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OpenMoko Schedule Announced 165

Posted by CowboyNeal from the preflight-check-lists dept.
levell writes "The schedule for the OpenMoko, an open source, Linux-based Neo1973 smart phone was posted to the community mailing list by Sean Moss-Pultz this morning. On Feb 11, free phones will be sent to key community developers and the community websites/wiki/bug tracker will be available. Then on March 11 (the official developer launch) we'll be able to buy an OpenMoko for $350. After allowing some time for innovative, slick software to be created there will be a mass market launch at which point Sean hopes that 'your mom and dad will want one too.'"
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OpenMoko Schedule Announced More

OpenMoko Schedule Announced

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  • Moko has an unfortunate homonym “moco [wordreference.com]”; if it manages to live that one down, however, here's hoping it has ssh.

    • SSH would be cool!

      If Amoco can make it in Puerto Rico then Open Moco can make in the world, I hope.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Haha, that was the first thing I thought of when I saw this post.

      Might as well call the thing "OpenBooger"

  • better interface? (Score:1, Insightful)

    by metaltoad ( 954564 )
    Why is the interface design always sub-par on these things? I don't care how many neat features you have if the interface is hard to use or text that is difficult to read my mom and dad are never going to want one - and neither will I.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by TheSHAD0W ( 258774 )
      What's wrong with the interface? Describe one you think would be better, maybe someone will implement it.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by thelost ( 808451 )
        preface, this IS a troll, anyhow:

        apple got there first. it's called the jesuspho... er, iphone.

        • Re:better interface? (Score:4, Insightful)

          by ramunasg ( 973228 ) on Saturday January 20, 2007 @01:19PM (#17695798)

          apple got there first
          No they didn't, the big difference between iPhone and OpenMoko is that OpenMoko is completely open, so anyone can extend it, while iPhone is closed and only licensed parties can write extensions. This is what uniqe about OpenMoko. Apple added glitter to iPhone, but there are other smart phones (maybe not as good, but I can't judge, it's a long wait till iPhone will be available in Europe) so nothing revolutionary about it. OpenMoko has philosophical feature - openess. So as a geek I know which one is the winner here :)

          • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

            by anagama ( 611277 )
            I'm with you on this. At first I was really excited about the iPhone, and then details came out. This looks like real competition for the iPhone. I don't understand why there are so many negative comments. There are plenty of people who want a phone+computing device. Perhaps not as many as those who want a phone+ipod, but so what. And when you compare specs, this thing isn't bad at all. For example, the OM has a 640x480 resolution. The iPhone has 320x480. The iPhone has a larger built in memory cap
            • The OpenMoko has a higer resolution display, but also a physically smaller one. For some things, this is nice, but at these sizes (3.5" vs. 2.8"), the raw numbers will mean alot to people -- the OpenMoko display will feel much smaller.

              The OpenMoko takes memory cards, which will make it cost roughly as much as the iPhone for less storage, but there's hope that that will improve over time. Saying that the iPhone has a larger built-in memory capacity is a tiny bit disengenuous, since the OpenMoko has approxi

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by mspohr ( 589790 )
          Actually, the LG Prada phone will be shipping long before the Apple phone does and it looks very much like the Applephone.
      • I like it.

        I think if I my mother was going to use it that there would need to be better contrast and cleaner fonts. other than that I think it is going to be a real player in the market. with an open community I'm sure that there will be all kinds of cool toys and gadgets made for the Moco phone but I'm not sure that someone like my mother would know about them or try to install them on the phone.

        I'm sure that the phone will be offered with a few skins and someone has thought about people like my mom.

      • Display *under* keypad (Score:5, Interesting)

        by KlaymenDK ( 713149 ) on Saturday January 20, 2007 @05:20PM (#17697282) Journal

        What's wrong with the interface? Describe one you think would be better, maybe someone will implement it.
        Okay, I'll gladly bite! Here are a few pet peeves of mine:

        For one, why does the display always have to be 'on top of' the keypad? You have to hold the thing with both hands, or nearly drop the phone while reaching for the * 0 # keys. Instead, flip it around so the display is *below* the keypad. Go on,try it with your own phone, right now (just ignore for now that your keys will be upside down):
        -- One-handed typing will be much easier, as you can hold onto the phone more firmly while typing. Also note how the 'thigh' of your thumb will not obscure the display.
        -- Two-handed speed-texting will be much more 'private' because your thumb's thighs will keep your display hidden from everyone but you (the teens will love this!).

