[coreboot] Permanent solution of the UEFI Secure Boot problem?!

[Svetoslav Trochev]

Hi Everyone and Happy New Year.

This summer I'm planning to buy new laptop.
Also ongoing debates related to UEFI transition and current implementation
of  'Secure Boot' requirement imposed by Microsoft's Windows 8
certification got me thinking and I would like to share my idea and see how
many people have similar thoughts. Basically boils down to create Coreboot
Reference Hardware for development, testing and daily use of coreboot. Here
is my plan (warning it is not very well thought through):

1. See how many people are ready to buy new hardware and are interested to
work on coreboot advancement.
2. If we have something like 10 people we can work together to define the
spec sheet of 'perfect' laptop.
3. Once we have the spec sheet it should be very easy to find OEM and place
one single order. In my experience 10 people buying same laptop will have
zero impact, but 1 person buying 10 laptops gets notice right away,
especially if the order is placed with small OEM. I suspect it will take
some time and we might go over several upgrade cycles before we get where I
would like, but if we make steady progress and get more people on-board we
can get to the point where we can order custom systems that are build to
our spec and get cooperation from interested commercial entities.
4. Once we have our identical hardware in hands of different developer we
can employ divide and concur strategy in order to overcome any problems we
will encounter making coreboot better then original UEFI/BIOS.
5. I was thinking to do this with laptop, but I do realize that could be
more easy done using desktop motherboard. So, if we agree on the plan of
action we can buy mainboards instead of laptops.
6. I also recognize that big group of coreboot developers are located in
EU, so we might have to place two separate orders: one in USA and other in
EU because we don't want to deal with import/export problems. We are going
to have enough problems porting coreboot to new laptop.

What do you guys think? Am I completely crazy to believe that we can make
material change in our industry?
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