alt Hacker NewsAnd you can use it. You can, in fact, keep using the software that shipped on it. What you want is access to further intellectual property they develop (updates, features), that just so happens to be able to run on your hardware and ability to shepherd it in a direction you want and they don’t.
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> that just so happens to be able to run on your hardware
the hardware is specifically locked down with "trusted computing" features to facilitate this. It's not a random coincidence. The problem here lies in the network effects and the use of trusted computing. If my bank app mandates that I use "real deal 100% certified android", then I can't just develop my own OS. So it's an antitrust situation.
If every company in the world teamed up with MegaCorp and made their services contingent on wearing a MegaCorp shock collar powered by trusted computing, would you wear it? You are free to not use the collar... and starve to death in the woods I suppose.
I don't usually even care about intellectual property. It's a hack to grant a temporarily exclusive monopoly as a way to incentivize R&D. The R&D in this case is just solving the question of "how do we establish a larger monopoly". So why should the public be forced to uphold it?
Asking me if I am willing to violate intellectual property in this situation is like if I was being lowered into a pit of liquid hot magma and in order to get out I had to break the flag code or jaywalk or something.
I'll gladly take that trade, either: - They lose the right to their "intellectual property" and I'll accept that they owe me nothing. or: - They continue to enjoy "intellectual property" protections granted by the state, but the state subdues them into actions which are for the benefit of the public.
I'd be happy to make that offer to any of the parties that build closed ecosystems, but none of them will take the offer since closed ecosystems are almost always built with the intent of misusing the copyright system to create a state-enforced monopoly and bloodsuck value produced by real economic activity.
> And you can use it.
Tell that to the locked bootloader.
> What you want is access to further intellectual property they develop (updates, features), that just so happens to be able to run on your hardware and ability to shepherd it in a direction you want and they don’t.
Well yeah, I am paying them with money (and data) and thereby with power and expect them in turn to provide directions for my device, so that is does what I want. That's kind of the deal. If they don't want to provide that, then they can just not accept my money (and data). They can of course produce devices, that to what they want, and want me to carry them around, but then they better pay me.
If they use the power I gave them against me, then I will demand my power projection as a service provider (aka. the government) to project power in my interest.