Raspberry Pi - Hardware Flaws and Fixups?

So I guess it is official that Pete has been abducted by some obscure organization to steal all the secrets of the Raspberry Pi ....

So I guess it is official that Pete has been abducted by some obscure organization to steal all the secrets of the Raspberry Pi ....

I expect he's just busy.  Norcott Technologies does a lot more than just Raspberry Pi after all.

It sure was refreshing to have him here briefly for rational technical discussions though, free of Liz's personal dictatorship and vindictive bans.  I hope he returns when he has time.

Morgaine.

Jorge,

   Pete didn't change companies, it appears he has a new title with the same

company, as of May 2012, which is just after he was last seen here.

Well Pete is one of the founders at Norcott, so I guess he can pick any title that works better for him and his company.

I thought that his participation on the RPF was as a volunteer.

I hear you Morgaine, I read somewhere folks now calling the RPF "The Upton's Show", funny, I believe there is an actual show with that name.

-J

'I thought that his participation on the RPF was as a volunteer."

well, the RPF is a bit unusual as an organization, since as they

often repeat, nobody has quit their day jobs.  And it seems that

this state of affairs is intended to go on indefinitely, which is more

than might be expected based solely on altruism.  So one might

conclude that Pete's "volunteer" work for the foundation was actually

sponsored by Norcott, with Norcott expecting to recoup their

investment during the manufacturing phase.  And one might

conclude that the "volunteer" work of the numerous Broadcom

employees, including Eben, JamesH, Gert, and Dom,

is sponsored by Broadcom, with the expectation that this

investment will be recouped from sales of the SoC and

perhaps future SoC's as well.

I would guess that Eben's MBA, which concluded in May 2011

coinciding with the Broadcom-developed alpha board, was

probably also sponsored by Broadcom.

http://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/interactive/emba/2012/podcast_upton_raspberry.html

So I would conclude that Pete's continued participation is in

jeopardy, given that Norcott is not doing the manufacturing.

"the RPF is a bit unusual as an organization", I'd concur with that, and it seems that includes its dose of internal struggles

for power and who is the face and controls the message. I remember seeing David Braben very often talking and promoting

the idea and early designs of the R-Pi, but after the "food comentator" got in, his participation seems to have diminished.

I still believe that the goal of contributing to the education of young kids and entice them into computer science and

programming is a noble one, but centering it on the R-Pi imho is taking the wrong road, and besides whatever funds they

can make from the hardware, without serious funding and dedicated people executing on those goals and visions would be

most probably practically impossible. But I better don't get into this subject, I really don't like the default attitude that if

there is something wrong with the foundation, the board or whatever, and you talk about it, what is wrong is YOU, unless

you can prove the contrary under cross examination.

I also find very hard to understand why so much secrecy and reticence around hardware development. If one makes a

comment sometimes the answer is "well you were not here when we were talking about it....", as far as I remember I

never seen any schematics for the previous designs, and I really thought that the R-pi was going to be like the little board

David use to show everywhere.

Oh, well, will see what happens.

-J

It may be "the Broadcom effect", as the company seems to treat openess like leprosy.  Who knows.

But whatever the cause or reason, nothing the Foundation does is open to discussion, nor even open to simple comment as the bans illustrate so well.  Not even the moderation of the alleged "community forum" by non-Foundation admins is open to discussion, as they themselves have openly stated.  It's a dictatorship.

That is altogether the wrong atmosphere for what is alleged to be a project with educational motivations and founded on community support.

"non-Foundation admins"

As far as I know, all the admins are "non-Foundation admins". Liz describes herself as an RPF volunteer, which is how the other admins describe themselves.  As far as I know, she has no formal connection to the foundation except by marriage.  She was however a director/corp. secretary, and editor of Eben's prior company, Podfun, Ltd.

"who is the face and controls the message"

RPF trustee Alan Mycroft gave a recent presentation

that concluded with the interesting statement:

"What we are lacking (and the Raspberry Pi Foundation cannot provide) is getting a coherent set of materials we can use with it to teach Computational Thinking and principled ideas from Computer Science."

http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~am21/slides/CAS12.pdf

Wasn't the main plan that the educational release would include

a recommended distro with a coherent set of CS teaching materials?