And I don't think Stallman has anything against network-delivered software. He's been doing that for years. The complaint I read was about the ability of the carrier to install things without user authorization, and to use authorization to remove/modify existing features in a way that cannot be recovered. Both of those have happened in the wild.

nitrogen• 15 years ago

The network firmware having the ability to control the radio is acceptable. Having it also able to modify the main CPU's RAM and interact with audio hardware is not. Control of the audio hardware should be entirely the domain of the main CPU. The main CPU (or an auxiliary low-power audio chip under the exclusive control of the main CPU) should then send audio data to the radio chip/SoC component via something like I2S. That way the network firmware can only transmit audio when the user-controlled software on the main CPU says it's okay to transmit audio, and it only transmits the audio fed to it by the main CPU (which may or may not be coming from a microphone, audio file, Internet stream, etc.).

joebadmo• 15 years ago

Google's openness is a pretty complex issue.[0]

If you define 'open' as binary, and only true if every item in a certain list is met, then it's almost certainly true that Android is not open.

But I don't think that's a particularly illuminating way to describe the situation.

I think it's fair to say that so far, the smartphone side of Android, up to and including Gingerbread, has been open in the way that Andy Rubin described in his tweet.

The tablet side, Honeycomb, has not. You can take this as evidence that Google nefariously pulled a bait-and-switch and unconscientiously uses principles like 'open' only when it suits them financially. Or you can give them the benefit of the doubt and accept their explanation that the source code for Honeycomb wasn't ready for public consumption, and they had to make a pragmatic decision in the interest of maintaining their platform.

Besides that issue, it seems to me that RMS's gripes are largely to do not with Android but with the entire phone industry, and most of every other electronics industry. It doesn't seem like a criticism of Android or Google as such. Like he said, Android brings smartphones closer to his dream than we've ever seen. It's really up to the parts that Google has little control over now.

"My personal take on all this is that if you base your offering on a huge amount of open source that you should keep the spirit of those whose code enables you to run your business alive and respond in kind."

I agree, and it seems to me that Google has mostly fulfilled its obligations.

[0]: I wrote a whole blog post on it: http://blog.byjoemoon.com/post/9579550453/googles-open-hand-...

guelo• 15 years ago

My complete speculation as to why Honeycomb wasn't open sourced is Amazon. Amazon was forced to use an older Android for their tablet instead of being able to take advantage of Google's tablet work.

guard-of-terra• 15 years ago

And that's exactly the scenario Free Software and Open Source both targeted to avoid.

beej71• 15 years ago

So that it wouldn't compete with Google's non-existent tablet? There's something more here I don't know--deals Google has made with other vendors or somesuch...?

bad_user5• 15 years ago

If Google didn't want for others to "take advantage" of its work, then they shouldn't have released Android as open-source in the first place.

In spite of people telling that Android is closed because it has a closed development branch, the one thing that you can do with open-source is to fork it if you're not happy with the current status quo.

But to fork Android 3.0 -- that's exactly what you cannot do. And that's definitely not open anymore.

I'm doing some apps for Android currently. I'm only testing on Android 2.2 / 2.3 -- that's because if I wanted a closed platform, I would prefer iOS instead.

When they'll release 3.x as open-source, then I'll be happy again.

spokengent5• 15 years ago

I for one love not having my freedom respected. It means good products that work.

danssig• 15 years ago

Ah great, so you're an iPhone user to?

spokengent5• 15 years ago

No, I've had an iPhone, and had android phones. At the moment I mainly use android.

My criteria for buying a phone does not feature "Does it respect my freedom". As usual Stallman is on a different planet to the rest of us, who just want shit to work.

Does Stallman only buy socks as long as he has full manufacturing instructions included? If he buys a bowl, does he insist they include the mould used to create it, as well as all the paints, a DVD documenting how it was made etc.

He's entertaining, but not much more than that.

voidr• 15 years ago

Quotation taken out of context. The article reasonably explains it's point.

leppie• 15 years ago

I wonder how many bootloaders and recovery images (specifically the commercial ones) uses the Linux kernel for it?

5hoom• 15 years ago

Ahh, the second controversial Richard on HN today ;)

Love him or hate him, Richard Stallman is nothing if not consistent.

The fact is that he is right on this issue. At this time Honeycomb is not open source software.

I'm a big fan of google, and as the story says Android is the best of a bad bunch (with regards to software freedom), but it's good that we have people like Stallman who can give us cause to stop & take a reality check (or unreality check, depending on your point of view...).

notatoad2• 15 years ago

he's right, but in the wrong way. honeycomb is not open source software, but that does not mean that android is not open source software. honeycomb is a dead fork of the android project, it has no future. the android trunk is as open as it has ever been.

tadfisher• 15 years ago

It is not as 'open' as most software projects. They develop in a closed environment and dump the results on the community. There are long-standing bugs that have been fixed in community distros such as Cyanogenmod, yet the Android team doesn't accept patches, because they're busy working on the next code dump.

At Google, there is no 'upstream'.

tarkin2• 15 years ago

I can understanding Google wanting control over who implements a not-quite-ready Android version. But, purely from a development perspective, if Ice-Cream Sandwich isn't fully OSS, it will decrease my enthusiasm for the platform enormously.

One of my main reasons for investing time into Android is to eventually involve myself in the sources (and not just the Kernel sources), for fun, profit and security. If they take that away, they'd be little reason for choosing it over the iPhone.

flarg• 15 years ago

After years of reading Stallman haters and lovers I'm sorry to say that he is almost always right - good intentions never lead to good outcomes; only good actions from the outset. Google's failure to release the source for Android 3x maybe with good intentions, but it also pushes the envelope of what is acceptable for next time - which will probably be something like not releasing the source code for a year 'just to allow us to make some money'. Google effectively owns the internet for a lot of us, so they need to behave very very well - they need to do what Stallman says.

ubernostrum• 15 years ago

After years of reading Stallman haters and lovers I'm sorry to say that he is almost always right

I frequently disagree with RMS' positions. Not because they're logically inconsistent, but because they're based on premises I don't accept. I think a lot of people are the same way; we can recognize an argument that "if you accept X, then Y", and say "OK, but I don't accept X".

