[coreboot] Fund a TALOS Secure Workstation as coreboot build system

[Sam Kuper]

On 03/12/2016, Paul Menzel via coreboot <coreboot at coreboot.org> wrote:
> I pledge 1,000 $.

Awesome!

> Everyone, the TALOS campaign only reached 10 % of the funding goal, and
> there are only twelve days left. [...]
> Currently, it looks like free software people don’t care about getting
> control over their hardware back.

People care, and ~$380k over 280+ pledges confirms this. But the TALOS
project is asking for about an order of magnitude more funding, and
2-100x more money per working end product, than pretty much any other
CrowdSupply hardware platform crowdfunding effort likely to be of
interest to free software people (Novena, Librem 13, Librem 15,
EOMA68, USB Armory, etc).

I realise that the TALOS is unique in its combination of technologies,
and that these technologies were chosen for very good reasons. But I
also realise that not many people can afford to buy a $7100 computer,
especially if one of the existing Libreboot or coreboot-supported
devices would meet most of their needs.

As for the non-hardware options TALOS offers, I suspect people have
some difficulty justifying making charitable donations towards a
for-profit enterprise, or paying for SaaSS under a time limit and with
only fairly limited use-cases.

I'm sure the TALOS developers have done their best to make the
fundraiser successful, but I wish it had been possible for them to
offer some hardware at a price that would let non-wealthy people buy
it; and I likewise wish it had been viable for them to set a lower
overall funding target.

I can't be the only one who saw them launch and thought, "This is
amazing, and I really hope they succeed... but I fear they are asking
more of the community than it can afford to pledge."

Maybe a miracle will happen.