[NovaPenguin]

This is why I argue that one of the best things that the Free/Libre software developer community can start doing is optimizing for lower spec machines. Microsoft and Apple are either too closely nit or drectly provide hardware to be prolonging the liftime of hardware they sell. In optimizing open OS's it can prolong the life time of hardware by a significant margin and it means that lower in come folks are not left in the dark. I don't just mean in well off countries, but if you are in the lower classes of the global south - there is no other option.

These was (is? - Not sure) a version of Firefox for PowerPC MaxOSX - TenFour Browser - that brought forward modern features/support of Firefox to Macs that were long past their prime. They mentioned that their favorite story in time of development was "One of my favourite reports was from a missionary in Myanmar using a beat-up G4 mini over a dialup modem; I hope he is safe during the present unrest. "

http://tenfourfox.blogspot.com/2020/04/the-end-of-tenfourfox...

This is what can happen when things are optimized for the people, not the business. This is part of why I still use a Core 2 Duo as my daily runner, if it ain't broke don't fix it.

[RulerOf]

>This is why I argue that one of the best things that the Free/Libre software developer community can start doing is optimizing for lower spec machines.

But isn't the primary application for these machines going to be the web browser, which is pulling in so much JS insanity that the web sites won't render well anyway?

[NovaPenguin]

Yeah, that is unfortunately a big part of it. Via NoScript I generally run the web very lean but there is only so much one can do.