A lot of Sailfish community members wanted the indian Intex smartphone. Jolla had provided a limited way to anybody with a EU address, outside India, to get one at a very low price.
Read more the FAQ about Jolla C program : https://sailfishos.org/community_program_FAQ/
Originally Posted by
1. What is the Sailfish Community Device Program? Why does it exist?
... The Program participants will get a limited edition Jolla C community device and can participate in online support sessions hosted by the Jolla R&D, product and design chiefs. First Program participants will be also invited to the International Sailfish Community Event on 17th June in Helsinki, Finland.
2. Who is eligible to participate in it? Why?
The Program is open for both developers and enthusiastic community members worldwide who support Sailfish OS by developing or advocating the platform. No code or other contributions are required.
...
6. If the device does not work properly or it breaks clearly because of production issues, can I return it? In case of a faulty product, you can return the product for a refund in accordance with and pursuant to Return Policy within 14 days from receiving the product...
The thing is that you are not actually ordering a device, you are paying a fee for a programme. In the EU, the law state that products sold must have a two year warranty. This won't apply to Jolla as they are not selling you a product (although it may be possible to argue this due to the wording of their terms and conditions). I don't think I'm being picky, I'm merely stating the facts. That you've stated "you're ordering a deice" [sic], goes to show that it's entirely possible that some consumers may be mislead.
Let me tell you the story as I remember it. The SailfishOS phone by Intex was announced one year ago with the announcement that once it reaches India, it will be available globally. Mind that it would be the first Intex device to go global, so all the warranty/service support by Intex would have to be created (and then train all their foreign partners with a completely different OS).
Shortly before that, Jolla quit the hardware business, so the availability of the device was an outcome of the agreement with Intex.
Later in 2015, Jolla almost went bankrupt, survived it, but since the original Intex phone was scheduled for the end of the year, many people expected the deal to be off, as Jolla was definitely not a stable partner at that time.
A pleasant surprise came this February before MWC in Barcelona, where at a Mer Meeting it was announced that the deal is still on, but it will be unfortunately limited to India only.
This was received with a disappointment in the community and many people called for Jolla to at least make a developer programme and ship few Intex devices to Europe. This seemed quite impossible - as mentioned above, there's no Intex warranty network outside of India, so servicing the devices would be unimaginably costly. Also the Intex phone is supposed to have advertising in the system, which would not be very welcome by Jolla's community.
Now Jolla stepped up and heard those voices, but as Intex certainly plans to go global at some point (they had the plan one year ago and now appeared at MWC), it would hurt their brand if there were Intex phones sent outside of their market without any support. People could connect the "lack of support" and "Intex" and refuse to buy their phones once they officially expand their operation. That's certainly why Jolla went all the way to put their branding on it and offered it to the developer community. Without any profit, to keep the support for them alive. Remember that soon all original Jollas will be out of warranty and developers will not have anything to develop on (there are not many stable ports). Even if Fairphone and Turing phones get their official SailfishOS versions, they will still be in a drastically different price range.
Please consider the context before using the "scam" word. IMHO this operation is as far from scam as possible. Even if they made the profit, which they won't (let alone with only 1000 devices) they transparently published all terms, so there is no misinformation.
The length of your reply suggests that I may have offended you by my post. I'm sorry, I did not intend to cause any upset.
I did not use the "scam" word in the way you have suggested and I never suggested that they were out to make a "huge profit". To be honest I don't really know what to make of it. I wish Jolla and their supporters well but I just wish they would cut the crap. If the programme is available to everyone then don't say that it's for developers or contributors. What's with the confusing wording of the terms and conditions that refers to programme registration as a "product"? If this is actually an Intex device then why not give people the opportunity to purchase it as a proper product with a warranty? It doesn't look like they've learnt very much from the tablet fiasco. I hope that all programme members will go home happy but due to their execution of this programme, I feel like there's another round of ranting and raving coming from unhappy customers and Jolla have no one else to blame but themselves.
The length of your reply suggests that I may have offended you by my post. I'm sorry, I did not intend to cause any upset.
Not at all I hope my long answer did not upset anyone either. The reason for the length is as follows:
My academic background (or present, in fact) pushes me to have my claims as cited as possible and you cannot do that in few sentences.
