[H-source-users] Suggestion: Digital Freedom Rating tool for every server/desktop/laptop/mobile device

[David Marceau]

Hi there,

As someone who wants to recommend Digital Freedom hardware to
consumers "hooked" on Windows/Apple product, it would be important to
have some kind of "Digital Freedom Rating" for every existing device.
 Simply mentioning that a piece of hardware comes with open-source
bios/uefi and can install GNU/Linux is not enough.  Consumers will be
too lazy to sift through a database saying which piece of hardware is
Linux compatible.

I propose a FSF/H-Node build a "Digital Freedom Rating Tool" that
device owners can run on their existing devices to help them measure
their current levels of Digital Freedom.  The tool would detect all
the devices within system being run on, connect back to h-node.org and
generate a detailed score for every detected hardware device based on
certain criteria:
-no-manufacturer blobs(i.e. 50-year old G.E. Toaster)
-manufacturer-blobs available(i.e. ATI RADEON 7970)
-open-source but not easily built(i.e. ADVENT VEGA ANDROID CYANOGENMOD)
-open-source and easy to build(i.e. ANDROID AOSP for GOOGLE PHONE)
-open-source binaries available in repos(i.e. INTEL
CPU/GRAPHICS/MOTHERBOARD drivers in Debian Linux repositories)
-open-source binaries perform as well as manufacturer-blobs(can't
think of an example)
-open-source bios(can't think of an example)
-open-source uefi(can't think of an example)
-DRM chipset(i.e. iphone/xbox/playstation?)
The detailed score could also mention certain impacts on digital
freedoms for each device. i.e. DRM chipsets enabled impacts on your
digital freedom to easily make copies of certain media content.
or i.e. manufacturer-blobs impact on your ability to protect yourself
against manufacturer-originating rootkits that steal your personal
information, log all your activity and at worst impersonate your
internet presence.
The detailed score could also mention which distros support the
specific device detected and with what driver and version.

Then at the end, the "Digital Freedom Rating Tool" would also generate
a summary score of everything based on different weights in the criteria.

Unfortunately, building a tool to run like this in Microsoft-land,
Apple-land and Google-Android-land will require different binaries for
those different operating systems.  This is where a tool like this is
needed most.  Having a tool like this running on Linux is like
preaching to the converted, but could be used as a reference point in
terms of what digital freedoms we have and to compare scores against
other non-"Digital Freedom" devices.

This tool would certainly influence consumers to move to GNU/Linux or
at least experiment with GNU/Linux.   Most important it would save
time explaining to GNU-unaware people by simply running this tool and
demonstrating to them how much digital freedom they currently have and
how much digital freedom they could have if they used GNU/Linux instead.
It could also recommend a distro best suited for the hardware they
currently owned also and possibly prepare an image customized for the
devices the tool detected.

Cheers