[LAU] OT: linux phone?

[Ken Restivo]

I may need to buy a cellphone soon.

But I'm a militant Free Software zealot so I refuse to spend any money on anything that isn't open and free, which is one reason why I've resisted cellphones for such a long time.

But it seems like there are a few options now for Linux-based phones, so I'm looking around.

Alas, OpenMoko looks the most promising, but they're out of stock, and, AFAICT the "phones" still can't make or receive calls yet. Oh well.

The Google initiative seems stalled to me; and also I'm not so sure about the licensing.

This PurpleMagic looks interesting though:
http://www.purplelabs.com/product-purple-magic.php?PHPSESSID=9ead9cbe0bf6cd6ff34b0a42c3151e71

But I haven't found a lot of technical info on it yet.

Anyone messed around with these? Any pitfalls to look out for?

The OpenMoko has USB so I was looking forward to maybe using it as a softsynth and playing shows with it. The Purple Magic doesn't have any such thing though.

-ken