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www/philosophy android-and-users-freedom.de.htm... |
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Date: |
Sun, 28 Aug 2016 11:58:00 +0000 (UTC) |
CVSROOT: /web/www
Module name: www
Changes by: GNUN <gnun> 16/08/28 11:58:00
Modified files:
philosophy : android-and-users-freedom.de.html
android-and-users-freedom.pl.html
Added files:
philosophy/po : android-and-users-freedom.de-diff.html
android-and-users-freedom.pl-diff.html
Log message:
Automatic update by GNUnited Nations.
CVSWeb URLs:
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/www/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.de.html?cvsroot=www&r1=1.52&r2=1.53
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/www/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.pl.html?cvsroot=www&r1=1.28&r2=1.29
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/www/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.de-diff.html?cvsroot=www&rev=1.1
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/www/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.pl-diff.html?cvsroot=www&rev=1.1
Patches:
Index: android-and-users-freedom.de.html
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RCS file: /web/www/www/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.de.html,v
retrieving revision 1.52
retrieving revision 1.53
diff -u -b -r1.52 -r1.53
--- android-and-users-freedom.de.html 13 Apr 2016 08:59:49 -0000 1.52
+++ android-and-users-freedom.de.html 28 Aug 2016 11:57:59 -0000 1.53
@@ -1,4 +1,9 @@
-<!--#set var="ENGLISH_PAGE"
value="/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.en.html" -->
+<!--#set var="PO_FILE"
+ value='<a href="/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.de.po">
+ https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.de.po</a>'
+ --><!--#set var="ORIGINAL_FILE"
value="/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.html"
+ --><!--#set var="DIFF_FILE"
value="/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.de-diff.html"
+ --><!--#set var="OUTDATED_SINCE" value="2016-06-29" --><!--#set
var="ENGLISH_PAGE" value="/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.en.html" -->
<!--#include virtual="/server/header.de.html" -->
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@@ -8,6 +13,7 @@
<!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.translist" -->
<!--#include virtual="/server/banner.de.html" -->
+<!--#include virtual="/server/outdated.de.html" -->
<h2>Android und die Freiheit der Nutzer</h2>
<p>von <strong>Richard Stallman</strong> | englischsprachige
Erstveröffentlichung in: <a
@@ -363,7 +369,7 @@
<p class="unprintable"><!-- timestamp start -->
Aktualisierung:
-$Date: 2016/04/13 08:59:49 $
+$Date: 2016/08/28 11:57:59 $
<!-- timestamp end -->
</p>
Index: android-and-users-freedom.pl.html
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RCS file: /web/www/www/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.pl.html,v
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diff -u -b -r1.28 -r1.29
--- android-and-users-freedom.pl.html 16 Jan 2016 00:04:55 -0000 1.28
+++ android-and-users-freedom.pl.html 28 Aug 2016 11:57:59 -0000 1.29
@@ -1,4 +1,9 @@
-<!--#set var="ENGLISH_PAGE"
value="/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.en.html" -->
+<!--#set var="PO_FILE"
+ value='<a href="/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.pl.po">
+ https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.pl.po</a>'
+ --><!--#set var="ORIGINAL_FILE"
value="/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.html"
+ --><!--#set var="DIFF_FILE"
value="/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.pl-diff.html"
+ --><!--#set var="OUTDATED_SINCE" value="2016-06-29" --><!--#set
var="ENGLISH_PAGE" value="/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.en.html" -->
<!--#include virtual="/server/header.pl.html" -->
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@@ -9,6 +14,7 @@
<!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.translist" -->
<!--#include virtual="/server/banner.pl.html" -->
+<!--#include virtual="/server/outdated.pl.html" -->
<h2>Android a wolnoÅÄ użytkowników</h2>
<p>Richard Stallman<br />Pierwotnie opublikowano w <a
href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-free-software-stallman";>The
@@ -328,7 +334,7 @@
<p class="unprintable"><!-- timestamp start -->
Aktualizowane:
-$Date: 2016/01/16 00:04:55 $
+$Date: 2016/08/28 11:57:59 $
<!-- timestamp end -->
</p>
Index: po/android-and-users-freedom.de-diff.html
===================================================================
RCS file: po/android-and-users-freedom.de-diff.html
diff -N po/android-and-users-freedom.de-diff.html
--- /dev/null 1 Jan 1970 00:00:00 -0000
+++ po/android-and-users-freedom.de-diff.html 28 Aug 2016 11:58:00 -0000
1.1
@@ -0,0 +1,322 @@
+<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
+ "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd";>
+<!-- Generated by GNUN -->
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"; xml:lang="en" lang="en">
