Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) has achieved immense success worldwide in virtually all areas of programming, with only one major exception where it has made no inroads: FPGAs. Every single manufacturer of these programmable devices has refused to release full device documentation which would allow FOSS tools to be written so that the devices could be configured and programmed entirely using FOSS toolchains.

It's a very bad situation, directly analogous to not being able to write a gcc compiler backend for any CPU at all, and instead having to use a proprietary closed source binary compiler blob for each different processor. That would have been a nightmare for CPUs, but fortunately it didn't happen. Alas it has happened for FPGAs, and the nightmare is here.

The various FPGA-based SDR projects make great play about being "open source, open hardware", but you can't create new bitstreams defining new codecs for those FPGAs using open source tools. It's a big hole in FOSS capability, and it's a source of much frustration in education and for FOSS and OSHW users of Electronic Design Automation, including radio amateurs.

If FPGAs are going to figure strongly in amateur radio in the forthcoming years, radio amateurs who are also FOSS advocates would do well to start advocating for a few FPGA families to be opened up so that open source toolchains can be written. With sufficient pressure and well presented cases for openness, the "impossible" can sometimes happen.

This level of evidentiary "certainty" is what's used all the time by the U.S. to justify killing thousands with drones, or millions in war. It's merely easier in this case to recognize the claims as being laughably - or perhaps disturbingly - false.

What's even more frightening than the idea the U.S. would conduct an act of war just to save a large corporation from some bad PR is the realization the people doing this are either too clueless to know how obvious is their charade or they're too deranged or too honey badger to care.

I suppose one could go for the clueless deranged honey badger (with WMD) trifecta.

But as long as lies distract people from talking about CIA torture, Wall St. crimes and economic collapse, and anything else meaningful, and direct Americans' desire for accountability and punishment away from powerful people and onto shadowy phantoms...then the lies have worked.

Of course North Korea didn't attack Sony. Asking "Did North Korea really attack Sony?" is like asking "Does NORAD really track Santa?"

The North Korea story was spin to save Sony from the devastating bad publicity about the depths of their business and technological incompetence. (The politicians who defended them will get repaid for this favor during the next election cycle. My previous comment about this from last week: They may even start using this to try to rescue that disaster of a movie. "You have to see 'The Interview'! To support free speech and America!")

The Dear Leader Of The Free World announcing "don't blame poor Sony, they were helpless victims of the evil North Koreans" totally changed the media story, saving Sony huge $$$ in both public perception and future lawsuits.

But just how America's President and trillion-dollar national security state could get things so wrong - but should always be trusted when saying who's bad and deserves to be killed, like some kind of psycho-Santa delivering death from his sleigh filled with drones - will never be questioned.

Businesses and politicians will never stop lying when it works this well.

Merry Christmas.

The Sony hack is just a simple case of incompetent corporate management and the lengths to which big-money donors and their political friends will go to protect themselves and advance their own ends.

By claiming this is all North Korea (the best Korea!)'s doing, what was initially lose-lose (Sony burns their multi-billion-dollar business to the ground, and the NSA gets exposed for not having any ability to stop it or even give warning) is now suddenly win-win (Sony gets to portray itself as a helpless victim and thus no liability, and NSA gets to argue for even more spying).

Sure makes it easier to avoid bad press and expensive lawsuits when the President himself comes out and tells the world "It wasn't Sony's fault."

(I bet that will be worth a lot come campaign contribution time. Sort of the Hollywood version of how Obama sold all Americans to the health businesses, in exchange for their support and donations to D's.)

And the Rahm Emanuel playbook - "Never let a good crisis go to waste" - is still clearly in use in D.C. Instead of people demanding to know "why didn't the outrageously expensive and unconstitutional NSA surveillance of every American (and the whole world) protect anyone against this?" the political spin can now be "see, this is why we need restrictions on everyone's use of the Internet."

(As an amusing political side note, even though the Republicans are well aware North Korea had nothing to do with this, and are seething at how the Democrats will be able to use Obama's move for huge amounts of Hollywood support in 2016, the R's can't say a damn thing - because if they do they end up looking like they're defending North Korea!)

But it is impressive the level of influence some people have. "Tell Obama we need him to hold a press conference and say our negligence and malfeasance that destroyed our company wasn't our fault."

They may even start using this to try to rescue that disaster of a movie. "You have to see 'The Interview'! To support free speech and America!"

Who knows, maybe someone will even dig up from the Archives that patriotic old WWII song "Good Old Sony."