cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/11175612
Off topic, but ownership is a hot topic here, right?
iFixit has petitioned the FTC to write standardized rules for right to repair. A federal ruling on what companies must do to respect your stuff. Your chance to inform policy is here.
Maybe you’re thinking, “what difference can I make?” However, the FTC must read all comments that aren’t marked as spam or copypasta. Now is your time. The request for comment period ends February 2nd, 2024.
There are less than 6 days left to make your voice heard. Tell the FTC what you think. Let them know about the hardships you’ve faced trying to fix your stuff. Bring up your concerns about the difficulty in repairing you phone or laptop. Rant about “you’ll own nothing,” if you like. They want to hear from you and they need ammunition to make the ruling stick.
Your voice matters. Make a difference, the chance comes very rarely. I shot my shot, now what about you?
They should make a law that companies need to give root access to devices, where no security updates are provided anymore. That would be great against eWaste…
That wouldn’t do a whole lot in practice for things like phones. Having root access is not the actual hurtle. The hardware itself is usually undocumented and the kernel is not mainline merged so the community can’t actually support the device in a meaningful way.
The only kernel that supports the device is the ancient orphaned forked kernel that ships from the manufacturer. This is what Android really is and why you’ll often hear people say it is not real Linux. In truth it is its own thing with a stripped down Linux kernel underpinning it. Google puts together a stripped down Linux kernel for devices that is specifically setup for hardware manufacturers to add the hardware support binaries at the last possible minute. You would need hardware documentation for the chipset and the source code for these binaries in order for the community to support the hardware in the mainline kernel.
These hardware manufactures are too embarrassed to share their terrible code, and too worried about getting caught for all of the IP they have stolen to build their hardware. Their criminality comes with the added benefit of theft of end consumer ownership through planned deprecation.
I didn’t word my reply so direct or strongly, but it is the glass half empty truth.
Seems very legit and I appreciate that you took the time, to write this text! I completely agree, what I had in mind writing “root” was in fact what you have written: additionally to root, make open the bootloader possible and provide info in order for community to make an OS that runs on that devices.
And if only install of custom Android ROMs must be easily possible, it would already be way better, than it is today.
I read most of it, wrote a 1.5k word supporting reply. Take the time folks. It’s worth it if you’re in the USA.
That’s funny because the captured US supreme court is just working on preventing any government agency from making such rulings. Then it will be decided by all the fascist federalist judges.
