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Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion

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On 08.03.25 15:36, Simon Josefsson wrote:
> One difference is that you could chose to trust their hardware (CPUs)
> but don't trust their software (non-free firmware).

True. But so, again, what's the material difference between "the 
firmware is baked into the hardware and cannot be changed" vs. "the 
firmware can be updated"?

Answer: there isn't one. They're both software, except that the vendor 
can choose to fix bugs on the latter. Nothing the FSF wrote or can 
possibly write changes this basic fact.

As a customer, which most of us are by necessity, simply because making 
hardware is a lot more expensive than coding, I am strictly worse off 
with ROM firmware. Why should I even report a bug to the manufacturer 
when that's of no benefit to me unless I toss out the buggy hardware and 
buy all-new stuff? Why should I ask the manufacturer to please open up 
their sources, maybe starting off with hardware that is no longer 
produced anyway, when I can't actually *use* the newly-open-sourced code 
for anything?

There was and still is no advantage to not shipping firmware with 
Debian, other than lofty philosophical principles and/or moral purity. 
If you decide not to buy hardware that requires loadable firmware you'll 
do that whether or not Debian also supports devices you won't buy. If I 
get my hands on hardware that won't work without it I can always install 
some other distribution instead of Debian, but I'm very unlikely to toss 
the hardware in question into the recycling bin and buy something that does.

Summary: We should, and in fact decided to (last time this came up), be 
pragmatic and leave the philosophy to the FSF.

My personal opinion: You want open hardware? go and build some yourself. 
That's the way how we got free/libre software, after all.

-- 
-- regards
-- 
-- Matthias Urlichs

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Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Simon Josefsson <simon@josefsson.org> - 2025-03-07 22:00 +0100
  Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Bill Allombert <ballombe@debian.org> - 2025-03-08 12:50 +0100
    Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Simon Josefsson <simon@josefsson.org> - 2025-03-08 13:50 +0100
      Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Aurélien COUDERC <libre@coucouf.fr> - 2025-03-08 14:30 +0100
      Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Simon Josefsson <simon@josefsson.org> - 2025-03-08 16:30 +0100
        Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Matthias Urlichs <matthias@urlichs.de> - 2025-04-10 11:20 +0200
          Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2025-04-10 14:00 +0200
          Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Simon Josefsson <simon@josefsson.org> - 2025-04-10 14:00 +0200
          Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Henrik Ahlgren <pablo@seestieto.com> - 2025-04-10 14:00 +0200
      Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion Johannes Schauer Marin Rodrigues <josch@debian.org> - 2025-03-08 16:30 +0100
        Re: Reconsidering Debian’s Inclusion of Non-Free Firmware - A Call for Discussion <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2025-03-08 16:50 +0100

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