+<head>
+<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
+<title>/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.html-diff</title>
+<style type="text/css">
+span.removed { background-color: #f22; color: #000; }
+span.inserted { background-color: #2f2; color: #000; }
+</style></head>
+<body><pre>
+<!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" -->
+<!-- Parent-Version: 1.77 -->
+<title>Android and Users' Freedom
+- GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title>
+<!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.translist"
-->
+<!--#include virtual="/server/banner.html" -->
+<h2>Android and Users' Freedom</h2>
+<p>by Richard Stallman<br />First published in <a
+href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-free-software-stallman">
+The Guardian</a></p>
+
+<h3 class="center">Support the <a
href="http://FreeYourAndroid.org/">
+Free Your Android</a> campaign.</h3>
+
+<p>To what extent does Android respect the freedom of its users? For a
+computer user that values freedom, that is the most important question
+to ask about any software system.</p>
+
+<p>In the <a href="http://fsf.org">free/libre software
movement</a>, we
+develop software that respects users' freedom, so we and you can escape
+from software that doesn't. By contrast, the idea of “open
+source” focuses on how to develop code; it is a different current
+of thought whose principal value is <a
+href="/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html">code
+quality rather than freedom</a>. Thus, the concern here is not whether
+Android is “<a
href="/philosophy/free-open-overlap.html">open</a>”,
+but whether it allows users to be free.</p>
+
+<p>Android is an operating system primarily for mobile phones and
+other devices, which
+consists of Linux (Torvalds' kernel), some libraries, a Java platform
+and some applications. Linux aside, the software of Android versions
+1 and 2 was mostly developed by Google; Google released it under the
+Apache 2.0 license, which is a lax free software license without
+<a href="/copyleft/copyleft.html">copyleft</a>.</p>
+
+<p>The version of Linux included in Android is not entirely free
+software, since it contains nonfree “binary blobs” (just
+like Torvalds' version of Linux), some of which are really used in some
+Android devices. Android platforms use other nonfree firmware, too,
+and nonfree libraries. Aside from those, the source code of Android
+versions 1 and 2, as released by Google, is free software—but this
+code is insufficient to run the device. Some of the applications that
+generally come with Android are nonfree, too.</p>
+
+<p>Android is very different from the <a
+href="/gnu/the-gnu-project.html">GNU/Linux operating
+system</a> because it contains very little of GNU. Indeed, just about
+the only component in common between Android and GNU/Linux is Linux, the
+kernel. People who erroneously think “Linux” refers to the
+entire GNU/Linux combination get tied in knots by these facts, and make
+paradoxical statements such as “Android contains Linux, but it
+isn't Linux.”(<a href="#linuxnote">*</a>) Absent this
confusion,
+the situation is simple: Android contains Linux, but not GNU; thus,
+Android and GNU/Linux are mostly different, because all they have in
+common is Linux.</p>
+
+<p>Within Android, Linux the kernel remains a separate program, with its
+source code under <a href="/licenses/gpl-2.0.html">GNU GPL
+version 2</a>. To combine Linux with code under the Apache 2.0 license
+would be copyright infringement, since GPL version 2 and Apache 2.0 are
+<a href="/licenses/license-list.html#apache2">incompatible</a>.
+Rumors that Google has somehow converted Linux to the Apache license are
+erroneous; Google has no power to change the license on the code of
+Linux, and did not try. If the authors of Linux allowed its use under <a
+href="/licenses/gpl.html">GPL version 3</a>,
+then that code could be combined with Apache-licensed code, and the
+combination could be released under GPL version 3. But Linux has not
+been released that way.</p>
+
+<p>Google has complied with the requirements of the GNU General Public
+License for Linux, but the Apache license on the rest of Android does
+not require source release. Google said it would never publish the
+source code of Android 3.0 (aside from Linux). Android 3.1 source code
+was also withheld, making Android 3, apart from Linux, nonfree
+software pure and simple.</p>
+
+<p>Google said it withheld the 3.0 source code because it was buggy, and
+that people should wait for the next release. That may be good advice
+for people who simply want to run the Android system, but the users
+should be the ones to decide this. Anyway, developers and tinkerers
+who want to include some of the changes in their own versions could
+use that code just fine.</p>
+
+<p>Fortunately, Google later released the source code for Android 3.*
+when it released version 4 (also with source code). The problem above
+turned out to be a temporary aberration rather than a policy shift.
