Greg Kroah-Hartman - Linux - Philips Web cam - Nemosoft


Date: Sun, 29 Aug 2004 01:24:08 +0200 (CEST)
From: Hans Schou <chlor@schou.dk>
To: kroah@...
Subject: Nemosoft: You did the right thing

Hi Greg Kroah-Hartman

A year ago I went out to buy a web-cam. I first did a quick search to 
see which one will work with Linux. It turned out that the Philips Web 
Cam was cheap and available at the local store - and it will work 
with Linux.

When I got it and attached it, it did not work. Strange as it was on a 
list of web-cams which will work with Linux. I then found out that I 
had to add a closed source driver to get it to work. Damn, I have seen 
this before and it will not work in the long run.

The best thing for me was if that cam was never on list of cams
working with Linux. But I do not think I could blame those who put it
on the list. I am more to blame Nemosoft or Philips. If there never
was a driver for that cam I would not have bought it.

Some years ago there was a network driver for Olicom TokenRing. The
driver was binary. Now the company has stopped the production af NICs
and the latest driver was for Linux kernel 2.0. Another story is about
SmartDisk FlashPath where there also was a binary driver developed
under NDA by LinuxCare. You can not get that driver anymore.

Today you can buy a lot of grapic cards with binary drivers, like
Nvidia, and people who buy those will get in that same situation one
day like I did.

I am done with binary drivers. Next time I buy a gadget I would look 
much more closely for the source to prevent situations like this.

GPL is for protecting the end user, so GPL is not such a bad idea at
all. It prevent people from getting stocked with useless hardware like
I did.

Nemosoft got 15 minutes of fame
and 15 days of shame.

Best regards and have fun
Hans