Pebble Community at Crossroads: Rebble Accuses Core Devices of Exploiting Open-Source Labor

In a candid blog post dated November 17, 2025, the Rebble team detailed a deteriorating partnership with Core Devices, the company helmed by Pebble's original founder Eric Migicovsky. What began as a hopeful collaboration to revive the Pebble smartwatch ecosystem has devolved into accusations of intellectual property theft, broken agreements, and a struggle over control of community-built infrastructure.

A Legacy Built on Community Effort

Nine years after Pebble Technology Corporation shuttered in 2016, leaving hundreds of thousands of smartwatches orphaned, Rebble emerged as the de facto steward. The non-profit and its volunteers salvaged app data, reverse-engineered APIs, invested hundreds of thousands in infrastructure—including Kubernetes clusters for reliability—and fostered a thriving app ecosystem. Highlights include a rebuilt dev portal hosting new apps from two hackathons, Timeline patches for hundreds of apps, and frontline user support.

Core Devices' current Pebble App Store? It's powered entirely by Rebble's backend, as explicitly noted by Rebble. Yet, according to the post, Core demanded unrestricted access to this decade's worth of curated data, refusing written guarantees against building a proprietary "walled garden" that sidelines Rebble.

"We’ll compromise on nearly everything else, but our one red line is this: Whatever we agree on, there has to be a future for Rebble in there." — Rebble blog post

Broken Promises and Technical Forking

Tensions escalated after Google released PebbleOS source code in January 2025. Rebble branched it immediately, funding community ports like an open-source Bluetooth stack for classic devices—work Core later leveraged for its commercial watches without compensation. Core then forked PebbleOS into a private repo, promising periodic merges back to upstream (e.g., June 23, 2025 statement), but none materialized by November.

Other grievances include:

• libpebble Foundations: Core's mobile app builds on libpebblecommon, Rebble-funded via grants, but Core added restrictive licenses and closed-source UI.
• Developer Site Takeover: Core initially promised Rebble ownership, then demanded control and redirection from Rebble's site.

The tipping point: Despite an agreement limiting access, Core scraped Rebble's servers for commercial use while delaying talks—a direct violation per Rebble's logs.

Footnotes in the post reference Core's own announcements, such as their May 20, 2025, fork justification for "moving faster" and stalled PRs like #58, where Core deferred merges awaiting Eric's approval (source).

Implications for Open-Source Hardware Ecosystems

This dispute underscores perennial challenges in open-source hardware revivals. Developers pouring volunteer hours into maintaining legacy platforms risk having their labor co-opted by commercial entities without upstream contributions or fair terms. For Pebble users and devs, the stakes are high: losing Rebble's neutral hub could fragment the ecosystem, echoing Pebble's 2016 demise.

Rebble warns of acquisition risks—imagine OpenAI snapping up Core and enshittifying the platform. Early Core hardware like Pebble 2 Duo already faces quality issues, with 30-day warranties and button failures reported.

Community Decides the Path Forward

Rebble presents two stark options:
1. Protect the Work: Enforce legal protections against unauthorized scraping, prioritizing long-term community control.
2. Hand Over the Keys: Grant Core unrestricted data access, passing the mantle despite risks.

A third path—mutual partnership—remains open if Core commits in writing. Otherwise, Rebble will gauge sentiment via Reddit (/r/pebble), Discord, and direct emails to its board.

As Pebble's revival hangs in the balance, this saga serves as a cautionary tale for tech communities: in the absence of formal governance, goodwill alone can't sustain shared infrastructure against commercial pressures. The community's verdict could redefine how open-source efforts safeguard their legacies in a profit-driven world.