Re: Debian ARM success story: Debian desktop on a TS-7300
Lennart wrote:
What gives you the idea PPC is disappearing?
Thanks for asking Lennart, I'll gladly clarify my point of view:
I think PPC will eventually disappear as being in *home computers*. And I'm talking about
*general purpose* computers that can run software from the mind-bogglingly huge pool
of debian packages, not closed appliances. I think there needs to be a
perpetual diversity of architectures for the *home user*. I'm not so
concerned about what chips are popular in industry and military, I'm
more concerned about ensuring the continuing availability of a
non-big-brother-ized computer that the common man or woman can get
their hands on for cheap.
Currently, all home computers with PPC chips
are in Apple computers. Once those PPC Apples get old and get recycled,
there will be no general purpose home computers with PPCs anymore. So
PPC will eventually disappear as an architecture from the perspective
of a home computer user. That would effectively leave i386/amd64/ia64
as the only architecture for general purpose home computer. Gee, what
a ripe scenario to introduce DRM and NGSCB into, when there are
effectively no alternative architecures for the home computer user!
Even if hardly anybody actually uses an ARM computer as a home
computer, the mere existence of it as an alternative will keep
i386/amd64/ia64 "honest", since people could easily migrate away if the
hardware got too "big-brotherized". Kind of like how the mere
existence of ogg (which a small percentage of people use compared to
mp3) keeps the owners of mp3 "honest". If Fraunhofer decided one day
that all mp3 users must pay them a licensing fee (the classic submarine
patent attack), everyone would say "no way, I'll just switch to ogg and
to heck with your stupid licensing fee". So Fraunhofer is "kept
honest" by ogg. That is to say, the mp3 patent submarine is effectively kept at bay, thanks to
ogg. In the same way, I'd like to see an alternative architecture like
ARM "keep honest" i386/amd64/ia64 wrt *general purpose home computing*. So call me paranoid, but I think ARM (being an architecture with a bright future) can help to keep Big Brother at bay.
In summary, I like general purpose computers, and if things continue the way they are (think DMCA, Homeland security, Patriot Act I and II), then general purpose, non-big-brotherized computers may become an endangered species in only a few years. I like the flexibility to install whatever software I want, so as to come up with new ways of doing things on a computer. I don't want computers to become mere corporate-agenda appliances, which I think will be the eventual effect of limiting technologies like DRM and NGSCB. Where is the room to innovate on an appliance? I want my computer to do my bidding 100%, not the bidding of corporations or the government.
Peace,
Dustin Harriman
My Blog: http://ca.blog.360.yahoo.com/dustinharriman
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