April 10, 2026
Open silicon, open season
What is RISC-V and why it matters to Canonical
Canonical bets on open chips as commenters say ‘see you in 20 years’
TLDR: Canonical says open‑standard RISC‑V chips are maturing fast, with Linux‑ready developer boards expected in 2026 and Google’s OpenTitan already shipping. Commenters split between excitement and eye‑rolls: some predict long waits and big‑player dominance, others cheer open hardware—while skeptics drag Canonical’s past habit of starting projects then walking away.
Canonical is banging the drum for RISC‑V, the open chip blueprint anyone can build from, promising Linux‑ready boards in 2026 and name‑dropping Google’s OpenTitan. But the comments stole the show. One joker deadpanned, “see you in 20 years,” turning hype into a meme about delayed dreams.
Curious onlookers asked if this is just PowerPC déjà vu. Fans replied that RISC‑V is an open standard (no costly licenses), designed to be modular and hackable for things like AI add‑ons—closer to “USB for CPUs” than a single brand. Canonical says profiles like “RVA23” should keep the chaos manageable and that Ubuntu support is coming.
Then the drama hit. A commenter found a borked Canonical link that blurted “You have successfully unsubscribed!”—cue roast session about polish. Others argued the shiny “new business models” mostly favor giants: hardware loves scale, so expect hyperscalers to roll their own while startups scramble. The spiciest thread dragged Canonical’s past: Unity, Mir, Upstart, Snap—“they shake up the ecosystem, then lose interest,” sighed a skeptic.
So yes, RISC‑V could open the chip world and cut gatekeeper fees. But the crowd’s split: starry‑eyed about open hardware, salty about timelines, and wary of Canonical playing kingmaker.
Key Points
- •RISC‑V is an open standard ISA created in 2010 and stewarded by RISC‑V International since 2015.
- •RISC‑V has shipped widely in embedded applications and is expected to see 2026 Linux‑capable developer boards supporting the RVA23 profile.
- •The permissive licensing enables diverse business models, from open source to proprietary IP and in‑house designs.
- •Industry adoption includes Qualcomm and NVIDIA using RISC‑V cores, and Google’s OpenTitan as a root‑of‑trust, with production silicon in Chromebooks and data centers.
- •RISC‑V’s extensibility allows custom instructions and standardized extension sets (e.g., ‘F’) and profiles (e.g., RVA23) to balance innovation with software ecosystem needs.