mr_machine

The hardware looks amazing and I covet it.

The lack of substantial info on Minimal OS makes it a non-starter, though, and that makes me sad. Security and privacy are job #1 for a smartphone, and there's no way I'm running El Rando OS just because the hardware is cute.

If they partnered with Graphene OS, I'd happily pay twice their asking price, though.

That's very interesting, and I've not seen it pointed out anywhere else. Have you?

GPD already makes such things, as does ClockworkPi. The Flipper One is exciting in significant part because it offers a different, smaller form factor.

Pretty sure from Google's standpoint, respecting privacy is a downside of local models. For them, the upside is using your compute rather than theirs.

Was initially excited about this project but their reticence to open source has really diminished that. The browser is far too critical a piece of personal infrastructure to be closed. Still hoping they open the whole thing, at which point I'll become an Orion+ subscriber immediately.

Until then, thanks but no thanks.

I on the other hand am fine with the premium price... but it looks like I'd need to install a proprietary app to use the service. That's a 'hell naw' from me.

Know what is super hard to do? Leave your house without being caught by someone else's Ring camera.

I like Kagi and pay for it. I've been impatiently waiting for Orion to come to Linux. But I won't run closed source.

This is a huge disappointment.

> people just want to hate on Firefox

While that may describe a few people, I don't think it fairly characterizes the backlash at all.

I want to love on Firefox. I've been using it since before it was "Firefox." I've championed it among co-workers and friends tirelessly. But over time, Firefox has become more and more unlovable, getting softer on privacy, altering settings in updates, foisting 'experiments' off on us, and now this AI nonsense.

I'm part of a large makerspace and have watched their market share dwindle among the nerds. Virtually no one is left.

Make Firefox fully and exclusively a tool in service of the user.

Eliminate - both in code and by policy - anything that compromises privacy. If a new feature or support of a new technology reduces privacy, make it optional. Give me a switch to turn it off.

Stop opting the user into things. No more experiments. No more changing of preferences or behavior during upgrade.

Give the user more control; more opportunities for easy and powerful automation and integration.

Not only would this win me back as a user, I'd pay for the privilege. I'm paying for Kagi and happy to be doing so. I'd love to pay for an open source browser I could trust and respect.

I've got two of the Venstar Colortouch thermostats running locally with Home Assistant. They were spendy and their interface feels dated and clunky, but they've been totally reliable for me.

Ink/Stitch (https://inkstitch.org/) is a F/OSS option for a lot of embroidery machines... maybe not hers, but worth a look.

I'd like to install and try this, but I don't use Google Play and it's not in F-Droid. Wish they'd just make an APK available.

I was just thinking similarly. I don't need any of these AI features and I'm certainly not about to start giving Adobe money, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't jealous.

I've been running Arch+Hyprland on my laptop for very nearly 1.5 years. For whatever reason, I've not had the negative experience you describe; it's run buttery-smooth and reliably for me. I like it.

I've been using (and paying for) Kagi since the beginning.

For the first while, the search results were inarguably better than any alternative. I was thrilled and was recommending Kagi to anyone who'd listen. In the last six months or so, things have gone downhill. More often, my results ignore some of my search terms and I have to try to "trick" Kagi into matching them all. More often, I get only one or two pages of results when other engines give me notably more relevant hits. And more often, my search hangs or fails to return at all.

I don't care if they noodle with AI or make T-shirts as long as the search is great. What I've experienced is the search getting worse while they noodle with AI and make T-shirts, though. The two may be entirely unrelated but from an outside perspective, it feels like their core offering is suffering because of these other-than-search undertakings.

So far, I'm sticking with it, but my enthusiasm has definitely diminished. A couple of my friends have canceled their subscriptions in disappointment and I've started to consider cancelling mine, as well.

Right there with you. I sent them feedback to that effect and hope everyone else does, too. Manufacturers need to hear this from us routinely.

I like the idea and wouldn't mind paying to use it. That doesn't seem possible without allowing scripts from Google, Facebook, and Youtube, though, and I'm not interested in doing that. I don't need fancy video or graphics even; just a personalized training plan would be worth money.

> CAD users don't necessarily need things to be open source... Open source is not in and of itself a goal.

While there are certainly challenges to open source development, there are no downsides to using open source software. It works just as well for people who don't know what it is or means and just as well for people who are indifferent to it. There are great reasons to avoid proprietary software, though, and they're even stronger when you're talking about SaaS (as we increasingly are nowadays, and specifically are in this case). CAD software is an area where many users have /already/ been burned by proprietary systems changing their offerings /after/ they've invested hundreds of hours learning and using their platform.

I'm aware I'm in the minority, but open source is absolutely a goal in and of itself for me. I've been using open source software exclusively for a very long time.

The browser is, at this point, like a public utility. You can't get by without one. How is it okay to bake in privacy compromises?

Yeah, I've been using it since the early days of OwnCloud, both personally and professionally. Love it and don't understand the haters at all. It's not perfect but it's really damn good -- and it's F/OSS.

It can also change after an election, and the impact can be retroactive.

Vlad needs to walk that "criminal" comment WAY the hell back.

I'm a subscriber simply because their search is far better than any available alternative. That's the primary thing I want from them and so far they're delivering it at a cost I consider fair.

Their other projects are not interesting or useful to me, but so far I can simply ignore them. Yes, on some level I wish they'd focus and quit wasting money and energy on things I don't care about, but that's really not my affair.

The one growing reservation I have is with regard to Vlad's/Kagi's actual, boots-on-the-ground approach to privacy. Kagi necessarily has the ability to know more about me than almost any other company. I want to see them demonstrate strong and unwavering commitment to respecting and protecting my privacy - through policy, technology, and careful and continuous vetting of partners. Expressed disinterest in collecting or capitalizing on my data is not enough, and seeing Vlad's communications in which he casually shrugs or responsibility-shifts to a third-party heightens my concern.

For now, I remain a customer - but a wary one. I've stopped actively recommending Kagi personally and professionally because as a privacy advocate, it increasingly feels irresponsible to do so.

How does it make sense to recommend Google Suite to someone unusually concerned with privacy?

Fast shipping and streaming were plenty sticky for me. I'm aware that Prime offers various other benefits, but I never cared about them at all. I paid for Prime for very many years and considered it a good value.

But their shipping has slowed considerably, and I'm in the no-ads-ever club, so they've lost me as a customer.

Currently, I stan Firefox, but only because all other alternatives compromise my privacy and security so egregiously. Mozilla has been messing around for years and in many ways, some merely dumb while others actively diminish the benefits of Firefox over others. I don't think a privacy conscious alternative browser is in any way a waste - it's exciting!

But I'd require both fullsome Linux support and an open source approach to even consider it.

Definitely not just you.

Often, though I know exactly the info required to find a message, Thunderbird comes up with no results. I've found that "repairing" the containing mailbox renders the message findable.

Not sure when things got this bad, but I can well recall in the past Thunderbird's search being fast, thorough, and reliable.

Will the source be available for self-hosting?

There are refuseniks like me who will never buy into Apple's (or Meta's or Microsoft's) ecosystems for reasons of privacy and control. I'm F/OSS only. In some areas, that leads me to do without. Having options like SimulaVR is very exciting even if the value proposition is arguably less strong.

Whether their potential customer base is large enough for success is a question I have, too.

My fear is that they'll want to make the system as like commercial offerings as possible, which will actually make it less appealing for nerds like me.

This is the way. I have a Dreametech Z10 Pro running Valetudo and integrated with Home Assistant. It works really well - better than I'd hoped it might.