In this case I think he's reaching the same conclusion I would, but via a different route (albeit one with some of the same stops along the way). So in this case I'd agree with his conclusion.

jerrya• 15 years ago

All else being equal, Richard Stallman took a complex topic and made it very clear. Which I find very impressive and also helps in making his essay very persuasive. I wonder how long it took him to write and rewrite his essay.

mkup3• 15 years ago

GPLv2 says:

----citation----

2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:

a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change. b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License. c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively when run, you must cause it, when started running for such interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on the Program is not required to print an announcement.)

These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program, and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.

Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the Program.

In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under the scope of this License.

----end-of-citation----

We know that:

1. Android is a collective work based on Linux

2. Non-Linux part of Android is not distributed as a separate work in binary form. In binary form both parts of Android (Linux and non-Linux) are distributed together as a whole.

3. According to GPLv2, "when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it"

So Google is clearly violating GPL here.

daniel_solano• 15 years ago

From the kernel's COPYING file:

    NOTE! This copyright does *not* cover user programs
    that use kernel services by normal system calls - 
    this is merely considered normal use of the kernel, 
    and does *not* fall under the heading of "derived
    work".

As I read it, the non-Linux part of Android is entirely in user-space, and thus exempt from the terms of the GPL with respect to the kernel.

mkup3• 15 years ago

OK, thanks for clarification. I didn't know about this special exception.

cdibona• 15 years ago

This is not correct, you don't understand how the gpl works, or how linking works wrt license compliance, nor do you understand the kernels approach to GPL compliance and linking.

The real problem is that I could point you to source.google.com and you could download the kernel and other gpl components from honeycomb right this second, but kernel.org and the osuosl site is recovering from a nasty hack. When those machines are back up, I invite you to go get the code you seem to be interested in.

mkup3• 15 years ago

> you don't understand how the gpl works, or how linking works wrt license compliance

Please clarify. Am I allowed to statically link GPL code with closed-source code and distribute resulting collective work in binary form? Am I allowed to dynamically link GPL code with closed-source code and distribute resulting collective work in binary form?

If the answer for the second question is "yes", what's the difference between GPL and LGPL then?

known• 15 years ago

Open source promotes open competition. Commercial entities do not like competition.

RyanMcGreal• 15 years ago

Why not link to the original source?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-fre...

rufibarbatus• 15 years ago

I.

This is a case where Stallman pushes the notion that software freedom === individual freedom. This notion, while defensible, is not necessarily true, and so the assessment that Android phones can't be said to respect my freedom sounds wild and passionate but while being hardly informative.

Freedom is one of those words which go deep with most people, but which for the same reason have come to mean a bunch of different, oft-contradictory things. (For some definition of freedom, the GPL can't be said to respect my freedom either.)

II.

The problem here is that Google had commited itself to releasing Android's source code. Withdrawing from it is exactly the same kind of thing as Sony's withdrawing multiboot from the PlayStation: they sold us something and now they're taking it away.

In that sense is Android not respecting our freedom: some of us chose Android because of something that was being offered — something Google was commited to — and now that we've voluntarily locked ourselves into that platform, Google takes that decision factor away from us.

Stallman has this weird ability to get cherry-picked for his most passionate quotes. Although I not always agree with him, it's important that we go a bit deeper and try to figure out his actual reasoning.

dspeyer• 15 years ago

Why is this being published now? Honeycomb was ages ago. Gingerbread (which is free) still dominates, and Ice Cream Sandwich (which will be free) will be out soon.

httpitis• 15 years ago

What would make Google release the source?

erikpukinskis• 15 years ago

At the risk of getting downvoted for being meta-, can I remind people that links like this need to be flagged? The Guidelines clearly state:

"Please submit the original source. If a blog post reports on something they found on another site, submit the latter." - http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

If you see a link to a blog post like this, which is just a bad summary of an original source (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-fre...), please flag the summary link on HN, copy the URL of the original source, and paste it into the HN "submit" page (there's usually no need to fill in a title). That will automatically upvote the original source, giving it exposure and improving the quality of discussion.

Obviously if the secondary source is an important editorial piece in it's own right, it's fine.

chalst• 15 years ago

...which had an earlier HN story, http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3013622

ShawnJG• 15 years ago

I am a bit disappointed that Google has seemingly reversed itself on its openness. While I would want someone poking around in code but I felt wasn't my best work, I feel that this excuse for Google is dubious at best. I believe it is done to stifle competition. They say they want to protect users experience, which you might be able to believe on face value if it weren't for the fact that anyone who had the skills to manipulate the code would inherently know that they are going to change the intended "Google experience". This is not something that a hacker would hold Google responsible for. If he actually could start the glass of milk you don't get mad at the cow because your milk is brown instead of white! Google is afraid that if they allow their code to be in the wild, hackers innovations will outstrip their own. They forgot what made their platform so attractive in the first place. Android OS benefited immensely the beginning from being open source people added features there were leaps and bounds ahead of Apple IOS. For people who are well-informed and made a comparison between the two a no-brainer. If they continue to do this it'll be like going to her door and closing it. And I will be their fault because I've been around long enough to know that there are infinite pathways innovations can take.

Richard Stallman: “Android Phones Do Not Respect Your Freedom”

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