Although this is obviously a step in the right direction it needs to be followed up with security updates, no point increasing the life of the hardware without doing the same for the software.
Yes! That would be the best. We should have access to our hardware. And just like most things you want to keep around for a long time (e.g. cars) you will have to tinker with it to keep it running smoothly into old age.
I hope you mean, always make it possible to unlock the bootloader offline (to not be dependent on them). There are good security reasons to have it locked by default.
While it is certainly nice to have continued support, I think I’d disagree that forcing companies to maintain software on legacy/outdated hardware is something that should be legislated. I think that would greatly stifle innovation in a lot of cases.
I’d be a supporter of something like @[email protected]’s suggestion, though. If they are no longer able to support security updates, then they should open it up to be able to maintain it yourself/community-maintainable. Expecting a company to maintain support through continued development on a 10 or 20 year old device that in some cases may not even be physically able to handle the updates is a big ask.
I’m not saying I think it would be a bad thing for support to continue. I just don’t think it should be legally required. If a small company decided to develop and produce a device, knowing they’d have to perpetually support it, legally, makes it exponentially cumbersome to continue further development. Newer software may not be able to run on older hardware, meaning they’d have to develop and maintain multiple versions of any security fix. For Apple, it’d hardly be a problem (financially) to continue support.
On the other hand, I understand that this creates a situation where new phones keep being churned out that are hardly different hardware-wise. It’d be lame to stop supporting the older devices just to push people to buy another one (Apple). There’s probably some middle ground to be found here.
Although this is obviously a step in the right direction it needs to be followed up with security updates, no point increasing the life of the hardware without doing the same for the software.
Making it illegal to lock bootloaders would make each device community-maintainable.
Yes! That would be the best. We should have access to our hardware. And just like most things you want to keep around for a long time (e.g. cars) you will have to tinker with it to keep it running smoothly into old age.
I hope you mean, always make it possible to unlock the bootloader offline (to not be dependent on them). There are good security reasons to have it locked by default.
Yes. No more of that unlock code nonsense. Even Fairphone has an online bootloader unlocking process. I hate it.
While it is certainly nice to have continued support, I think I’d disagree that forcing companies to maintain software on legacy/outdated hardware is something that should be legislated. I think that would greatly stifle innovation in a lot of cases.
I’d be a supporter of something like @[email protected]’s suggestion, though. If they are no longer able to support security updates, then they should open it up to be able to maintain it yourself/community-maintainable. Expecting a company to maintain support through continued development on a 10 or 20 year old device that in some cases may not even be physically able to handle the updates is a big ask.
At a minimum, stuff should be put in place to allow for people to update legacy hardware to be maintained by individuals.
I mean, Apple does it for 10 years old devices and it’s not stopping them from churning out phones every year
I’m not saying I think it would be a bad thing for support to continue. I just don’t think it should be legally required. If a small company decided to develop and produce a device, knowing they’d have to perpetually support it, legally, makes it exponentially cumbersome to continue further development. Newer software may not be able to run on older hardware, meaning they’d have to develop and maintain multiple versions of any security fix. For Apple, it’d hardly be a problem (financially) to continue support.
On the other hand, I understand that this creates a situation where new phones keep being churned out that are hardly different hardware-wise. It’d be lame to stop supporting the older devices just to push people to buy another one (Apple). There’s probably some middle ground to be found here.