Since Apple has been 'bricking' phones for 'daring' to open up a bit, the debate about the openness of telephones is getting a great deal of attention. Many argue that mobile devices are the future. Essentially, they are becoming the new personal computers. The sad state of openness of phones has brought life and attraction to a project called OpenMoko, among a few other similar projects and products. Here is a video that hypes up the impending release of OpenMoko
Parts of the Mono Project, the open source implementation of Microsoft's .NET, have been made available for the OpenMoko Neo1973 phone. OpenMoko is a GNU Linux-based mobile phone platform alternative to the traditional approach of systems locked down by either the phone company or the handset manufacturer.
OpenMoko, beware. Please. It's OpenMoko, not OpenMono.
Fact #1: over time slop gets worse (training set is like some blurry JPEG). Fact #2: People's "smell" for slop improves over time, as they 'train' on slop and can detect it based on prior encounters. Put 1 and 2 together.
Richard Stallman's seminal manifesto and foundational (practical) work on GNU gave us a very solid system that facilitates productive work without concerns over spyware
