first, i refer to the idea of using a special hardware - the freerunner. when i first heard of openmoko - the first open phone, i was very happy. once and for all i can do whatever i like with my phone, not what nokia/orange/whatever wants me to do ...
however, i never got to get one (1972/freerunner)- it wasn't sold in israel, it was not cheep, but the real killer - it was technologically outdated i have a nokia phone (N95 8GB). it is closed source, but still i can call using voip over wlan. i have a camera (5MP), i have 3.5G data connection. from experiance i know i'll only carry one phone with me even if i promise to carry both ... i can't take (good) pictures (or motion pictures) with it. also one thing i wanted an open phone was to use voip over cellular data connection -> i can't with (1972/freerunner) as gprs has too a big latency .. in the end i didn't jump on the moko train .... it is open, but (currently) crippled by hardware and coming to think of it, linux didn't catch up by running on dedicated hardware - we do not use a linux specific display adapter neither linux specific processor or bus. what was good about linux, is that it runs on everything (almost) ... the way i feel openmoko can catch up, is if it is made to run on the latest phone hardware - (nokia N95 would be my choise), but any modern phone will do. i know the regular problems - hardware supports, documents, and a lot of which have much to loose ... this time the cellular carriers / manufacturers take the place of the villain which was formerally reserved for microsoft's (because they have a lot to loose) this seems like linux hardware support problem all over again ... just my 2c erez.
