TMobile is kicking old Android phones off their network in January because vendors have abandoned the hardware and they no longer get security updates. Android's model of forcing you to buy new hardware every few years to get security updates is broken. https://www.tmonews.com/2020/12/t-mobile-will-no-longer-support-devices-january/

@kyle Where revenue streams are tied to device sales, and existing-device support is an ongoing uncompensated cost, this is a rational decision on the part of businesses.

What's Purism's approach to cashflow if not device sales, service subscriptions, advertising, or surveillance, the four standards?

@dredmorbius Purism's approach is tied to its Social Purpose, which allows us to put our ethics at a higher priority than "increasing shareholder value" compared to a traditional C Corp.

@kyle Is there an exlainer on this?

@dredmorbius https://puri.sm/about/social-purpose/

@kyle Thanks, though mission and purpose aren't cashflow generators.

C-Corps can also revert or be sold, as appears to have occurred with Ello (I'm uncertain what the story is, but following a very loud public benefit orientating, things got vewwy vewwy qwiet after the founders were uninstalled, and distinctly opaque).

Purism does have service offerings, e.g., the rather premium-priced SIM / mobile-resale service.

I'm just getting more clued in to the inherent traps of technology pricing models, and why dark patterns (original AT&T, IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, Red Hat, Google, Facebook, ...) are so prevalent. It's what cost and revenue structures dictate.

Or look at the failures: Osborne, Wang, DEC, Cray, SGI, Palm, Sun, every commercial Linux distro not named "Red Hat". Most hit a point where revenues couldn't fund the next development stage. Yahoo shows that the monetised eyeballs can glaze over as well.

Somehow there's got to be recurring revenue. I'm watching with interest, I don't quite see it. Selling durable widgets, eventually everyone's got s sufficiently familiar, sufficiently performant, sufficiently useful, and not self-evidently booby-trapped-and-tripwired widget. Though as the niche entrant, that might take a while. Premium power-user market, maybe faster readily than otherwise though.

And I can understand not spilling the secret sauce if you do have this figured, but I'm scratching my head, as cats do....

@dredmorbius Business model is similar to Apple's but with our ethics: sell things people are willing to pay for (premium hardware and services) to fund things people aren't as willing to pay for (FOSS development).

@kyle That is plausible.

The tech-literate world is small, though can show strong allegiances.

https://www.nngroup.com/articles/computer-skill-levels/

@dredmorbius Our market is everyone, not just tech-literate, because everyone deserves privacy, security, and freedom. Customers prioritize those three legs of the stool differently and you might be surprised how many non-tech-literate folks are happy laptop customers. Like w/ laptops, the phone market mostly starts with a FOSS core who values freedom first, and will expand outward to everyday folks who value privacy or security over freedom.