Re: FSF continuously harms Free Hardware

[Jacob Hrbek]

> But we will to state the range to which the stand applies. For 
instance, I have some dimmable LED bulbs.  They have some nontrivial 
circuit.  I have various DC power adapters.  They have nontrivial 
circuits.  I have digital clocks.  I have a microwave oven.  I have 
telephones to use with my landline. -- RMS

_Dimmable LED Bulbs:_ This is a practice project for arduino providing 
source code, schematics and elaborated documentation on 
https://create.arduino.cc/projecthub/NIKHIL1916/led-dimming-circuit-8d6c9e

It's released under GPlv3+ You can fork it and adjust it to do your 
computing as you wish e.g. adding bluetooth or wifi connection for 
Internet of Things with some example projects provided with the article.

Thingiverse also has a lot of cool lamp designs such as this artichoke 
lamp https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1015178 that are compatible with 
this project that you might like 
https://www.thingiverse.com/search?q=light+bulb&type=things&sort=relevant 
(note that you can use arduino pico)

So i would say that <25 EUR/USD in materials for the whole project.

_DC Power Adapters:_ This is probably the most designed thing in 
electrical engineering, depending on your usecase i found 
https://github.com/dc-power-supply/dc-power-supply.

The material cost could be anywhere from 0.42 EUR/USD and up.

_Digital Clock:_ I want to highlight here that not everything has to be 
electrical such as this digital sundial 
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1068443

Material cost is 0.39 EUR/USD on my 3D printer.

_Microwave oven:_ The microwave is a very simple circuit (basically 
power rectifier connected to a coil) so i think that any average kicad 
user can create one from scratch, but i can't in clear mind share 
relevant files here as too many people such end up like this guy 
https://vid.puffyan.us/watch?v=FIU8WZR9DNA (what he's doing is very very 
stupid and life endangering) as you need to understand the dangers 
around working with microwave as without it you will hurt 
yourself[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4440565/] and/or 
fry wifi receivers in your area.

If you still want to build a microwave then search for them on the web 
or alternatively i found an article how to convert any microwave oven 
into a linux-enabled https://lwn.net/Articles/674877 with article on how 
to make one from scratch.

The material cost is <35 EUR/USD (including sheet metal) assuming that 
you can find the coil on a local scrapyard (very common scrap part) 
otherwise you can make one yourself for <3 EUR/USD.

Is this sufficient as encouraging or what do you suggest we do to 
convert this effort from what you see as pushing?

>Such products are not available with free designs, or even with 
nonfree top-level schematics.  Would you suggest we all stop using them 
until they do? -- RMS

In relevant European politics we use the philosophy of using the most 
optimal solution for the task so adapting it into this situation: 
Technoliberal projects are clearly superior to non-free as they are 
significantly more functional and reusable which always makes them a 
better option in terms of citizen empowerement, ecology, economy and 
privacy as such they should always be preferred if they are sufficient 
or better solution to other alternatives and citizens should be informed 
about the reasoning to make an informed decisions.

So in this context i am not against the use of non-free hardware by the 
general public as long as they are no ethical considerations (e.g. 
spyware) and as long as that is the only solution e.g. for innovative 
projects that depend on economy to fund the development, but even that i 
personally avoid non-free at all cost even if they are better solution 
as i can't change them easily and they usually are prone to breaking and 
very difficult to repair.

> How do you feel about devices from suppliers such as Pine64, these 
allow for free software to be installed, but also for parts to be 
removed and replaced. -- Sutton

I argue that pinephone should be avoided at all cost as it has a 
built-in spyware and 
backdoor[https://www.pine64.org/2020/01/24/setting-the-record-straight-pinephone-misconceptions/].

> It would be good to be able to fabricate our own chips, Perhaps in 
the mean time we can come up with a subset of devices that exist now, so 
we can get behind them. -- Sutton

I am not against using rockchips and i think that projects alike are 
important for hardware freedom as they strip the built-in malware from 
an arm architecture and liberate it.

> we would need a major education shift to being reprogrammed with the 
maker (or more hacker) mindset,  we are rebuilding that, just slowly.  
-- Sutton

I am not hardware engineer i learned everything myself as the 
information needed is widely available and there are numerous 
communities that will guide you in your projects.

I do agree that the education system in the US and EU should be reworked 
to include topics from 21st century though.

On 1/27/22 05:12, Richard Stallman wrote:
> But we will to state the range to which the stand applies.  For
> instance, I have some dimmable LED bulbs.  They have some nontrivial
> circuit.  I have various DC power adapters.  They have nontrivial
> circuits.  I have digital clocks.  I have a microwave oven.  I have
> telephones to use with my landline.
>
> Such products are not available with free designs, or even with
> nonfree top-level schematics.  Would you suggest we all stop using
> them until they do?

--
Jacob Hrbek

publickey - kreyren@rixotstudio.cz - 1677db82.asc
Description: application/pgp-keys

signature.asc
Description: OpenPGP digital signature