        For another, who the hell decided that a phone's keypad should be the inverse of a standard numeric keypad??!? That's just plain daft! Not so long ago, some phones were one way, some the other; but then some moron decided that the One True Way was NOT the way of every single keyboard. What?!?! That makes no sense!

        How about that? Who will be the first to implement that? And, will they be able to patent it, now that it's described here?
        • What is this keypad you speak of? The OM, just like the iPhone, does away with it. The consumer's apparent love for the keypad as it is has helped prevent market change in this area. Nokia has tried a few phones with unconventional interfaces. None of them particularly took off. Many companies have tried "alternative" mechanical designs, but in the end the old Startac-style clamshell and Brick style candy bar still reign supreme.

          Quite possibly, it will take an Apple to finally break this barrier agains

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by renoX ( 11677 )
          >why does the display always have to be 'on top of' the keypad?

          Because if you put the display below the keypad, your hand will prevent you to see the screen, duh!
          In one handed typing my hand hide about half of the screen: a bad idea..

          >who the hell decided that a phone's keypad should be the inverse of a standard numeric keypad?

          Bah, like you type on the phone keypad, the same way you do on a keyboard!
          What matters, is that it is standardised on the phone keypads and on keyboards, but as you type differe

          • why does the display always have to be 'on top of' the keypad?

            Because ... In one handed typing my hand hide about half of the screen ...

            That is not a problem for me. it seems you have differently shaped hands than me.

            who the hell decided that a phone's keypad should be the inverse of a standard numeric keypad?

            I wonder what happened first: phones with keypad or keyboards with keypad?

            Since my last post I've done a bit of research, and it appears to be the computer keypad predates the phone keypad. That is to say, the computer keypad is made to mimic the calculator keypad which positively predates the phone keypad.
            Bell Labs made tests in the early 60's where they sampled a whopping 18 different layouts; two of these being the "123 top row and zero beneath 8" and "789 top row and zero beneath 2" layouts dis

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by zsau ( 266209 )
              I don't understand what you're trying to convey with the first sencence, but I should think most people who work with numbers (finance and software workers, etc.) punch numbers the same way -- not differently.

              When I'm typing numbers on my keyboard's keypad, I put my middle finger on the five and touch type: The height, size, resistence, depth of travel etc. all make this a great way of entering numbers on this device.

              When I'm using my mobile phone's buttons, I use my thumb; if I'm using a regular phone, I u

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by renoX ( 11677 )
                That's what I wanted to express, but then the example with the calculator was a good one: depend on the shape of the calculator, you may use your thumb with a calculator so it should be coherent with a phone..

                Note that if we talk about coherency then:
                -keyboards should be ABCDE.. instead of QWERTY: we learn the alphabet much earlier than we learn how to use keyboards.
                -CPUs (x86 blah) should be big endian instead of little endian: this helps a lot when you dump a memory and try to read the result.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by zsau ( 266209 )
                  keyboards should be ABCDE.. instead of QWERTY: we learn the alphabet much earlier than we learn how to use keyboards.

                  That doesn't follow; the keyboard layout should be optimised for typing (and then all keyboards would be basically the same), not for being learnt the first time. If you're a touch-typer, and you've had exposure to some of the new layouts that have the Insert/Delete/Home/End/... block aranged vertically instead of horizontally, or that has them all shifted down a row with the PrintScreen/Scro
      • The dimensions of the device break the interface: it's 120.7 x 62 x 18.7 mm -- 4.5" x 2.25" x 2/3". The thing if a FREAKING BRICK. It makes the iPhone look small.

        • Small phones are no use... (Score:4, Interesting)

          by Simon Brooke ( 45012 ) * <stillyet@googlemail.com> on Saturday January 20, 2007 @06:41PM (#17697754) Homepage Journal
          The dimensions of the device break the interface: it's 120.7 x 62 x 18.7 mm -- 4.5" x 2.25" x 2/3". The thing if a FREAKING BRICK.

