I know that my current government would not do something like this, but imagine if governments were committed to technological innovation through creating open hardware. This is something off the cuff that I’d just like to have in the aether, but imagine the government solicits bids for modular laptop, mobile, and wearable platforms. Companies then submit proposals, and whoever wins the bid must make available x amount of electronics platforms per year, with direct support for the boards guaranteed for 10 years. To win these bids, the company would need to meet criteria that consider ecological impact, production labor conditions, operating cost, production cost, longevity, and interoperability.

Other companies would be free to stick to their in-house designs, teams, and private supply chains, or they could opt to remix the public hardware platform, but the subsequent design must be released back into the public domain. There is likely some optimal timeframe for the design to be exclusive to the company producing it (likely in the 1-5 year range).

This post is somewhat inspired by the Framework and all the cool projects I see their motherboards popping up in. The other factor influencing my thoughts here is the fact that computing technology is stable. Desktops have been in a good spot, laptop chips have reached a solid performance/power spot, and battery technology has immensely improved. There will be gains, but it feels like we have long passed the point of immense gains, and our efforts and public funds should go towards long-term/frugal computing. Most people I know who aren’t computer professionals or hobbyists don’t need a cutting-edge machine; they need a stable one.

I would like to spend some more time thinking through this. For now, I offer this little sketch of a possible future.