- cross-posted to:
- technology@hexbear.net
- cross-posted to:
- technology@hexbear.net
“Open source” really isn’t the right term here, if they’re just releasing API specifications. “Open sourcing” the speakers would be releasing the source code to the software that runs on the speakers.
Like, all of Microsoft’s libraries on Windows have a publicly-documented interface. That hardly makes them open source. Just means that people can write software that make use of them.
Yes, the correct term for this would be “open api”
“documented api”, nothing open about it
Indeed it’s misleading wording but credit where credit is due, this is far better than turning them all into e-waste. It’s not like anyone bought these with the assumption they would have any sort of official API someday, especially after seeing how Sonos handled their similar situation…
It’s misleading wording by arse-technica, not Bose. The quoted wording from Nosebis correct and it looks like they’re doing the right thing. After originally announcing they would be dumb speakers, now they’ll continue to be useful and third party apps can continue to use them. Applaud Bose for doing the right thing
Direct your Boos to arse-technica
I appreciate the distinction, but open source is always a spectrum, so I think the description is a reasonable application here.
open source is always a spectrum
It most definitely is not.
It is a spectrum (MIT vs GPL vs APL for example) but this is outside that spectrum.
That is not a spectrum of open source. They are all open source, as in you can access the source code without restriction. These licenses just limit what you can do with the source code.
Well, yeah. That’s what the spectrum is.
Low end: “you can see the source but can’t do anything with it” (questionable whether this counts as open source at all)
High end “do what you want, it’s literally yours” (public domain).
One can debate where the low boundary of “open source” is, or what makes one license more or less free than another, but the spectrum is the range of limitations.
Basic documentation does not equal open source.
Toaster ovens from 40 years ago did better. They came with a technical diagram.
We need a law that companies provide device owners root access for every end of life device.
That’s something the EU would do, but never America.
How about a free gun at the end of life of any device?
NOW we’re talking!
I think medical device manufacturers should have to support their products for some definite length of time—maybe 10 years?—or not be allowed to make devices at all
Yes! Exactly. I buy, I own. That’s what it SHOULD be.
Phones are the worst example. Pay 1500 moneyz and still it’s not yours. You may only use it in the way they want you to. Ugh.
GrapheneOS is your savior. I should donate, their work is only getting harder.
I use it. But it’s only half of the solution. There’s still the phone itself and it’s from the worst of the worst 😑
They’re working on that, too.
It would be one thing for a corporation to misuse the term open source as they’ve been doing lately. It’s pretty bad for one of the biggest and oldest tech news sites to be doing it.
More like ArseTechnica, eh?
Chad Bose.
That’s fantastic. Can Apple Pay attention to this?
No thanks. I had like 20 sonos speaker, and then, one day, sonos decided to fuck the app up, making it impossible to use my library anymore. This was the day I sold them all, ranted like a pissed off babuskha and never thought of buying similar products ever but make my own.
Real open source or go fork yourself in the eye. I’m so done with this corpo-crapshit
You sound like an extremist brother. If they lie and dont do it (seems like they already have made it open-source) then get mad. But it sounds like you are upset because you got screwed by Sonos and Bose actually are attempting to do the right thing for their customers.
That kinda sucks, especially since even the older ones work with Home Assistant etc directly now
Not without internet access and Sonos cloud servers, it doesn’t…
I think that the cloud system might be needed to initially pair the speaker to a network+account, but apart from that no. The speakers in my media network are not allowed Internet access.
That’s a pretty cool thing to do
They didn’t open source anything.
Yes, but at least documenting the API and saying “have at it” is better than dropping it