          Small phones are no use if you want to do anything interesting with them. If you only want to phone your girlfriend, then fine, get a totty little device. But if you want to present or work with data it's useless. And increasingly as we move into location-aware, network connected devices there is a huge number of applications which just weren't possible before. I've moved from a Sony-Ericsson P910i to a Hewlett Packard IPAQ 6515 - the Sony-Ericson is bigger than OpenMoko, the IPAQ a lot bigger. Why? Because to run real applications you need more screen real estate (and the IPAQ has built-in GPS, which I need for the applications I'm building, but so does OpenMoko). 640x480 pixels is great news. Open API is even better news. I will definitely be playing with one of these, and soon.

        • Hrm...its a it bit bigger...but not that much.
          A bit thicker than the iPhone. [sizeasy.com]
          A bit thinner than the Treo 700p. [sizeasy.com]

          Overall, a tad bigger than both, but it's not a case of the iPod vs. the Neuros or anything...
    • It's a little too orange for me, but other than that it looks well-thought-out and attractive.

  • FYI (Score:3, Informative)

    by TheSHAD0W ( 258774 ) on Saturday January 20, 2007 @12:37PM (#17695538) Homepage
    Just FYI, at the moment only Cingular and T-Mobile will be able to support the phone in the US at this time.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by spikeb ( 966663 )
      where'd you get that info? I'd like a link to some sort of page about it, so i can keep an eye on it.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by yelvington ( 8169 )
      I'm not sure what point you're trying to make but your assertion is not precisely correct.

      None of the carriers will "support" a phone you did not buy from them, recently. The general response to any configuration question translates to "go F* yourself." I have an unlocked GSM Windows phone (Voq) and have never been able to get MMS working because T-Mobile will not provide the necessary info.

      On the other hand, an unlocked GSM phone like this one at least gives you a choice of carriers.

      While Cingular/AT&T
      • My last two T-Mobile phones were unlocked phones purchased elsewhere. I had no trouble getting T-Mobile to help me configure them for T-Zones Internet access and voicemail.
      • My unlocked phone (non supported by Tmobile), works fine with T-mobile and MMS. Message me and we will figure out what's missing.

    • Re:FYI - Wrong? (Score:2, Informative)

      by gustaffo ( 598224 )
      I think that's wrong. From the specifications, it looks like it's a GSM phone (they don't specifically say it's GSM nor do they say which frequencies it's radio supports) from the fact they say it supports GPRS.

      As a result, it should work on *any* of the GSM carriers in the US that support the frequencies it uses. Let's assume for a moment it supports at a minimum 900/1800/1900 (hopefully 850 too) - like most tri-band devices do.

      Take a look here [gsmworld.com]. According to GSM world there are quite a few GSM carriers
    • (Cingular is now part of the revenant AT&T. Ma Bell has risen from the grave.)

      I can think of a big motivator for T-Mobile to pick up on OpenMoko, or whatever they're going to eventually call this thing when the marketers get through with it. AT&T will have iPhone and be the only people with iPhone. T-Mobile will have what to counter it? Crackberry? Sidekick? Please.

      OpenMoko looks really, really REALLY good. It has a SCARY resemblance to the Apple device, which was supposedly kept under wraps with do

  • First open source mobile? I think not. (Score:5, Informative)

    by GreatBunzinni ( 642500 ) on Saturday January 20, 2007 @12:38PM (#17695548)

    The website states the following:

    2006.11.7 OpenMoko Announces the World's First Integrated Open Source Mobile Communications Platform at Open Source in Mobile Conference in Amsterdam.

    First one? I beg to differ. Should I point out Trolltech's Qtopia Greenphone [trolltech.com]? I believe it precedes OpenMoko by a considerable notch.

    • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      And, for those of us with experience of using Trolltech's programming tools the Greenphone is a fantastic piece of kit.

    • Re:First open source mobile? I think not. (Score:5, Funny)

      by Speare ( 84249 ) on Saturday January 20, 2007 @01:06PM (#17695714) Homepage Journal

      See, that's where you're misreading the announcement. The Greenphone is not the World's First Integrated Open Source Mobile Communications Platform at Open Source in Mobile Conference in Amsterdam . The Greenphone may have been first at other locations, but not this conference. So there.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Sloppy ( 14984 )
      Perhaps some people don't understand how a system where pay for the SDK, is "open."

