[Dev] Misleading information in EOMA68 news

[Tiberiu-Cezar Tehnoetic]

Hi,

I'm not a Parabola hacker and I only speak for myself. I believe Paul
refers to this news entry at parabola.nu:

https://www.parabola.nu/news/new-libre-hardware-crowdfunding-project-with-parabola-pre-installed/

On 15.08.2016 20:09, Paul Kocialkowski wrote:
> * "New Libre Hardware Crowdfunding Project"
> 
> Saying that the hardware is libre or free is an overstatement.
[...]
> I think the title should be reworked, depending on whether the circuit board
> design is libre or not.

I agree. AFAIR the circuit board design is being withheld for now, and
the designer has promised to release it at a later date (presumably
under a libre license).

Quoting from the campaign page:

"The only exception to this rule to release everything in advance is the
PCB CAD files for the Computer Card. We’re planning to release the PCB
CAD files for the Computer card once sufficient units are hit that
ensures any third party manufacturing runs will not undermine the
project’s development or stability."
- https://www.crowdsupply.com/eoma68/micro-desktop

> It is an overstatement to say that the computer can respect freedom. 
[...]
> the hardware has at least
> one major feature that cannot work with free software: its GPU. Thus, we can't
> say that its software aspects respects freedom (despite being a candidate to
> receive the FSF's RYF certification).

I agree with this too.

> Thus, it would be more accurate to say that the device is free-software-
> friendly, which is vague enough to not be contradictory with the facts.

I'm not really a big fan of the "free-software-friendly" term, exactly
because it's vague (laking a definition/criteria) and it doesn't really
tell users much regarding how respecting of software freedom that piece
of hardware is. That's why a wide range of hardware projects feel at
liberty to promote themselves as "free-software-friendly".

> Of course, this situation is much better than many other computers out there,
> that can't even startup without proprietary software.

I agree. Instead of using the term "software-freedom-respecting" or
saying it "respects your freedom" or that it "respects your software
freedom", probably a better choice of words and accurate presentation is
that this hardware is RYF-certifiable by FSF or that it has been allowed
by FSF the provisional use of the RYF certification mark, to quote Joshua:

https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/libreplanet-discuss/2016-06/msg00213.html

> Sidenote: I am very happy to see projects such as the EOMA68 come to life, as
> they are really moving things forward. However, I also care very much about
> providing accurate information, especially after what happened with Purism.

I agree and I am happy too to see such an important project implemented!

Thanks,
Tiberiu

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