+However, what happens once may happen again.</p>
+
+<p>In any case, most of the source code of various versions of Android
+has been released as free software. Does that mean that products using
+those Android versions respect users' freedom? No, for several
+reasons.</p>
+
+<p>First of all, most of them contain nonfree Google applications for
+talking to services such as YouTube and Google Maps. These are
+officially not part of Android, but that doesn't make the product ok.
+Many of the free applications available for earlier versions of
+Android have
+been <a
href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/10/googles-iron-grip-on-android-controlling-open-source-by-any-means-necessary/">
+replaced by nonfree applications</a>; in 2013 Android devices appeared
+which <a
href="http://www.androidbeat.com/2013/12/new-google-play-edition-devices-lack-photo-gallery-app-use-google/">
+provided no way to view photos except through a nonfree Google+
+app</a>. In 2014 Google announced
+that <a
href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/06/android-wear-auto-and-tv-save-you-from-skins-and-oems-from-themselves/">Android
+versions for TVs, watches and cars would be largely nonfree.</a>
+</p>
+
+<p>Most Android devices come with the nonfree Google Play software
+(formerly “Android Market”). This software invites users
+with a Google account to install nonfree apps. It also has a back
+door with which Google can forcibly install or deinstall apps. (This
+probably makes it a universal back door, though that is not proved.)
+Google Play is officially not part of Android, but that doesn't make
+it any less bad.
+</p>
+
+<span class="inserted"><ins><em><p>Google has moved many basic general
facilities into the
+nonfree <a
href="https://blog.grobox.de/2016/the-proprietarization-of-android-google-play-services-and-apps/">Google
+Play Services library</a>. If an app's own code is free software but
+it depends on Google Play Services, that app as a whole is effectively
+nonfree; it can't run on a free version of Android, such as Replicant.
+</p></em></ins></span>
+
+<p>If you value freedom, you don't want the nonfree apps that Google
+Play offers. To install free Android apps, you don't need Google
+Play, because you can get them
+from <a href="http://f-droid.org">f-droid.org</a>.
+</p>
+
+<p>Android products also come with nonfree libraries. These are
+officially not part of Android, but since various Android
+functionalities depend on them, they are part of any real Android
+installation.</p>
+
+<p>Even the programs that are officially part of Android may not
+correspond to the source code Google releases. Manufacturers may
+change this code, and often they don't release the source code for
+their versions. The GNU GPL requires them to distribute the code for
+their versions of Linux, assuming they comply. The rest of the code,
+under the lax Apache license, does not require them to release the
+source version that they really use.</p>
+
+<p>One user discovered that many of the programs in the Android system
+that came with his phone
+were <a
href="http://www.beneaththewaves.net/Projects/Motorola_Is_Listening.html">modified
+to send personal data to Motorola.</a> Some manufacturers add
+a <a
href="http://androidsecuritytest.com/features/logs-and-services/loggers/carrieriq/">
+hidden general surveillance package such as Carrier IQ.</a></p>
+
+<p><a href="http://replicant.us">Replicant</a> is the free
version of
+Android. The Replicant developers have replaced many nonfree
+libraries, for certain device models. The nonfree apps are excluded,
+but you certainly don't want to use those. By contrast, CyanogenMod
+(another modified version of Android) is nonfree, as it contains some
+nonfree programs.</p>
+
+<p>Some Android devices are “tyrants”: they are designed so
users
+cannot install and run their own modified software, only the versions
+approved by some company. In that situation, the executables are not
+free even if they were made from sources that are free and available
+to you. However, some Android devices can be “rooted” so
+users can install different software.</p>
+
+<p>Important firmware or drivers are generally proprietary also. These
+handle the phone network radio, WiFi, bluetooth, GPS, 3D graphics, the
+camera, the speaker, and in some cases the microphone too. On some
+models, a few of these drivers are free, and there are some that you
+can do without—but you can't do without the microphone or the
+phone network radio.</p>
+
+<p>The phone network firmware comes preinstalled. If all it did was
+sit there and talk to the phone network when you wish, we could regard
+it as equivalent to a circuit. When we insist that the software in a
+computing device must be free, we can overlook preinstalled firmware
+that will never be upgraded, because it makes no difference to the
+user that it's a program rather than a circuit.</p>
+
+<p>Unfortunately, in this case it would be a malicious circuit.
