Labnotes » It’s not closed unless I want it changed

I’ll bite.

The iPhone is truly a closed platform. Let’s me illustrate just how big of a closed platform it is. It won’t let me decide how my calls get routed, who logs those calls and what they do with these logs. Not just that, the phone checks with base, so they know when I’m drinking coffee, when I get back home from the office, and I have no control or access to that data.

I gave AT&T my social security and credit card number, can’t control that either. I bet their billing system is one big security hole. On the other hand, I pay for this luxury at a rate decided solely by AT&T. Can’t buy those rates on the open market.

Can it get more closed than that?

It’s a multi-billion dollar platform that’s closed and I have no control over what it does, and no choice but three other equally closed platforms. If you want something truly open, don’t use a cell phone!

So now that we’ve established I’m a prostitute, we’re just haggling over the price. Apple charges $20 for the software upgrade, relative to the rest of the platform, we’re haggling over not even a penny. I must be on crack to care.

My cognitive dissonance is doing just fine. I only care to the effect that I’ll want to control stuff over the convenience of not. And I’d rather not. I always prefer things that are fixable over things that are not, open standards and open source make that possible. But higher on the priority list than things that are fixable, are things not broken to begin with.

It’s not closed until I need it to change.

I give people shit for buying DRM music, because I know one day they’ll come to regret it. Tough love. And I’ll help them reclaim their music when the DRM goes bad. I care that my music will play anywhere, and I’m happy to say all my MP3’s still play after the upgrade.

(I think I should feel bad about having my music as MP3, but I don’t. I assembled that collection running on Windows, Linux and OS X, and so far it all plays and it’s all portable to any other device I might buy, so that’s open enough for me)

I gave shit to Microsoft over PlayForSure, which surely does not play, because it’s deceptive marketing. That, I have a problem. Choice is great, let’s just make sure people can make informed decision.

Speaking of Microsoft, I ranted to several people at Microsoft that they’re not using open source. I’m a big believer that using open source can change a company’s DNA, again tough love. Keyword is using, as in running Linux servers, using the Gecko rendering engine, or all the wonderful libraries and tools created by their community.

If you’re just dumping open source code on the world but not using other people’s code, as Microsoft does, that tells me you don’t care for my code. I’m just not going to care for yours.

That in a nutshell is my open source philosophy, which explains why I choose the licenses I do, why I use open source as often as I do. If I wasn’t too lazy to stand in line, I could enjoy checking out the long credits page (settings=>general=>about=>legal) and knowing Apple does one thing right by me.

Because a lot of other things are broken. What’s with this exclusive AT&T deal? Why is the bluetooth crippled, and why can’t I synchronize over it? Tethering? Alternative software distribution channels? I could go on and on, lots of things broken.

But at the end of the day, we’re just quibbling over a penny, when we already established our professional leanings. So let’s put our moral relativism aside. The next best thing has to be better. It may be better because it’s just as good and everything else is fixable. If it just requires more fixing, I don’t care.

Jul 16th, 2008

Nik Cubrilovic

Awesome. Microsoft are starting to become more open - checkout the group Ozzie is leading. The devs there are all python, ruby guys (albeit Iron* on .NET). That team at Microsoft is doing a lot of cool stuff (Mesh etc.)

Assaf

I don’t know much about IronPython, but I’m going to guess there’s no way to get a feature into IronRuby without Microsoft’s consent. The gatekeeper is the company, not the community. And that’s what I’m talking about.

Not using other people’s code.

Check out the iPhone management tool, it’s written in Rails and running on MRI, both of which ship in OS X. Doesn’t make up for the platform lock-in, or the AT&T deal, but being pragmatic, just moving more companies to where Apple is on the open scale would be a big win.

And PS, I agree with Microsoft that Windows Mobile is more open. I just can’t enjoy using it.

Jul 17th, 2008

Aristotle

To this day, I do not use a cell phone. If I ever do, it’s going to be one that can be turned off as in taking-out-the-battery off (which means the iPhone is out of the race right away), and it’ll spend a lot of its time that way.

(I also avoid using my debit card – I pay in cash, which cash I almost always withdraw at one of the three ATMs in the neighbourhood.

Oh yeah, also, I renewed my passport just before they were going to start issuing them with RFIDs. And by the look of things, I am not going to be visiting the U.S. in this lifetime.

And thanks for asking, but I don’t wear a tinfoil hat.)

@aristotle,

I don’t understand your reason for going that route, but I understand the logic that follows. You’re looking at the overall platform and deciding not to be part of it. My hat off to you.

Jul 19th, 2008

Jim Deville

Assaf, as the SDET on the IronRuby project, I beg to differ.

IronRuby is a fully open sourced project. If you want to go add a certain library, and you implement a good C# implementation of it that passes the RubySpec, we’ll accept it. We use the Open source RubySpec implementation as our primary Ruby tests. All patches that we get go through a code review that is sent out to the IronRuby mailing list. I’m happy to answer any questions you have, just shoot me an email. jdeville at microsoft dot com.

Jul 21st, 2008

The possibility of this sort of thing exemplifies quite well what my reason for going that route is. I am always aware of the data shadow I am generating and unlike many others, I am also incapable of repressing my awareness of it.