The Gifts that Keep on Giving (and Sharing, and Reusing - and Campaigning)
Posted by Danny O'BrienMake magazine's Open
Source Gift Guide is an eye-opening collection of the products and services
that aid your freedom to tinker, share, improve and learn seriously. Some of
the goods offered are more aspirational than practical holiday gifts: you'll be hard
put to track down the OpenMako unrestricted
GSM phone, or Chumby, Bunnie
Huang and co's prototype hackable alarm clock, in time for Christmas. But popular open
products from Neuros, Magnatune's DRM-free FLAC audio, the open
source MediaPortal Windows media
center, and Rockbox, the free
firmware replacement for most MP3 players, show just how vibrant a market can
be when it casts off DRM shackles and sets about re-asserting user control.
And then there's Make's highly sensible suggestion of a $100 donation to the EFF - the perfect gift for
those few friends of yours who aren't already members.