+Malicious features are unacceptable no matter how they are
+implemented.</p>
+
+<p>On most Android devices, this firmware has so much control that it
+could turn the product into a listening device. On some, it controls
+the microphone. On some, it can take full control of the main
+computer, through shared memory, and can thus override or replace
+whatever free software you have installed. With some, perhaps all,
+models it is possible to exercise remote control of this firmware to
+overwrite the rest of the software in the device. The point of free
+software is that we have control of our software and our computing;
+a system with a back door doesn't qualify. While any computing system
+might <em>have</em> bugs, these devices can
<em>be</em> bugs. (Craig
+Murray,
+in <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2006/aug/12/politics">Murder
+in Samarkand</a>, relates his involvement in an intelligence operation
+that remotely converted an unsuspecting target's non-Android portable
+phone into a listening device.)</p>
+
+<p>In any case, the phone network firmware in an Android phone is not
+equivalent to a circuit, because the hardware allows installation of
+new versions and this is actually done. Since it is proprietary
+firmware, in practice only the manufacturer can make new
+versions—users can't.</p>
+
+<p>Putting these points together, we can tolerate nonfree phone
+network firmware provided new versions of it won't be loaded, it can't
+take control of the main computer, and it can only communicate when
+and as the free operating system chooses to let it communicate. In
+other words, it has to be equivalent to circuitry, and that circuitry
+must not be malicious. There is no technical obstacle to building an
+Android phone which has these characteristics, but we don't know of
+any.</p>
+
+<p>Android is not a self-hosting system; development for Android needs
+to be done on some other system. The tools in Google's
+“software development kit” (SDK) appear to be free,
+but it is hard work to check this. The definition files for certain
+Google APIs are nonfree. Installing the SDK requires signing a
+proprietary software license, which you should refuse to sign.
+<a
href="http://redmine.replicant.us/projects/replicant/wiki/ReplicantSDK">
+Replicant's SDK</a> is a free replacement.</p>
+
+<p>Recent press coverage of Android focuses on the patent wars. During
+20 years of campaigning for the abolition of software patents, we have
+warned such wars could happen. Software patents could force
+elimination of features from Android, or even make it unavailable.
+See <a href="http://endsoftpatents.org">endsoftpatents.org</a> for
more
+information about why software patents must be abolished.</p>
+
+<p>However, the patent attacks and Google's responses are not directly
+relevant to the topic of this article: how Android products partly
+approach an ethically system of distribution, and how they fall
+short. This issue merits the attention of the press too.</p>
+
+<p>Android is a major step towards an ethical, user-controlled, free
+software portable phone, but there is a long way to go, and Google is
+taking it in the wrong direction. Hackers are working
+on <a href="http://replicant.us">Replicant</a>, but it's a big job
to
+support a new device model, and there remains the problem of the
+firmware. Even though the Android phones of today are considerably
+less bad than Apple or Windows phones, they cannot be said to
+respect your freedom.</p>
+
+<hr />
+<ul>
+<li><a id="linuxnote"></a>The extreme example of this
confusion appears in
+the site linuxonandroid.org, which offers help to “install Linux
+[sic] on your Android devices.” This is entirely false: what
+they are installing is a version of the GNU system,
<em>excluding</em>
+Linux, which is already present as part of Android. Since that site
+supports only <a href="/distros/distros.html">nonfree GNU/Linux
+distros</a>, we do not recommend it.
+</li>
+</ul>
+
+
+<!-- If needed, change the copyright block at the bottom. In general,
+ all pages on the GNU web server should have the section about
+ verbatim copying. Please do NOT remove this without talking
+ with the webmasters first.
