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Date: Fri,  6 May 2011 11:29:33 -0500
From: Jack Norton <jack@0x6a.com>
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To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs <9fans@9fans.net>
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Subject: Re: [9fans] freedom (was Re:  Compiling 9atom kernel)
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errno wrote:
> So, what to do?
>
> The Web:
>
> Reject it? (aka "go buy a tablet" )
>
> Reproduce it? (aka "have you looked at webfs?" )
>
> Reuse it? (aka "port webkit")
>
>
> There's no possible way that I'm the only one who has envisioned
> some rendition of the following science-fiction:
>
> * a Plan 9-based platform targeted at the general consumer market
>
> ...   * Stuff * ....
> I don't want google and facebook and flicker et. al. owning my data; I
> don't want to make intel and dell rich with their overpowered machines
> and processors so I can run ever-bloating os and software; I don't want to
> maintain a collection of various ad-hoc essentially autistic (please excuse
> the term) computers in my household. I want to be able to access my
> private, personal computing environment from anywhere with an internet
> connection via my portable thin client. I want to be able to easily share
> my data and resources within a trusted circle. I want all communications
> to innately and transparently run over an ssl encrypted channel at all
> times.
>
> A radically distributed internet where power and control is put back into
> the hands of individuals. I'm tired of centralized gilded cages and
> hierarchical client server models formed and shaped mostly for the benefit
> of a few monolithic companies and an ever-encroaching federal government,
> and the ever-insidious "Intellectual Property" gestapo.
>
> From where I stand, this is where Plan 9 belongs. This is what it ought to be
> doing, and where it ought to be going.
>
> I hope I have not offended anyone, please do not be too harsh on me if
> you disagree.
>
>
>
>

You've got some misplaced idealism.  Plan 9 isn't needed for any of
this.  In fact you could probably leverage some existing
frameworks/api's and whatnot on a linux machine to do this in a matter
of days for cheaper (hours even?).  All you'd need is a dash of
pragmatism.

Remember your comment on how Acme/rio et al don't really interest you
but 9p/per-process ns et al did?  You can kinda do that in linux.  If
you want to create a product on that scale yourself, linux, for all its
faults, will get you a time-to-market that isn't a pipe dream.  You just
have to leverage many unsightly 'technologies'.

Plan 9 to me is a playground to have something clean and unencumbered by
the world. There is a certain zen to saying "well I don't really think
that is necessary" and to forgo a "hop on the bandwagon" or "me too!"
existence.

In the end though, the list will eventually say it: start hammering out
some code and we'll see what you come up with.  Proof in the pudding.

Good luck,
Jack