Have you ever felt unhappy about using a proprietary OS like iOS on your phone rather than an open source software? Ever felt helpless on becoming a product of Google even though you know that it tracks your information to sell advertising? Do you want your data to be YOUR DATA? Well, someone is definitely obvious about conquering their privacy.
Gael Duval, the person who created the once hugely popular Mandrake Linux (also known as Mandriva Linux) due to the obvious reason that he liked open source software and didn’t like Windows has now developed eelo, an open-source version of the mobile OS Android that is not related to Google.
Duval announced about ‘eelo’ in a post saying: “I’m not happy with this situation because iOS is proprietary and I prefer Open Source Software. I’m not happy because Apple is getting crazy with their latest products. They are more and more expensive, and not really exciting.” He also mentioned that he isn’t happy with Google as the company tracks the information of users and sells it for advertising.
“Last, I think that, in the long run, Apple, Google, Facebook etc. business models are harmful for our economical and social environments,” he added.
To re-conquer his privacy, Duval is creating an open source mobile operating system named as eelo, based on LineageOS which is an open source Android distribution. Apart from serving as a mobile OS, eelo will provide associated web-services, including email, cloud storage, online office tools and etc with better personal privacy and data.
The prototypes of the new mobile OS that features the newly developed BlissLauncher 2 are being tested on LeEco Le2 smartphone, Xiaomi Mi 5S and LG G6. Google web search alternatives such as DuckDuckGo and Qwant; F-Droid and APKPure for Android applications alternatives are being considered.
Currently, the project is under development and it is also running a Kickstarter campaign for those who are interested in developing the project. The final eelo will be a usable product with:
- a mobile OS with new default applications and new UI
- basic web services such as search, cloud storage, settings recovery
- updates for 3 years or more
- Focus on privacy
“The eelo project will release attractive “privacy-enabled” smartphone ROMs and smartphones for the average user, with associated web-services,” the Kickstarter page of eelo reads.
