Petition to Qualcomm to allow Google to release factory images hits Change.org
Yesterday, we were saddened to hear that longtime Android Open Source Project maintainer and beloved community participant Jean-Baptiste Quéru would be leaving his post at the Android team to take on other endeavors within Google.
The apparent reasoning is because of Google’s unwillingness to release factory images for the latest Nexus 7 due to a request from Qualcomm. The chipset vendor has proprietary binary code that they don’t want the public getting their grubby little hands on, and that has delayed the release of the factory images for who knows how long.
So what better way to show Qualcomm we’re standing behind JBQ’s beliefs and fighting for those factory images to be released than to sign an online petition? One has gone up on Change.org, and it needs help. It only sits at about 312 signatures as of the time of this writing, but we imagine this will balloon quite significantly in the days and weeks to come.
Here is the letter directed at the CEO of Qualcomm:
Please allow Google to release the factory images of Android devices using Qualcomm CPU’s and GPU’s to the Android Open Source Project. It is a large inconvenience to developers and programmers worldwide trying to improve the experience of Android, while the factory images are locked down, due to legal issues with a few proprietary GPU binaries.
Stamp your name to that if you’re down for the cause, and be sure to share it with all your friends to see if we can’t get Qualcomm to ease up on the legalities a bit. Developers need this stuff, and considering they’re the ones who make this platform tick it just isn’t right to take this stuff away from them. We’re not sure if any change of course would be enough to bring JBQ back, but there’s no reason we can’t still fight for his work. Go ahead and find the petition at Change.org.