On 10/06/2011 11:07 AM, Ben Eisenbraun wrote:
On Thu, Oct 06, 2011 at 10:19:49AM -0400, Matthew Gillen wrote:
On 10/06/2011 09:23 AM, Dan O'Donovan wrote:
My next cell phone will be an openmoko
I remember saying that five years ago - kinda glad I got an iPhone now...
I will never buy one of those. The way they treat jailbreakers (sue
them for copyright infringement, brick their phones)
I call bullshit. A cursory Google doesn't return any hits for Apple suing
people who jailbreak their phones, and I doubt you'll find _any_ reliable
reference saying that they are deliberately bricking jailbroken phones with
their updates.
So, references please.
Bricking iPhones:
http://www.applegazette.com/iphone/apple-says-it-may-brick-unlocked-iphones-with-next-software-update/
http://gizmodo.com/303171/apple-says-unlocked-iphones-will-brick-after-software-update-+-what-does-it-mean
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9039479/Update_Apple_plays_hardball_Upgrade_bricks_unlocked_iPhones
It's hard to "prove" intent without getting court orders to uncover
internal emails and memos and such (sorry, I just don't have the
resources to up against Apple's legal dept.), but the statement from
Apple in the first link is clearly a warning. It doesn't take Columbo
to make the connection.
Suing jailbreakers: first google hit:
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/02/apple-says-jailbreaking-illegal
They didn't actually file any lawsuits, but made claims that they would,
until the Copyright Office slapped their hand (thanks to the EFF!):
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20011661-38.html
Even if they didn't get around to filing any suits (during the short
time they could before the Copyright Office completely nullified Apple's
claims), it doesn't sit well with me that they were even making the
threats. Seems awfully petty to me...
On 10/06/2011 11:49 PM, David Kramer wrote:
Anyone who is surprised when their Apple device isn't as flexible as
its competitors or becomes obsolete in months is not paying
attention. But if that mindset doesn't work for you, don't buy an
Apple.
On 10/07/2011 12:37 AM, Jon Masters wrote:
if I didn't care about hackability, I'd totally say it's a great
choice, which it is for end consumers who just don't care. Consumers
don't care about whether your phone is blessed by Stallman, but they
do care if they can make telephone calls with it reliably (antenna
notwithstanding).
As David and Jon point out, my real beef is with hackability. I'm not
saying my phone has to blessed by Stallman, but the hostility to the
jailbreak community really turns me off, because of the implications
about control and (non-)hackability.
Google has been pretty agnostic as far as I can tell about rooting, and
at least one major android phone manufacturer (HTC) has said they will
no longer use locked bootloaders (so as to be more hacker-friendly):
http://www.engadget.com/2011/05/26/htc-officially-dissolves-locked-bootlader-policy/
http://hothardware.com/News/HTC-Kills-Bootloader-Lock-Policy/
So in my book, android gets a win for a more diverse community (Android
has many hardware manufacturers, therefore it is more likely that there
are some that have a clue / are hacker-friendly). It's also harder to
control (i.e., by google), which gives the anti-authoritarian in me warm
fuzzies (I fully anticipate a fork of Android in the future, a la Oracle
spinning off their own brand of RHEL, although hopefully a fork of
android would be more productive for the community than Oracle is with
their RHEL ripoff).
To those that say "well, at least Apple doesn't collect all my
information", I have one word for you: iCloud. ;-)
Finally, just so people don't belabor the point, yes, I fully
acknowledge that I'm not a "typical" customer, and that for people who
just want something that looks pretty and "just works" (for the set of
activities that Apple has approved of), I'm sure the iPhone is a
perfectly viable choice.
Matt
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