I disagree a little bit -- why not for the general public? reference implementation phones aren't necessarily just-for-developers -- i.e. nexus line...
There is nothing stopping the general public from buying it. It is a great device.
But if you as a company plan to offer something for the general public this means some implications such as:
* providing a end user/customer general support system that is really different than supporting developers.
* polishing versions to the point of not being dangerous or buggy. This device supports nightly updates and anyone doing nightly updates of a mobile OS knows this is a move that comes with a lot of emotion and surprise ;-)
* creating a logistic solution to keep your supply line going and establishing channels for sales point and management
The list goes on and on. Of course Mozilla has some of this in place for its current run of end user targeted devices but it is all done in partnership with hardware makes such as LG, Alcatel and ZTE who already have end user support and logistics sorted out. This device is being built by an ODM.... its a different ball game.
The difference between selling to developers and selling to end users is not about the hardware itself. Its about scale, expectations and guarantees. They are really different and require a huge amount of money which Mozilla could use elsewhere.
Its like Raspberry Pis. They are really popular and now we see lots of non-developers buying and playing with it and being happy but there is a difference in the services and guarantees you have when you go with a Raspberry Pi or when you go with a DELL/Lenovo/HP.
extra costs incurred to the consumer for features that they're unwilling to pay for normally. (software ram limiting, dual sim, OS revisioning/partitioning, etc)
