Re-organisation of Jolla company

General
#101

The last time that I collected opinions about SFOS, it was considered:

  • expendable, not a real FOSS system

In my last SFSCON presentation and slides, I made people notice that 2/3 of the binary code running at root level or a more privileged level is about HW vendor firmware, and it would change nothing, whatever SFOS or AOSP in terms of freedom.

This means that at this time we do not have any system for mobile devices that can provide us a fully working smartphone and fully FOSS-compliant. Moreover, probably, it will be not exist for years.

Forget about community or FOSS.
Name it in the proper way: fan club.

#102

If you were in a position to buy Jolla Oy or were even in contact with people who could buy it, you would just know the liability and the assets without asking. Feel free to confute this statement.

#103

Parts of it are (still) closed source afaik.

1 Like
#104

Ah, you asked. I am afraid, because I lack the will to listen. Why? I have too much to do. Why, @piggz says I’m OCD. How? Maybe it was nutrition at an early age that failed me … What am I afraid ‘from’. Hmm. Ah, I ain’t afeared a’ anything!

1 Like
#105

I’d be willing to invest (middle 5 figures). (EDIT: PS: I know it’s not much, but I’m investing in other money losing propositions, as I speak :slight_smile:

2 Likes
#106

2 posts were merged into an existing topic: Re-organisation of Jolla company - Off-topic discussion

#107

I hope Jolla makes the turnaround and there are some good business ideas how they can make additional profit. Like

  • Selling Xperias pre-flashed with Sailfish like Murena, iode etc do with their devices
  • Working Fairphone 5 port that can be paid for
  • Subscription tier model: Free: Get Sailfish Update every two months, 10€ every month: Get monthly update, 25€ a month: Get updates plus support

Because as of now, and I get that Sailfish is but a side hustle for Jolla at the moment with their AppSupport being the main gig for car companies, Sailfish is just too cheap compared to other ungoogled phone OS solutions, while also not accessible enough for the layman, and jolla-devices as the only shop offering pre-flashed Sailfish phones is raking in all the profits in that matter.

1 Like
#108

Hello everyone!

The proposed pricing policy worries me a little…
I’m not in need, but I won’t be able to do without the support and I won’t be able to afford to pay €25 every month.
For me, this will mean switching to another OS.

I am convinced that many users are in my situation.

Rather than trying to create a business policy that doesn’t belong to us, why not let Jolla offer us the result of their reorganization?

4 Likes
#109

This is exactly what makes me sad. A lot of people (like myself) would like to pay a subscription to receive updates. If someone does not want to pay money or only one time, they could get updates every 2-6 months (like the current situation is).

I do really want to have a regular updating SFOS, and I would be more than happy to pay for it.

#110

While I would be happy to see new devices coming directly from Jola, I’m not 100% sure if letting people without some minimal technical knowledge lose on SFOS in it’s current state would be a wise idea. I’m afraid it would only generate bad reviews all over TikTok.
Having to flash the device acts as a kind of filter so anyone who wants to try it out has to have the ability to read and to follow simple instructions. :slightly_smiling_face:

3 Likes
#112

Just so we’re clear: I have no objection to to Jolla offering a subscription model provided it is offered alongside the continued option of buying a SFOS device licence. I have no interest in renting my phone product.

You’d be buying access to the SFOS dev and/or testing channels, while normal users just stay on SFOS stable. Which I think would be a great way to support the product.
But of course the subscription could be for anything, as long as it adds some perceived value and fuels steady Sailfish development.
Other alternative phone OS makers do the same: Purism has librem one software suite, Murena offers cloud services, iode sells some adblock stuff, in addition to selling preloaded hardware.

Also, Murena and iode - like all other android forks - have the benefit of being able to drop support for their phones constantly, so they can create artificial supply and demand. Jolla on the other hand has to rely on phones getting broken or really super outdated on their own to once in a moon sell you a new license in an easily saturated market segment.

3 Likes
#113

I’m not a fan of a subscription model either.

Also - rant warning - I am so not interested in the Fairphone when I realised that 90% of its philosophy is hot air (they’re not really re-usable or upgradeable), and the price is just way too high.

5 Likes
#114

The usual revenue channel seems to paid apps or content with a “fair” commision … fair from the pov of investors of course :wink:

Does anybody know what stopped Jolla from doing that?

2 Likes
#115

Apparently the user base is too small to even generate enough revenue to pay for the infrastructure

1 Like
#116

So the situation is pretty grim?
What we can do? Let’s all buy one license, don’t know what to say

#117

Yes, and store all installation files for flashing and all needed app installation files on local computer for later offline installation, for worst case…

2 Likes
#118

Oh damn, no way. Jolla, survive, please, do not let the ship sink into the sea :slight_smile:

9 Likes
#119

The future of SFOS would not so dark or even jeopardized, if it were a real open-source operative system supported by a system developers community like CentOS (or based on it).

Unfortunately none of these two requirements is true.

#120

Sailfish OS never was an open source OS, nor ever claimed to be.
This is also the reason for which it works reasonably. Most of the critical bugs reside in open source parts (i. e. AOSP) but nevertheless there is not all this haste by the community to address them.

2 Likes
Re-organisation of Jolla company - Off-topic discussion
#121

5 posts were merged into an existing topic: Re-organisation of Jolla company - Off-topic discussion