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by speculatrix ( 678524 )
        trolltech have a dual licensing approach; some people are irritated by the idea, perhaps by the fact it is so polarised into basically
        * GPL forever: at the moment you download you choose the GPL path, you can't later decide to make your project non-GPL and pay the license fee to trolltech and go commercial; this would be a PITA to any bedroom startup; however, I wouldn't be surprised if a few stealth startuos *did* bend this rule
        * payware: cough up a license fee for the SDK and support

        if you don't li

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by dgatwood ( 11270 )

          The question is whether you can write software for the phone that doesn't use QT. If the answer is "no", then it isn't open.

          • Linux is GPL. Qt is GPL. The Greenphone's community SDK is GPL. If it was only possible to run Qt applications on the Greenphone, which is a Linux device, where exactly would that make it non-open?
          • Unfortunately for your argument, there is nothing stopping you from writing software for the Greenphone using GTK. The only problem is that they haven't done the work to make it easy, so it might be a very significant effort to get started.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by aliquis ( 678370 )
            As long as you software is released under GPL aswell there is no problem with using QT.
          • i don't think openmoko is qt based, it's a bit like gpe (gtk+)

            even so, and if you don't like qt, use sdl, or write your own gui toolkit on top of framebuffer (see some of the opentom projects for example)

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by rsidd ( 6328 )

          at the moment you download you choose the GPL path, you can't later decide to make your project non-GPL and pay the license fee to trolltech and go commercial

          Any links to back up that rather weird assertion?

          The GPL and commercial versions of Qt are the same, only the licence is different. End-users can run dynamically-linked commercial binaries with their local GPL copies of Qt. If you decide to go commercial, you just pay Troll Tech for a commercial licence and go ahead. There is no legal, contra

          • if you read the terms and conditions on Trolltech's website you'll see that it is very clear that you can't start a GPL project and then later buy the SDK. It took me about 2 minutes to find the URL, so I suggest you never really looked!

            http://www.trolltech.com/company/about/businessmo d el [trolltech.com]

            I quote... Please note that it is necessary to choose either the Open Source or Commercial license at the outset of development. Trolltech's commercial license terms do not allow you to start developing proprietary s
      • Perhaps some people don't understand that paying for free means it is free. The Greenphone SDK is available for a free download.
        *cough*.

      • Perhaps you would be able to understand if you read the Greenphone pricing plan [trolltech.com]. You see, Trolltech only charges for the commercial release of the SDK. The community SDK is free and released under the GPL.
      • Not sure how I got modded up; I was definitely wrong as several people pointed out. The SDK is available through GPL.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Raenex ( 947668 )
          Not sure how I got modded up; I was definitely wrong

          The moderators are people like you. Ask yourself why you were wrong and you will get the answer as to why you were modded up.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hritcu ( 871613 )
      Maybe it's not the first, but a Neo1973 development device will cost $350 while a Greenphone costs twice ($695).

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Klivian ( 850755 )
        The pricing difference is quite natural as the Greenphone basicly are a development board, while the Neo is supposed to be a consumer device. Hopfully soon after the release we will see a port of the Greenphone suite to it. Giving the best of both worlds. Giving access to cool stuff like this: http://blogs.qtdeveloper.net/archives/2007/01/19/w ebkit-on-embedded/ [qtdeveloper.net]

  • GPRS but not EDGE? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dada21 ( 163177 ) * <adam.dada@gmail.com> on Saturday January 20, 2007 @12:45PM (#17695590) Homepage Journal
    I rely on EDGE for high speed access throughout most of the West (US) and a large part of the East that I visit (Poland, Switzerland, India). This phone looks nice, but no EDGE means antiquated technology.

    That, by itself, makes it a non-starter.
    • hopefully this will be the first of a sequence of open phones. if you are seriously interested in being a developer, then you'd need at least two of them, so buy this new "starter" one to get practising so as not to "miss the boat" for unstable/alpha testing, and when the new one comes out you can use it for the beta/release candidate unit. don't kill the device from apathy!

      anyway, as I understand it, EDGE is a matter of firmware, not hardware, so I would hope GPRS + HSCD + EDGE will all be featured at s

  • One question... why? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Saturday January 20, 2007 @12:46PM (#17695594)
    Okay, I grok the "Open software uber alles" mentality; it's certainly a valid point of view, but of course that's a very VERY tiny market. Reading through the linked post, however - which is just a mailing list submission - I don't really see why anyone would think there'd be any mass market appeal at all regarding this project.