I call this thread a "memory self-erasing thread" - when you post some fact, people forget it couple posts later and continue with their never ending circle. This thread should have been in off-topic long time ago and I do not want to feed it with multiple posts (as I'm doing now), so it is better to cover as much as possible in a single one.
If this is actually an Intex device then why not give people the opportunity to purchase it as a proper product with a warranty?
I thought I answered this in my reply quite well. Warranty is not something that falls out of the sky - Jolla is not a HW company anymore, so they cannot provide it. Intex does not have the infrastructure yet so they decided not to.
It doesn't look like they've learnt very much from the tablet fiasco. I hope that all programme members will go home happy but due to their execution of this programme, I feel like there's another round of ranting and raving coming from unhappy customers and Jolla have no one else to blame but themselves.
I agree that this programme is not necessarily good for Jolla, but all what they are doing is listening to what we were asking them to do - to somehow get few devices to the developer/enthusiast community. It is not a charity - keeping the development alive is, of course, in their best interest as well, as the app ecosystem is crucial for the OS.
However, when you are criticizing that it is a developer programme, but it is open to everyone, how would you choose just the "real" developers?
I was quite upset myself that I did not get chosen for the mysterious tablet development programme and that one of the explanations were that I had apps mostly on OpenRepos and not in the Store. I am really glad they learned from that and are offering the device even to potential developers - the sole act of getting a limited edition device might motivate someone to start coding. Even if there was only one such person, it is worth it.
This thread should have been in off-topic long time ago and I don't want to feed it...
Exactly my thoughts.
Good job, Dave! You a happy derailing troll camper now?
Behave for f*ck's sake!
Or go create your own rant-blog for whoever cares.
My academic background (or present in fact) pushes me to have my claims as cited as possible and you cannot do that in few sentences.
Tell me about it! I myself am trying to write a thesis which has to be finished in a couple weeks. Personally, I try to avoid writing forum posts like a paper but I respect your approach.
I thought I answered this in my reply quite well. Warranty isn't something that falls out of the sky - Jolla is not a HW company anymore, so they can't provide it. Intex doesn't have the infrastructure yet so they decided not to.
Rereading it now, you did indeed answer it quite well. It wasn't entirely clear to me first, I confess to knowing very little about Intex other than seeing it mentioned a few times here on TMO. I wrongly assumed that Jolla might be able to provide a warranty through Intex. It's a shame that this isn't the case.
However, when you are criticizing that it is a developer programme, but it is open to everyone, how would you choose just the "real" developers?
It's good question. Other companies have offered devices to developers before, arguably they didn't choose them very well. I am a little surprised that they are including Alien Dalvik with this device as without it they probably would have attracted less fanboys, thus it might have ended up in the hands of more developers. Not to mention that it's likely that they had to pay a licence fee to Myriad which probably increased the programme fee.
It's good question. Other companies have offered devices to developers before, arguably they didn't choose them very well. I am a little surprised that they are including Alien Dalvik with this device as without it they probably would have attracted less fanboys, thus it might have ended up in the hands of more developers. Not to mention that it's likely that they had to pay a licence fee to Myriad which probably increased the programme fee.
I agree, the Android emulation layer is indeed unnecessary on the device if it truly was for development purposes. As it is a fanclub-slash-development device, it probably merits to be there.
I think the licensing cost of Dalvik cannot be very high really, so probably they just would have saved 1-2 kEur by leaving it off, a cheap insurance for not risking that some people receiving it would make an awful noise when realizing that it is missing
Dude. Travel around countries and even areas of big countries will give you the same thing. News media in all countries ignore someone to paint a picture. Travel the world and you might find the differences intresting. Let's say. You will only talk to males one day, the next the only the only females. the conversion will differ from a mix and you will see patterns.
Let's say that you have want to read US posts for a week. Tell you a lot of that area.
Or you think it worse to single out and ignore a country than a single user?
Now what is this called?
I don't judge. Just asking.
Just sayin' this is completely stupid to resume an ingore list to a specific country, but if this is you way of life dude, just do it.
You'll just take the risk to miss someone interesting, with a different point of view.
FYI, I also traveled a lot, and your "ignore list country" doesn' fit with someone used to a multicultural environnment, more with someone afraid of "the other" and that never leaved his beautiful country because evertyhing else isn't as good as what's done in his beloved country....
No offense
regards ...
I hope my long answer did not upset anyone either. The reason for the length is as follows: