In an interesting mobile development, Linux.com reports that four new phones are shipping with cyanogen as their base.
After many delays, all four major mobile Linux alternatives to Android have finally arrived on smartphones. Mozilla's Firefox OS was first out of the gate two years ago, followed by Jolla's Sailfish OS, and this year they were joined by the first Ubuntu and Tizen phones. Yet, a fifth open source mobile Linux platform may have already eclipsed them all. The CyanogenMod flavor of Android is rapidly expanding from its role as the most popular alternative mobile phone mod for flashing onto Android phones to being a much sought after pre-installed OS.
This week, a UK-based company called Wileyfox joined a growing number of third-party vendors to tap the commercial Cyanogen OS 12.1 version of the fully open source CyanogenMod with its new Swift and Storm phones. Meanwhile, a Lenovo-backed Chinese startup called ZUK announced plans to ship an international version of its ZUK Z1 phone equipped with the same 12.1 Cyanogen build starting in September. CyanogenMod 12.1 is based on the latest Android 5.1.1 Lollipop platform.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 31 2015, @08:37PM
But even if they are, so what? Isn't that the beauty of open source: if some corporation (eg. Sun) tries to acquire some great open source software (eg. OpenOffice) the open source fans of that project can just fork it (eg. LibreOffice)?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 31 2015, @09:28PM
> But even if they are, so what?
Cyanogen's association with MS means they don't get the same benefit of the doubt that they got when they were independent. After Win10 revealed that MS's new business model is just Google but moar, we need to be cognizant of their motivations when judging their actions. Watch carefully for signs of Cyanogenmod turning into yet another merchant of other people's privacy.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 01 2015, @01:02AM
Have you already forgotten when M$ funded SCO's attack on Linux?
The M$-SuSE alliance?
...or are you so young that you aren't even aware of those episodes?
When Redmond hands out cash, watch for an additional set of guys spreading FUD and otherwise trying to undermine the freedom aspect of FOSS.
...and when MICROS~1's proprietary apps|protocols are welded into the firmware that ships with Cyanogen's open stuff, are you still going to call that "open"?
-- gewg_