+ Please make sure the copyright date is consistent with the document
+ and that it is like this: "2001, 2002", not this: "2001-2002". -->
+</div><!-- for id="content", starts in the include above -->
+<!--#include virtual="/server/footer.html" -->
+<div id="footer">
+<div class="unprintable">
+
+<p>Please send general FSF & GNU inquiries to <a
+href="mailto:address@hidden"><address@hidden></a>. There are
also <a
+href="/contact/">other ways to contact</a> the FSF. Broken links and
other
+corrections or suggestions can be sent to <a
+href="mailto:address@hidden"><address@hidden></a>.</p>
+
+<p><!-- TRANSLATORS: Ignore the original text in this paragraph,
+ replace it with the translation of these two:
+
+ We work hard and do our best to provide accurate, good quality
+ translations. However, we are not exempt from imperfection.
+ Please send your comments and general suggestions in this regard
+ to <a href="mailto:address@hidden">
+ <address@hidden></a>.</p>
+
+ <p>For information on coordinating and submitting translations of
+ our web pages, see <a
+ href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations
+ README</a>. -->
+Please see the <a
+href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations
README</a> for
+information on coordinating and submitting translations of this
article.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Copyright © 2011, 2012, 2014, <span
class="removed"><del><strong>2015</strong></del></span> <span
class="inserted"><ins><em>2015, 2016</em></ins></span> Richard
Stallman</p>
+
+<p>This page is licensed under a <a rel="license"
+<span
class="removed"><del><strong>href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0/us/">Creative</strong></del></span>
+<span
class="inserted"><ins><em>href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">Creative</em></ins></span>
+Commons <span class="removed"><del><strong>Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 United
States</strong></del></span> <span
class="inserted"><ins><em>Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0
International</em></ins></span> License</a>.</p>
+
+<!--#include virtual="/server/bottom-notes.html" -->
+
+<p class="unprintable">Updated:
+<!-- timestamp start -->
+$Date: 2016/08/28 11:58:00 $
+<!-- timestamp end -->
+</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+</body>
+</html>
+</pre></body></html>
Index: po/android-and-users-freedom.pl-diff.html
===================================================================
RCS file: po/android-and-users-freedom.pl-diff.html
diff -N po/android-and-users-freedom.pl-diff.html
--- /dev/null 1 Jan 1970 00:00:00 -0000
+++ po/android-and-users-freedom.pl-diff.html 28 Aug 2016 11:58:00 -0000
1.1
@@ -0,0 +1,322 @@
+<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
+ "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd";>
+<!-- Generated by GNUN -->
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"; xml:lang="en" lang="en">
+<head>
+<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
+<title>/philosophy/android-and-users-freedom.html-diff</title>
+<style type="text/css">
+span.removed { background-color: #f22; color: #000; }
+span.inserted { background-color: #2f2; color: #000; }
+</style></head>
+<body><pre>
+<!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" -->
+<!-- Parent-Version: 1.77 -->
+<title>Android and Users' Freedom
+- GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title>
+<!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/android-and-users-freedom.translist"
-->
+<!--#include virtual="/server/banner.html" -->
+<h2>Android and Users' Freedom</h2>
+<p>by Richard Stallman<br />First published in <a
+href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/android-free-software-stallman">
+The Guardian</a></p>
+
+<h3 class="center">Support the <a
href="http://FreeYourAndroid.org/">
+Free Your Android</a> campaign.</h3>
+
+<p>To what extent does Android respect the freedom of its users? For a
+computer user that values freedom, that is the most important question
+to ask about any software system.</p>
+
+<p>In the <a href="http://fsf.org">free/libre software
movement</a>, we
+develop software that respects users' freedom, so we and you can escape
+from software that doesn't. By contrast, the idea of “open
+source” focuses on how to develop code; it is a different current
+of thought whose principal value is <a
+href="/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html">code
+quality rather than freedom</a>. Thus, the concern here is not whether
+Android is “<a
href="/philosophy/free-open-overlap.html">open</a>”,
+but whether it allows users to be free.</p>
+
+<p>Android is an operating system primarily for mobile phones and
+other devices, which
+consists of Linux (Torvalds' kernel), some libraries, a Java platform
