On 2009-06-29, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@aNOoSPAMl.com> wrote:
>> No, but we haven't been "mugged", you're just raising the spectre that
>> we *might* be in the future.
>
> No, the iPhone is locked-down now. You seem to have missed Dvorak's point-
> if Microsoft had released the exact same iPhone

How can you think I have missed that point when we have been
specifically discussing it?

> The Pre debuts with the ability to sync with iTunes, (which everyone
> now considers the de facto "standard" in music management) and Apple
> immediately responds with warnings that future iTunes updates could
> break third-party sync functionality.

Er, of course they said that. They presumably don't have access to the
Pre source code, they don't know how it works, they have no way of
guaranteeing that it will work (not to mentiom very little motivation
to come up with such a guarantee, of course ;-) ).

This surely is actually a point considerably in favour of Apple - they
have managed to get most (all?) of the music on iTunes to be DRM-free,
so you can use iTunes to purchase your music no matter what phone you
use.

> If Palm had built the Pre to sync with Zune, MS would be dancing in the
> streets because it would mean someone might actually use it!

I thought Microsoft had shut down their music sales business?

>> That makes even less sense. An phone is not a desktop computer.
>> Why *should* what's done on one be appropriate for the other?
>
> An iPhone has the power of Wintel and Mac OS laptops built several years ago,

Which still doesn't make it a desktop computer.

> And limiting app distribution to a single "source seems to be a universal
> sin of closed platforms like game consoles. Why does that make any more
> sense on a "mobile computing platform" than on a computer?

Apparently it does make a difference, because as you say people
wouldn't tolerate it on a desktop computer, but most people seem to be
fine with it on the iPhone or on games consoles.

>> ... and the upgrade could easily remove the non-official stuff.
>> But it doesn't, because Apple didn't make it do that, even though they
>> easily could.
>
> What "non-official stuff" are you referring to?

The non-official apps the user has installed on the phone.

> Upgrading an unlocked phone legitimately, relocks the phones. I'm
> not aware of that happening with any other flashable phone.

You seem to be confusing SIM unlocking, and jailbreaking.

> Except for the iPhone, SIM unlocks, like diamonds, are forever.

As far as I'm aware, that's because most SIM unlocks work by setting
the SIM lock flag to "off", whereas the iPhone SIM unlock hacks work
by disabling the code which enforces the SIM lock. So when you
re-flash the code, the flag is still set to "locked" and the lock
comes back.