    That's fine, if that's what the expectations really are; but the Slashdot submission makes it sound like the people behind the phone think they can take on the world. So please, seriously - tell us WHY anyone outside the "live open or die" community will care?

    • Re:One question... why? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Coryoth ( 254751 ) on Saturday January 20, 2007 @01:25PM (#17695826) Homepage Journal
      That's fine, if that's what the expectations really are; but the Slashdot submission makes it sound like the people behind the phone think they can take on the world. So please, seriously - tell us WHY anyone outside the "live open or die" community will care?

      Because it is a really nice looking device and they look like they've already put together a great software stack for it, and have an expectation for a lot more interesting applications to be added prior to mass market launch. In short they expect to have mass market appeal because they think (and I have to agree with them on this) that they have a very nice smart phone. Try looking at the press page [openmoko.com] which has pictures of the device and screenshots of it. It looks good. Sure, it's not going to take over the world of mobile phones, but in the class of upper end smartphones (the sort of market the iPhone is pitched toward) it can certainly compete, and given the price, could do well.

    • The iPhone (Score:3, Insightful)

      by soren100 ( 63191 )

      I don't really see why anyone would think there'd be any mass market appeal at all regarding this project.
      [snip] So please, seriously - tell us WHY anyone outside the "live open or die" community will care?

      Au Contraire, everyone cares -- because the wireless companies have such control that the current offerings in the phone industry really suck.

      Witness the current excitement over the iPhone -- it's one step closer to actually doing something really useful with all the processing power of the phone

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jZnat ( 793348 ) *
        the black AT&T phone (with camera) that most people have
        The Motorola RAZR [motorola.com] (wiki link [wikipedia.org])?

      • Witness the current excitement over the iPhone -- it's one step closer to actually doing something really useful with all the processing power of the phone in your pocket, and people are going wild over it.

        The fact that iPhone is hawt and k3wl and sleek and from Apple accounts for a large part of its popularity. It could be just a cellphone equivalent to other 'normal' phones on the market, and the buzz would be only slightly muted.

        The "open" phones will be the competition that helps make

      • Personally, I think the Nokia N800 is a more useful portable browsing device than the iPhone, not least because you can run any software you want on it, and because of the better screen.
      • As you say, it still comes down to the wireless companies and what they will or won't allow you to do.

        That said, I'm with Cingular, and I just purchased a Blackberry Pearl. Hands down the best phone I've ever owned. I can do anything with it, as far as putting various media on it and watching/listening to it. Cingular doesn't restrict me. Not only that, but there's a rather large Blackberry developer community out there that provides a large amount of software to run, albeit not free or even cheap.

        I

    • You're reading Slashdot: News for nerds, stuff that matters
      OpenMoko is an open phone, which means you can tweak it anyway you want, program and install anything you want, pretty nerdy don't you think?

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by giffnyc ( 253778 )
      In case you hadn't noticed, open software and the computing academic community have revolutionized the way we live and work by being ahead of the curve. The essential conceptual work of the web, of network protocols, of OS refinement, and now of mobile networks owe their existence to folks like these. The issue isn't whether they'll attain a mass market, its whether their conceptual refinement of the the way we interact with mobile devices and what we expect of them will take root and inform the Cingulars
  • I only read the top level article (no links) and came away with the distinct impression that this is some marketing luser's idea of how to tap into the OSS market. The high sounding goals alluding to open source philosophies together with an unrealistically compressed roadmap smells fishy. They've got nothing to lose and maybe they will sell a few $350 phones after the second month of the roadmap. If it really goes well, they will get a lot of free coding expertise from the OSS community.

    I'll admit the w
  • It looks a bit like Qtopia... but very much more slick than the version I have on my Zaurus. To be honest I was happy enough with that, this new version should cause some envy.

    Slightly off topic, but on the subject of small media devices, the Penny Arcade comments on the iPhone/Zune are worth a look as they can pretty well be considered trendsetters for the market of people willing to spend lots of money on things that go beep:

    http://www.penny-arcade.com/2007/01/15 [penny-arcade.com]

    I had hoped that there at CES I wo

  • Okay, I'm a complete doofus when it comes to phone standards. If I end up roped to a cellphone, I leave it off unless I want to make a call, and then I turn it off again. I don't know what the different networks are, and the idea of "quad band phones with wifi and bluetooth" just makes me want to ignore all manner of phone technology for another year. Somehow in the case of phones, each sufficiently advanced technology just seems to make it less and less like magic.