+and some applications. Linux aside, the software of Android versions
+1 and 2 was mostly developed by Google; Google released it under the
+Apache 2.0 license, which is a lax free software license without
+<a href="/copyleft/copyleft.html">copyleft</a>.</p>
+
+<p>The version of Linux included in Android is not entirely free
+software, since it contains nonfree “binary blobs” (just
+like Torvalds' version of Linux), some of which are really used in some
+Android devices. Android platforms use other nonfree firmware, too,
+and nonfree libraries. Aside from those, the source code of Android
+versions 1 and 2, as released by Google, is free software—but this
+code is insufficient to run the device. Some of the applications that
+generally come with Android are nonfree, too.</p>
+
+<p>Android is very different from the <a
+href="/gnu/the-gnu-project.html">GNU/Linux operating
+system</a> because it contains very little of GNU. Indeed, just about
+the only component in common between Android and GNU/Linux is Linux, the
+kernel. People who erroneously think “Linux” refers to the
+entire GNU/Linux combination get tied in knots by these facts, and make
+paradoxical statements such as “Android contains Linux, but it
+isn't Linux.”(<a href="#linuxnote">*</a>) Absent this
confusion,
+the situation is simple: Android contains Linux, but not GNU; thus,
+Android and GNU/Linux are mostly different, because all they have in
+common is Linux.</p>
+
+<p>Within Android, Linux the kernel remains a separate program, with its
+source code under <a href="/licenses/gpl-2.0.html">GNU GPL
+version 2</a>. To combine Linux with code under the Apache 2.0 license
+would be copyright infringement, since GPL version 2 and Apache 2.0 are
+<a href="/licenses/license-list.html#apache2">incompatible</a>.
+Rumors that Google has somehow converted Linux to the Apache license are
+erroneous; Google has no power to change the license on the code of
+Linux, and did not try. If the authors of Linux allowed its use under <a
+href="/licenses/gpl.html">GPL version 3</a>,
+then that code could be combined with Apache-licensed code, and the
+combination could be released under GPL version 3. But Linux has not
+been released that way.</p>
+
+<p>Google has complied with the requirements of the GNU General Public
+License for Linux, but the Apache license on the rest of Android does
+not require source release. Google said it would never publish the
+source code of Android 3.0 (aside from Linux). Android 3.1 source code
+was also withheld, making Android 3, apart from Linux, nonfree
+software pure and simple.</p>
+
+<p>Google said it withheld the 3.0 source code because it was buggy, and
+that people should wait for the next release. That may be good advice
+for people who simply want to run the Android system, but the users
+should be the ones to decide this. Anyway, developers and tinkerers
+who want to include some of the changes in their own versions could
+use that code just fine.</p>
+
+<p>Fortunately, Google later released the source code for Android 3.*
+when it released version 4 (also with source code). The problem above
+turned out to be a temporary aberration rather than a policy shift.
+However, what happens once may happen again.</p>
+
+<p>In any case, most of the source code of various versions of Android
+has been released as free software. Does that mean that products using
+those Android versions respect users' freedom? No, for several
+reasons.</p>
+
+<p>First of all, most of them contain nonfree Google applications for
+talking to services such as YouTube and Google Maps. These are
+officially not part of Android, but that doesn't make the product ok.
+Many of the free applications available for earlier versions of
+Android have
+been <a
href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/10/googles-iron-grip-on-android-controlling-open-source-by-any-means-necessary/">
+replaced by nonfree applications</a>; in 2013 Android devices appeared
+which <a
href="http://www.androidbeat.com/2013/12/new-google-play-edition-devices-lack-photo-gallery-app-use-google/">
+provided no way to view photos except through a nonfree Google+
+app</a>. In 2014 Google announced
+that <a
href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/06/android-wear-auto-and-tv-save-you-from-skins-and-oems-from-themselves/">Android
+versions for TVs, watches and cars would be largely nonfree.</a>
+</p>
+
+<p>Most Android devices come with the nonfree Google Play software
+(formerly “Android Market”). This software invites users
+with a Google account to install nonfree apps. It also has a back
+door with which Google can forcibly install or deinstall apps. (This
+probably makes it a universal back door, though that is not proved.)
+Google Play is officially not part of Android, but that doesn't make
+it any less bad.
