Simputer - Fsf-friends

4 Apr 2004


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Fred,
I think BBC missed the point here. The Simputer happens to be the first hardware experiment on GPL using the FSF mode of development.
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Except that  the license for  the Simputer is non-free[3].  You cannot
make commercial use of the hardware :
"Any commercial  exploitation of the  Specifications (whether Simputer
or Simputerized) involves a nominal one time payment to the Trust. The
payment  will be  $25,000 for  developing countries  and  $250,000 for
developed countries."
They charged a good amount for development tools, even for educational institutions. We (at IIITA) had requested some tools when picopeta themselves tried to market the product (sans the amida thingy). They were interested only in selling the product and devel. tools to us. One of the professors told me that they were concerned more about "protecting their Eye-Pee" than letting students work on the system (effectively porting softwares to their system for free). In the end, we didnt buy anything from them. I hope things have changed for the better.
bala