    That said, if I wanted a phone like

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by ozamosi ( 615254 )
      You don't have to sell your soul to any carrier - it wouldn't be much of an open phone if you had to do that, would it? You buy it and put any SIM card you want in it.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jZnat ( 793348 ) *
      Cingular or T-Mobile in the US, or pretty much any provider in other countries. You can buy the phone separately.

  • No wifi :( (Score:2, Informative)

    by p80 ( 771195 )
    The only problem is that there is no wifi and probably won't be for a long time. The openmoko crew refuse to implement it cause there's no chip that comes with open driver as of today and there isn't any on the horizon.

    One of the greatest advantage of having an open phone is so that you can install a SIP phone on it and use it when there's a wifi connection available which is almost everywhere these days (at work, at home, lots of public places...). When there's an open phone that comes out with wifi int

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by MadJo ( 674225 )
      I, for one, know of no wifi hotspots in my neighbourhood (aside from the one at home) so, not everywhere is there wifi.
      Aside from that, at offices, if you use too much bandwidth you could get fired; hotspots like at mcdonalds are limited in bandwidth, detrimental for sound quality, if you even get SIPphone services running (some hotspots even outright forbid the use of VOIP). That only leaves home, and I already have a phone there.
      GSM and GPRS is much more prevalent here in Europe, almost blanket coverage.
    • The openmoko crew refuse to implement it cause there's no chip that comes with open driver as of today and there isn't any on the horizon.

      What are Nokia using in the N800? Presumably that must have an open driver, otherwise Nokia would be violating the GPL by shipping the systems with the proprietary driver linked to their Linux kernel...

  • Must have WiFi for this crowd. (Score:4, Informative)

    by Qwavel ( 733416 ) on Saturday January 20, 2007 @02:19PM (#17696194)
    Sounds great, shame about the WiFi.

    Your average consumer might not need WiFi on their phone, but I think it is very important for the slashdot/techie/FLOSS crowd. The main reason is that we want to be able to bypass the cell network whenever possible to avoid paying. WiFi is free and plentiful for me at home, at work, and in many other places, whereas cellular bandwidth is slower and much more expensive. For syncing, downloading music, uploading pictures, and VoIP, WiFi is a requirement for my next phone.
    • Your average consumer might not need WiFi on their phone, but I think it is very important for the slashdot/techie/FLOSS crowd.

      The entire slashdot/techie/FLOSS crowd could boycott this phone to a man - and never be missed.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Lumpy ( 12016 )
      Then get a Nokia 770 + razr,slivr, whatever.

      It's great, surfing or RSS reading is actually a pleasure on it instead of the mess that a tiny cellphone screen gives you.

    • There was a discussion (almost a flamefest) on the mailing list about wifi. Here's the summary. Sean wanted to make sure the device was completely open (excepting the GSM stack, which runs on a seperate processor). There were no low-power wifi chips that had open drivers that he could find. The chip used in the one-laptop-per-child project might be a good candidate however, but at any rate it will have to wait till the next hardware release.

      As far as wifi being useful on a phone -- yes, the project lead
  • Consider this product dead already in any spanish speaking town.
  • LGPL software is not about free and open source software, its really about proprietary software! Companies want you to think that using LGPL software like GTK+ makes them open source, but it isn't true. They don't give back to the community! The Lessor GPL allows companies to build proprietary software and to rip you off! Which do you want more of? Free and open source software? or commercial, proprietary software? If you are really for free and open source software, you would use only GPL software like Qt [trolltech.com]

  • So... (Score:2)

    by Goaway ( 82658 )
    If they want "innovative, slick software", why are they turning to the open source community?
  • First parsed as "Moloko." Just the sort of phone to take to the Korova Milkbar...
  • The biggest missing bit according to the linked spec page is bluetooth. Wi-Fi would be nice for surfing at higher speed, but no bluetooth is hard to understand. This makes syncing more difficult, no wireless headsets.

    In theory someone might be able to cobble up something to the USB ( if it supports host or on-the-go ), but that would be pretty clunky. A tiny micro-sd adapter maybe?

    It's hard to imagine the hardware being built with 640x480 screen, GPS and no bluetooth.

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