OpenMoko

So I've been drooling over the iPhone since it came out but I have some serious reservations about getting it. Yeah its awesome and slick and it will make women want me and men want to be me, but it costs a freakin fortune! Even after they knocked $200 off of the price it still costs $400 for the "cheap" version. Then they lock you into a service plan with AT&T. I'm not totally against AT&T but I don't like the idea of being locked into it for 2 years are whatever. Also it has wifi and internet access but no IM client. WTF is up with that? Also you can't just install software on it because its all locked down by Apple. I know that hackers have unlocked the iPhone and I'm sure that I could follow the instructions and do it myself, but why bother when there is going to be such a better alternative with OpenMoko!

From what I've gathered so far OpenMoko is a linux distribution meant to run on phones. The project has one phone so far that is built just to run it, but it has been installed on other smart phones with some success. I've always felt that cell phones were kind of a dubious racket, with all their locking you in to service plans and charging out the ass for anything extra. Having a totally unlocked phone running free and open source software seems really cool to me. Almost rebellious, as much as having a cell phone can be rebllious, which is not much.

The one phone that is built to run OpenMoko, the Neo1973, seems pretty sweet. It has a iPhone-esque look and a touch screen. They are only offering development versions right now which require you to flash a copy of the OS and filesystem to it but they say a real version will be coming between October and December. I'll be keeping an eye on this and I'll probably get one soon!