[Arm-netbook] Status update

[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Wednesday, November 23, 2022, Paul Boddie <paul at boddie.org.uk> wrote:

> Well, I am sorry that you have been persistently attempting
communication, but
> probably one of the things that we have collectively learned in recent
years
> is that without continuous communication with those who have supported a
> crowdfunding campaign, confidence in that campaign evaporates rapidly.

in this exceptional case, i am sorry to say, "tough".

if this list was private rather than public, i would
have been able to reach out to everyone at the exact
time *in real time* as Chris was failing to respond.

i would have been able to say, to everyone,  "that's
really strange, Chris has taken 0.8 BTC and receipt
of the 93 Cards, promised to test them and begin
shipping them out... and yet here we are, August 2021
no response, Jan 2022 no response, a year later March 2022
no response, November 2022 over 18 months later no response,
what the hell."

i could not possibly write that because it could damage Chris's
business, and he was the one who sponsored me for
USD *60 THOUSAND* over a 2+ year period including equipment.

one person every 3 weeks has emailed project-questions and
i have asked every single one of them to contact Chris.

no response.

now he has definitely deliberately evaded answering, i am
extremely pissed off.  i trusted him with that BTC and with
those Cards, and as best i can tell he's embezzled them.
it may be that the FBI raided his premises and stole thm,
but *we don't know* because he *won't fucking respond*

this has to all go into the Update that i have been holding
back for literally a year because of the damage it could
do to Chris's business.


> Most of us here do not question your motivations, but I know of at least
one
> other project which I follow (but have no direct interest in) where the
> creator has suffered from numerous setbacks and yet has continually kept
their
> supporters informed, even if the news has been negative.

there is a world of difference between "negative" and
"potentially being so bad it causes the evader to go bankrupt".

Apart from a couple
> of provocateurs, most of the people who are involved seem sympathetic to
the
> creator and their situation.
>
> I know that you do not like your actions being reviewed and questioned,

this is completely incorrect: i am paranoid about ensuring
i keep people informed, such that things *can* be reviewed
and questioned.

what i am *very* pissed off about and will not tolerate is
people assuming that i can and am going to do everything for
them. this attitude is completely unacceptable.

you - all of you - have no fucking idea how much my life
has been absolute hell, to bring this campaign to fruition.
subsistence living, moving 15 times, zero holidays, no
health insurance and degraded quality of life due to severe
debilitating illness, for TEN YEARS.

and i'm being told i'm a "scammer" and should deliver what
you DEMAND?? fuck off!!


> when the absence of such finished items was revealed, it suddenly became
the
> job of the "community" to remedy the situation.

Paul: *read* the updates. look above at the circumstances
i describe i have been living under.  i even moved to Taiwan,
being completely isolated, unable to communicate with anyone
except through translation software, to keep living costs
down, in order to continue.

> And when somebody did offer their assistance, they inadvertently
transgressed
> with respect to your personal choice of collaboration tools, and you
treated
> them appallingly. I completely regret not speaking out forcefully about
this
> at the time. A genuine community project should be a democracy and
> participants should be treated with respect. Instead, you seem to think
that a
> community involves you deciding how things should be done and then telling
> everyone that you "need" them to do it, as if they are your employees.

i'm sorry you feel that way.  you should indeed have spoken
up because it would have allowed the misunderstanding to be
cleared up.

with the ill health and barely-above poverty subsistence level
income, and overwhelming isolation you perhaps can appreciate
or empathise why it appeared i have been "demanding".

if there was more money available, i could have offered it
to people.

>> examples include writing documentation, wiki pages, developing
>> linux kernel support, u-boot patches and getting OS Support
>> up and running.  none of which i can possibly be expected to
>> handle alone.
>
> In fact, some of us have attempted to engage with the supposed community
> aspects of this effort. But again, if the role of the community is merely
to
> channel the thoughts of the important and very busy leader into actions,
then
> there are several obstacles. Firstly, people need to have concrete things
to
> work with if they are to do concrete tasks, and they also need to be
empowered
> to get the work done and to be able to provide input and exercise
influence.
>
> Amongst other things, I have actually looked into some of the tasks around
> documentation and kernel support. One fundamental element of the kernel
> support was the way that housings should affect the devices seen by the
> computer card. I had a long discussion with you about this in 2020 where
you
> insisted that with regard to the mechanisms in the Linux kernel...
>
> "it's all there.  the pieces are in place."

yes. devicetree overlays emerged over time, and Alan Cox
advised that the I2C Bus Scanning could be placed in lib/.


