Wow you're right: https://www.reddit.com/r/Onyx_Boox/comments/hsn7kx/onyx_usin...

I work in the display industry. I haven't seen them behave in a nasty way. If you look at that comment you linked to, I questioned it and didn't get a reply. So I'm suspicious. I even saw a news article use that very same comment as a citation which is ridiculous. Then now you cite the same unsubstantiated comment as well which is worrying. I do see a lot of disgruntled hobbyists here on HN who seem to hate E-Ink, Liquavista and other new display tech manufacturers. I gather there's a feeling among these hobbyists that somehow manufacturers should be lining up to give them samples and assist them in their startup ideas. That's an unreasonable expectation.

The linux part of the Onyx OS is unmodified. They don't comply with the GPL requirement to redistribute the linux binaries...because you can download them everywhere. Yes, this is a violation of the Linux license. Good luck with getting a court to impose any sanctions for it.

And the Apache license doesn't require them to share proprietary code, so they don't share their customizations to Android.

It's too bad people go after them for minor license violations without actually understanding how the licenses work.

Being reasonable only works with reasonable people. By and large, the people who rail against things they don't understand are not reasonable people.

But nowhere in more official documentation?

> People ignored it

Ignored it, or just dismissed it because they have reason to think it is not possible to run the kernel and/or other parts on that hardware without modifications that would be covered by the GPL?

> one of the forum posters tried to dox the community manager

That is definitely not acceptable behaviour, granted. Though it isn't a reason they stated for closing the forum.

- Any EMR stylus will work on their Note devices.

- They run full Android, so I don't need an over-engineered Dropbox/GDrive integration to get my files. Syncthing Fork on F-Droid does wireless sync from my laptop without a cloud-based middleman.

- I can attach a BT keyboard and do my journaling on an eyestrain-free screen. Amazon would tell me to buy a Kindle Fire if I described that use case to them.

I bought the Note Air over the Kobo Elipsa, even though it was more expensive, and didn't have domestic warranty support like the Kobo would. Why? Because Kobo only has Dropbox and Pocket integration, and supports only their own bookstore for DRM'd titles. If you have purchases saved to your Kindle account, you are SOL.

As a consumer who would if possible prefer not to support companies who take what they want, however they want, for their commercial gain and to hell with the wishes (and legal stance) of the creators that says they shouldn't, I gather my priorities differ from yours.

Of course if those features truly are must haves for your work/life (and they aren't all available in one product elsewhere which I don't think they are), or you simply didn't know about these matters before purchasing, then the equation is quite different. If you have no practical other choice then you have no practical choice.

I don't need the featureset enough to ignore my objection to their behaviour with respect to the kernel's licence (and possibly the licences of other components their devices use). Until a competitor offers the same/better or they change their tune, I can live without.

There's a certain amount of cognitive dissonance (or callousness) required to operate modern technology while also maintaining one's personal ethical standards. After all, I purchase phones and computers that are assembled in sweatshops, using components whose raw materials are mined by children in countries with no safety regulations. I clearly haven't drawn the line there either.

Compared to that, choosing a product from an OEM that's not GNU compliant is an infinitesimally smaller ethical quandary.

Or non-existent of course, as the previous poster suggests and I stated I find quite believable.

> The other alternatives are either the same

Which other alternatives are modifying GPL covered code but refusing to uphold their requirements under the license? Or the same for another license?

> or fully closed.

Fully closed but correctly licensed (their own work and/or correctly licensed software from other sources) is preferable to taking OSS and breaching the licenses. It is at least more honest.

I don't think a computing prison is preferable to an OSS breach. A device with an open bootloader that will take whatever code you give it is always infinitely preferable to restrictive computing.

Certainly I expect code to optimise things for the specifics of the hardware. That would be useful to have if they stop supporting it and something needs fixing after that point in time (for security reasons for instance) perhaps the hardware can still be more than a fancy brick. That is in part where the GPL came from in the first place - RMS being irritated by a locked-down printer he wanted to add some utility to.