Project funding and growth

this project is a huge effort of huge importance. it depends on the heroic efforts of one person for now. and everybody knows: men pass, institutions remain. save for unlikely regulation changes in the EU, this low key project might now be the one chance the world has to have a free but usable mobile platform in its future.

and unfortunately, things have been looking grim for a long while now. (#420, #752, etc.) i've come to believe that this project will fail unless an institution seriously backs and funds it, and AFAIK little if any work has been done on this front.

i imagine mavin would like getting competitively payed for his time on this project, and might like to devote more to it then. he might like leading a couple of professional, talented, hand picked devs working by his side instead of working in solitude. but he might not like politics and working for funding; yet he might benefit enormously from it.

but why would someone do something one doesn't like for a hobby? this might be why marvin hasn't seriously tried -i think- getting funding so far. and i also think this is obvious: if marvin has to do too much stuff he dislikes, he'll quit.

as it stands: 1) the project is hugely important for online freedom. 2) the project is in danger because it depends on the will and availability of a single person, marvin. 3) marvin is unlikely to fix # 2 by himself.

so can we help?

yes, marvin might not like strings attached to some offers of help, and it's absolutely his project. but nonetheless i say let's try getting the offers first. and strings? we'll cross that bridge when we get there (or actually, marvin would).

to market this project, we ourselves have to have a clear idea of its value. what is it? google has been proprietarizing Android for years and has been hugely successful. today it's hard to participate in online life without carrying a PC around and having google exclusively controlling your devices. some of us find that totally unacceptable and pay the price of rooting and become superuser of our devices too. the key word here being "too": yes, we control our devices, but so does google.

this was an utterly unthinkable situation 10 years ago: you can't use your computer unless you have a remote root account for some USA company in there available at all times.

even if you trust google not to do evil, would you trust the USA gov? what would it take for the DoJ to ask google to remotely hack your phone and download a copy of your decrypted signal/telegram/whatsapp local message database just because google can? would they do it? have they done it?

having google and indirectly the USA gov as an always connected, all accessing superuser in our computing devices is a huge problem for the world that seems to go largely unnoticed. and the options? apple? ok, switch bullcrap for cow crap.

i don't mind running google's proprietary software; i just don't want google to be root. that's microg's value for me. for others its value is different: maybe Richard Stallman would hate me for thinking this way. but if it was up to me, this is how i would sell microg.

who'd be likely interested in backing this?

we can compile a list and try to contact everyone on it, see how it goes. i'll start with a few names.

these two tried and failed to compete with Android:

• Mozilla Foundation with Firefox OS
• Canonical with Ubuntu Touch

whatever moved them to create those projects might move them to back microg.

• Mark Shuttleworth: maybe Ubuntu doesn't want microg, but this man might throw some bucks at it anyway.

• FSF, EFF, etc: all free software-related foundations might be interested in helping microg, but unfortunately their budgets are often limited. still worth trying, they might hook us up with something.

• governments: the EU, as well as many non-USA friendly governments might be interested in helping. even the USA gov itself might.

• phone vendors: vendors producing Android phones cannot bundle microg without breaching contract. and even Tizen is gone. but that doesn't mean they don't want to help, maybe though some foundation, because...

• all of Google enemies are our potential friends: this even includes Apple, Microsoft, Samsung, etc, and of course the killer of the list...

• Amazon! they have no contract blocking them from bundling microg on their platforms. but they don't need to! they can just ready their platform for it and let us publish it on Amazon market. or at least the bits that interact with google's services. how much is a fully functional microg worth to Amazon?

google is making headway

google is advancing technologies that will further block competition. everyone here knows what safety net is all about: blocking competing platforms. it requires opt-in by app developer.

here's another of their gimmicks: app bundles. marketed as a way to ease app deployment and improve user experience, and also requiring dev opt-in, the technology is really about devs surrendering their signing keys to google. everything that this technology claims to do can be done without such a bold requirement. but what this technology achieves without stating it is inhibiting sideloading and blocking competing markets. and how long before google starts to inject their code inside all apps? what about their code failing unless running on a googlephone rendering in-the-wild apps unusable for "compatible" android platforms?

devs won't realize about these issues and will fall into google's traps unless there is a real userbase having these issues. and when enough apps are poisoned, the world won't be able to make a free android anymore; we need degoogleized androd devices in the wild ASAP.

so what now?

hopefully some of us will feel bold enough to reach out to some of the entities on this post. and please also add more names you can think of. the value of this project is huge, but i think that the entities that would benefit from it are unaware of its existence.

thanks!

No files, tests, or implementation entry points are identified. Start by reviewing this proposal alongside issues #420 and #752, then define a concrete, scoped project change before considering implementation; the issue does not specify what completion would look like.