+</p>
+
+<span class="inserted"><ins><em><p>Google has moved many basic general
facilities into the
+nonfree <a
href="https://blog.grobox.de/2016/the-proprietarization-of-android-google-play-services-and-apps/">Google
+Play Services library</a>. If an app's own code is free software but
+it depends on Google Play Services, that app as a whole is effectively
+nonfree; it can't run on a free version of Android, such as Replicant.
+</p></em></ins></span>
+
+<p>If you value freedom, you don't want the nonfree apps that Google
+Play offers. To install free Android apps, you don't need Google
+Play, because you can get them
+from <a href="http://f-droid.org">f-droid.org</a>.
+</p>
+
+<p>Android products also come with nonfree libraries. These are
+officially not part of Android, but since various Android
+functionalities depend on them, they are part of any real Android
+installation.</p>
+
+<p>Even the programs that are officially part of Android may not
+correspond to the source code Google releases. Manufacturers may
+change this code, and often they don't release the source code for
+their versions. The GNU GPL requires them to distribute the code for
+their versions of Linux, assuming they comply. The rest of the code,
+under the lax Apache license, does not require them to release the
+source version that they really use.</p>
+
+<p>One user discovered that many of the programs in the Android system
+that came with his phone
+were <a
href="http://www.beneaththewaves.net/Projects/Motorola_Is_Listening.html">modified
+to send personal data to Motorola.</a> Some manufacturers add
+a <a
href="http://androidsecuritytest.com/features/logs-and-services/loggers/carrieriq/">
+hidden general surveillance package such as Carrier IQ.</a></p>
+
+<p><a href="http://replicant.us">Replicant</a> is the free
version of
+Android. The Replicant developers have replaced many nonfree
+libraries, for certain device models. The nonfree apps are excluded,
+but you certainly don't want to use those. By contrast, CyanogenMod
+(another modified version of Android) is nonfree, as it contains some
+nonfree programs.</p>
+
+<p>Some Android devices are “tyrants”: they are designed so
users
+cannot install and run their own modified software, only the versions
+approved by some company. In that situation, the executables are not
+free even if they were made from sources that are free and available
+to you. However, some Android devices can be “rooted” so
+users can install different software.</p>
+
+<p>Important firmware or drivers are generally proprietary also. These
+handle the phone network radio, WiFi, bluetooth, GPS, 3D graphics, the
+camera, the speaker, and in some cases the microphone too. On some
+models, a few of these drivers are free, and there are some that you
+can do without—but you can't do without the microphone or the
+phone network radio.</p>
+
+<p>The phone network firmware comes preinstalled. If all it did was
+sit there and talk to the phone network when you wish, we could regard
+it as equivalent to a circuit. When we insist that the software in a
+computing device must be free, we can overlook preinstalled firmware
+that will never be upgraded, because it makes no difference to the
+user that it's a program rather than a circuit.</p>
+
+<p>Unfortunately, in this case it would be a malicious circuit.
+Malicious features are unacceptable no matter how they are
+implemented.</p>
+
+<p>On most Android devices, this firmware has so much control that it
+could turn the product into a listening device. On some, it controls
+the microphone. On some, it can take full control of the main
+computer, through shared memory, and can thus override or replace
+whatever free software you have installed. With some, perhaps all,
+models it is possible to exercise remote control of this firmware to
+overwrite the rest of the software in the device. The point of free
+software is that we have control of our software and our computing;
+a system with a back door doesn't qualify. While any computing system
+might <em>have</em> bugs, these devices can
<em>be</em> bugs. (Craig
+Murray,
+in <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2006/aug/12/politics">Murder
+in Samarkand</a>, relates his involvement in an intelligence operation
+that remotely converted an unsuspecting target's non-Android portable
+phone into a listening device.)</p>
+
+<p>In any case, the phone network firmware in an Android phone is not
+equivalent to a circuit, because the hardware allows installation of
+new versions and this is actually done. Since it is proprietary
+firmware, in practice only the manufacturer can make new
+versions—users can't.</p>
+
+<p>Putting these points together, we can tolerate nonfree phone
+network firmware provided new versions of it won't be loaded, it can't
+take control of the main computer, and it can only communicate when
+and as the free operating system chooses to let it communicate. In
+other words, it has to be equivalent to circuitry, and that circuitry
+must not be malicious. There is no technical obstacle to building an
+Android phone which has these characteristics, but we don't know of
+any.</p>
+
+<p>Android is not a self-hosting system; development for Android needs
+to be done on some other system. The tools in Google's
+“software development kit” (SDK) appear to be free,
+but it is hard work to check this. The definition files for certain
+Google APIs are nonfree. Installing the SDK requires signing a
+proprietary software license, which you should refuse to sign.
