[Replicant] basic phone with 100% free software to use on Verizon?

[Mychaela Falconia]

Paul Kocialkowski <contact at paulk.fr> wrote:

> I'd love to live in a world where free software would
> be defined only by the ideas carried by the concept, with no legal
> ground as that would be unnecessary or obsolete. But this is not the
> world we live in [...]

The world we live in is meant to be changed, and the change begins
with you.  The most effective way to change the world is to live and
act *as if the change you seek is already here*, and that is what I
do.  If everyone starts defining free software the way I do, then this
new sans-legalities definition will become the generally accepted
definition, and hence the truth.  I am simply being one of the first.

It is fully within our power to make copyrights irrelevant and
ineffective, and we can do it right now, literally this minute: it is
as simple as just ignoring them.  If not only me, but every one of you
- yes, YOU - were to start ignoring copyrights tonight, then by the
morning all copyrights will be completely irrelevant by virtue of
being unenforceable: there are 7 billion people in the world, and if
every one of us w/o exception starts to ignore copyrights principally
and systematically, it will be logistically impossible for the
vanishingly small pro-copyright lobby to go after all of us.

> and right now, and in practice, your software fits the
> description of proprietary software, not free software.

Only in eyes of lawyers, license worshippers and other suppressive
persons, but NOT in the eyes of the remaining 99% of Humanity.

> [...] and that it's
> hurting development of free software alternatives, which is all
> factually correct.

Claims of factual correctness require proof.  What proof do you have
that OsmocomBB will magically flourish into a practically usable
alternative to the status quo totally closed and proprietary phone
basebands in the event that FreeCalypso dies?  On the contrary, all
available evidence suggests that OsmocomBB will remain a stagnant,
effectively abandoned dead-end project whether I exist or not.

On the other hand, your suppression of FreeCalypso (i.e., your efforts
to ensure that as few people as possible learn about its existence)
*is* actively harming those human beings who are currently suffering
the evils of the status quo.  Because OsmocomBB most likely WILL NOT
produce anything practically usable within the lifetime of most of us
here, dangling it like a carrot in front of a donkey (but always out
of its reach) does *not* provide any real, tangible help to those who
are suffering in the status quo - therefore, by denying those suffering
from proprietary phones an opportunity to learn about the existence of
FreeCalypso, you are simply condemning them to remaining in the status
quo (utterly closed and proprietary phones with zero visibility into
their inner workings) forever, instead of your imaginary outcome of
OsmocomBB emerging as a champion.

M~