The rationale is interesting. I'm glad they kept the logo as it's recycling ♻️

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[–] 96 points 1 month ago (9 children)

I welcome the change. PostmarketOS doesn't really roll off the tongue

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  • [–] 24 points 1 month ago* (3 children)

    What even was the idea behind the original name? Was “Postmarket” meant to evoke aftermarket, as in an OS you install to replace the original OS that came with your device?

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  • [–] 45 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    Basically, yes, but also not quite no. Market products offer you an initial baseline experience. Aftermarket products offer you an enhanced "better than the average" experience. Postmarket (or postconsumer) products are a de-growth mechanism by which you extend the life of your initial purchase beyond its planned obsolescence. There used to be a really great paper on creating circular economies that accounted for how in the reduce-reuse-recycle cycle our capitalist society has placed all emphasis on recycle when that's supposed to be the third order option behind reduce (consumption) and reuse (by extending the life of the products you already own) but I can't seem to find it anymore, but that paper was where the PostmarketOS name came from

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  • [–] 40 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (4 children)

    No, but it was a helluva lot more obvious what it was. I guess I understand their reasoning, but it's yet another obscure name among the innumerable ones out there already.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago (3 children)

    Do you really think anyone would see the name "postmarketOS" and right away think this is a Linux distro for phones? Perhaps the "-OS" part gives it away that it's some kind of OS, but so are a lot of projects that end with "-OS".

    For example: ReactOS, RedoxOS, ChibiOS, MicroOS, TempleOS. Can you really look at any of these names without knowing beforehand and tell what it is about?

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    GrapheneOS doesn't instill the same view either. I think post market was better fit than this more obscure name.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

    I had heard the "PostmarketOS" name in the past but it never sparked my interest, the name made me think it was an OS made for some old obscure hardware that I'm likely to not own or that I would not be able to buy anymore. Either that, or a distro meant for old PCs.

    I just found out that it comes shipped in PinePhones and that it's actually a modern OS not necessarily constrained by a specific line of legacy hardware.

    I think it's better a name with no implicit meaning than a name with a misleading meaning. All names are obscure when they just appear, I don't think "PostmarketOS" was such mainstream name.

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