+<a
href="http://redmine.replicant.us/projects/replicant/wiki/ReplicantSDK">
+Replicant's SDK</a> is a free replacement.</p>
+
+<p>Recent press coverage of Android focuses on the patent wars. During
+20 years of campaigning for the abolition of software patents, we have
+warned such wars could happen. Software patents could force
+elimination of features from Android, or even make it unavailable.
+See <a href="http://endsoftpatents.org">endsoftpatents.org</a> for
more
+information about why software patents must be abolished.</p>
+
+<p>However, the patent attacks and Google's responses are not directly
+relevant to the topic of this article: how Android products partly
+approach an ethically system of distribution, and how they fall
+short. This issue merits the attention of the press too.</p>
+
+<p>Android is a major step towards an ethical, user-controlled, free
+software portable phone, but there is a long way to go, and Google is
+taking it in the wrong direction. Hackers are working
+on <a href="http://replicant.us">Replicant</a>, but it's a big job
to
+support a new device model, and there remains the problem of the
+firmware. Even though the Android phones of today are considerably
+less bad than Apple or Windows phones, they cannot be said to
+respect your freedom.</p>
+
+<hr />
+<ul>
+<li><a id="linuxnote"></a>The extreme example of this
confusion appears in
+the site linuxonandroid.org, which offers help to “install Linux
+[sic] on your Android devices.” This is entirely false: what
+they are installing is a version of the GNU system,
<em>excluding</em>
+Linux, which is already present as part of Android. Since that site
+supports only <a href="/distros/distros.html">nonfree GNU/Linux
+distros</a>, we do not recommend it.
+</li>
+</ul>
+
+
+<!-- If needed, change the copyright block at the bottom. In general,
+ all pages on the GNU web server should have the section about
+ verbatim copying. Please do NOT remove this without talking
+ with the webmasters first.
+ Please make sure the copyright date is consistent with the document
+ and that it is like this: "2001, 2002", not this: "2001-2002". -->
+</div><!-- for id="content", starts in the include above -->
+<!--#include virtual="/server/footer.html" -->
+<div id="footer">
+<div class="unprintable">
+
+<p>Please send general FSF & GNU inquiries to <a
+href="mailto:address@hidden"><address@hidden></a>. There are
also <a
+href="/contact/">other ways to contact</a> the FSF. Broken links and
other
+corrections or suggestions can be sent to <a
+href="mailto:address@hidden"><address@hidden></a>.</p>
+
+<p><!-- TRANSLATORS: Ignore the original text in this paragraph,
+ replace it with the translation of these two:
+
+ We work hard and do our best to provide accurate, good quality
+ translations. However, we are not exempt from imperfection.
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+ <address@hidden></a>.</p>
+
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+Please see the <a
+href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations
README</a> for
+information on coordinating and submitting translations of this
article.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Copyright © 2011, 2012, 2014, <span
class="removed"><del><strong>2015</strong></del></span> <span
class="inserted"><ins><em>2015, 2016</em></ins></span> Richard
Stallman</p>
+
+<p>This page is licensed under a <a rel="license"
+<span
class="removed"><del><strong>href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0/us/">Creative</strong></del></span>
+<span
class="inserted"><ins><em>href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">Creative</em></ins></span>
+Commons <span class="removed"><del><strong>Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 United
States</strong></del></span> <span
class="inserted"><ins><em>Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0
International</em></ins></span> License</a>.</p>
+
+<!--#include virtual="/server/bottom-notes.html" -->
+
+<p class="unprintable">Updated:
+<!-- timestamp start -->
+$Date: 2016/08/28 11:58:00 $
+<!-- timestamp end -->
+</p>
+</div>
+</div>
+</body>
+</html>
+</pre></body></html>
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