[Freedombox-discuss] Introductions

[hartmans@debian.org (Sam Hartman)]

>>>>> "intrigeri" == intrigeri  <intrigeri+freedombox at boum.org> writes:

    intrigeri> Hi,
    intrigeri> Bruno BEAUFILS wrote (26 Aug 2010 10:40:03 GMT) :
    >> My point is that such box should offer at least a service of storage
    >> and that most plug computer do not offer large space of storage.

    intrigeri> Some plug computer already support USB 2.0 external mass storage.
    intrigeri> I bet this will be the common case in N years when the FreedomBox
    intrigeri> software stack is ready to ship.

OK, let's make sure that this all is internally consistent:

* We want a plug form factor because we can plug it in and forget it.

** Needs to have few if any things connected to it

* We want it to be a wireless router so it can fill a need people
  already have both to fill an existing need and to avoid introducing
  new devices

** Wireless routers need network so you're probably going to need  an
   ethernet plugged in

* We want to offer storage.

* not all the plugs have internal wireless AP chips.

I don't think a frob that you need to plug an ethernet into as well as a
wireless USB adapter is very compelling as a consumer story.  Plugging
ethernet, a USB hub, wireless adapter and external storage is not
something I think you could sell to the average US consumer.

So, I think for most consumers we're going to need to find a product
with built-in wireless and SD cards and that we're going to need to
target a set of applications where the SD card is sufficient.  Advanced
users may well plug in more storage.

This doesn't seem that bad: I think for a lot of consumers you can
easily fit most of the data they need on a server in 32G or 64G.  I'm
less sure of the part where you backup your friends' data.  I actually
think that storing encrypted backups on a centralized cloud service is
more compelling.  I don't think this limits your freedom: you are
purchasing a service (storage) from someone. You have multiple market
choices for that service. You are not giving them access to your data.
If you are worried they may limit your freedom by denying access to your
data in the future, you can hedge that by helping to store your friends'
data on a centralized service and by storing your data on multiple
services.  If you are willing to plug in a couple of USB HDDs and a hub,
then you can provide backups for some of your friends, so you and your
friends do have the choice of running your own redundant storage if none
of the market options are acceptable.

We should not forget that as we're promoting the technology for people
to maintain their own information, we also want to promote business
models that are compatible with that information. If we find that I'm
right and that centralized encrypted storage has benefits and no
significant costs in terms of freedom, then we want to work well with
that. Similarly if we find that services like pushing to a centralized
cloud provider for public content benefit our users, we may want to
support that. I'm less sure that makes sense: you do give up some
freedom by allowing the provider to track which public content is
accessed by whom.