> Supposedly, all the support had been introduced for Raspberry Pi "hats",
but
> when I looked they didn't actually address the problem.

i would, in all frank honestly, not expect the wider Pi
community to be able to find their derrieres with both hands,
but occasionally a gem of a recipe "snippet" pops up from
an expert or a highly-motivated individual, which is nice.

disappointing to hear it didn't happen in this case, but not
a great surprise.  i would expect better luck amongst TI
Beagleboard community and 96Boards, though.

debian however is going to be a lot of hoop-jumping as
overlays are not enabled by default.

> That is another issue
> about taking direction from someone who thinks they have all the answers:
> often, those answers don't stand up to scrutiny. However, with regard to
the
> Linux kernel, with its own form of unconstructive, exploitative
"community"
> dynamics, I should probably give you some benefit of the doubt if you had
the
> wrong impression.

the general entrepreneur and Engineering mindset "i don't know
the answer but have the tools to find it" has only ever failed me
due to sheer overwhelming exhaustion, not for any other reason.

> All of this is pretty academic without actual hardware to use, leaving us
> treading water in the hope of something eventually showing up. At one
point in
> the distant past, actual hardware was distributed to various individuals.
What
> happened to that hardware

i don't know! very few went out.  the gnu guix team got one
each, i *think* tobias platen got guix operational, but he
is quite reclusive and didn't widely announce it.

with exhaustion and lack of money from the campaign funds
i had to focus my time on earning money for my family.
if people don't ask or don't tell, i am not going to
chase them, it costs me time and money to do so.

like right now.

nobody is paying me money for writing this.


> I am inclined to think that failure should be considered the default
outcome
> of any crowdfunding campaign. Responsible crowdfunding should therefore
> involve conferring the ability to reproduce what was done to those who
have
> supported the effort.

a fascinating observation. the project's intended as Trademarked
(Cert-Marked) FOSSHW.


>> so that we can send a Courier round to recover them, get them
>> to Portland, so that Joshua can test them.
>
> Although the argument has been presented that all of this has been very
> frustrating and/or delicate and that much has been tried behind the
scenes to
> make progress, I view the lack of transparency rather negatively.

above. would you write something publicly that resulted in
someone losing their livelihood after they'd given you money
to feed yourself and your family for over two years?

could you do that to someone?

have a look at some of the news coming out of Keene, NH.
Chris has been through some pretty rough shit. he doesn't
need to be treated any rougher.

> It may be
> the case that you have wanted to communicate the situation but Crowd
Supply
> have been reluctant to do so,

no, they've been extremely good, encouraging me.
Joshua wants those Cards so that he *personally*
can do the testing.


> In any case, you don't need me or anyone else to send messages to some
guy on
> another continent to initiate whatever action is necessary.

yes, i (or, the project) really do (does).

you underestimate the power of personal embarrassment.

if you like i can assign the Cards that you pledged to be in
the batch that is within Chris's personal possession?
if that helps to give you the perspective and motivation
that yes, there is concrete action directly related to
you, that a direct and real person is witholding items
that are your personal property, then i am happy to do that?

the idea there is that it would nip in the bud any impression
that you are doing something you feel uncomfortable about
taking responsibility for (to the benefit of everyone),
instead replacing that with something that is very much
about you, and you alone.

what do you think? if you would still not contact him to
say "where is MY computer Card" then i will not do it, as
there's no point.

Whatever I might
> do is completely superfluous to whatever could already be done to resolve
this
> matter.

no, really, this is false, and diminishes the true power
that you have.  the sheer numbers are what he
cannot deny.  he cannot keep censoring 2,500 people or
censor slashdot or other large news outlet.

if you are just one person, yes he can ignore you.

if you are part of a crowd, no.

come on, you must know how this works.

l.


-- 
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crowd-funded eco-conscious hardware: https://www.crowdsupply.com/eoma68