[Discuss] Free Software Foundation's "Respects Your Freedom hardware product certification"

[Hanspeter Portner]

On 08.01.2015 04:25, Roy Nielsen wrote:
>
> On 1/7/2015 4:07 PM, Matt Maier wrote:
>> "But maybe a decentralized, peer-review audit-like system could be
>> viable, run by the OSH community for the OSH community on a voluntary
>> basis.     If there would be a simple to use infrastructure where you
>> could have checked/looked over one of your designs by other fellow
>> OSH designers (and you would check theirs, ...) and they     could
>> give you feedback on what things are missing, could be improved for
>> your design to meet the OSH definition"
>>
>> Isn't that just, you know, what normally happens? What would that add
>> over the normal interest and review and discussion that happens on
>> any project? How would disagreements be handled?

Exactly! And it works great. The difference is just an added active
component where a designer could actively ask for feedback somewhere
defined whether his/her design is in accordance to the OSH definition
instead of waiting for someone stumbling across it in the web or
elsewhere. A given design may well be of use to only a handful of
individuals or to none at all and thus never get any passive feedback ;-)

Just found the idea interesting to have a design be *actively* looked
over when desired by a designer who's not sure whether he/she got it
right, nothing more, it may be useful, it may well be totally unnecessary...
There seems to be no need for any certification as long as there's no
massive fraud being done with false OSH claims in the first place...

>>
>> I think the point of a "certification" would be for one unambiguous
>> standard to be maintained to benchmark against. Something with a
>> gatekeeper that guarantees consistency.
>
> I guess my concern would be to make sure the certification would be
> unbiased, impartial and a community agreed upon standard.
>
> Regards,
> -Roy
>
>> On Wed, Jan 7, 2015 at 2:08 PM, Hanspeter Portner
>> <dev at open-music-kontrollers.ch
>> <mailto:dev at open-music-kontrollers.ch>> wrote:
>>
>>     On 06.01.2015 13:31, Roy Nielsen wrote:
>>     > It would be great to have a certification that certifies that the _hardware_design_ is also open source.
>>
>>     I am a bit sceptical about any central authority who manages
>>     certification (e.g. I doubt that as many organic food is produced
>>     as is labeled with a certificate and sold in stores...).
>>
>>     But maybe a decentralized, peer-review audit-like system could be
>>     viable, run by the OSH community for the OSH community on a
>>     voluntary basis.
>>     If there would be a simple to use infrastructure where you could
>>     have checked/looked over one of your designs by other fellow OSH
>>     designers (and you would check theirs, ...) and they
>>     could give you feedback on what things are missing, could be
>>     improved for your design to meet the OSH definition...
>>     (I'm not thinking about feedback whether your design is any good,
>>     just whether it meets the OSH definition)
>>
>>     >
>>     > If the platform is closed source and the firmware is open
>>     source is that a win for open source?  I say only partially. 
>>     It's a nice first step, but to be fully open source, the
>>     _hardware_design_ must also be open source.
>>     >
>>     > What do you think?
>>
>>     Yes, there seem to be different conceptual levels for which
>>     freedom may be granted:
>>     1. free software
>>     2. free access to the free software
>>     3. free hardware design
>>     4. free chip design
>>
>>     I'm looking forward to the day where we reach 4, this looks
>>     promising: http://www.lowrisc.org/
>>
>>     > Regards,
>>     > -Roy
>>     >
>>     > On Tue, Jan 6, 2015 at 3:28 AM, Hanspeter Portner
>>     <dev at open-music-kontrollers.ch
>>     <mailto:dev at open-music-kontrollers.ch>
>>     <mailto:dev at open-music-kontrollers.ch>
>>     <mailto:dev at open-music-kontrollers.ch>> wrote:
>>     >
>>     >
>>>     I just stumbled across the "Respects Your Freedom hardware product
>>>     certification" [1] by the Free Software Foundation.
>>>     I was agnostic about that until now. I thought I would post it
>>>     here if
>>>     somebody should be interested.
>>>
>>>     I think it is an interesting idea to actually have someone
>>>     (independent,
>>>     non-profit) check whether your hardware/firmware is
>>>     free (or falsly claimed to be...).
>>>
>>>     Compared to the OSH definition [4], it does not seem to define any
>>>     criteria for the hardware design to be open, but puts its focus
>>>     on shipped firmware/software. The latter (in contrast to the OSH
>>>     definition) must be free to pass the certification criteria [2].
>>>
>>>     There is already some certified hardware out there [3].
>>>
>>>     [1]
>>>     http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom
>>>     [2] http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/criteria
>>>     [3] http://ryf.fsf.org/
>>>     [4] http://www.oshwa.org/definition/
>>>
>>>     Hanspeter
>>

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