The cathedral plus the bazaar: Open source and Apple (design) envy

"Jon Ribbens" <jon+usenet@unequivocal.co.uk> wrote in message
news:slrnh4n8th.c30.jon+usenet@snowy.squish.net...
> On 2009-06-30, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@aNOoSPAMl.com> wrote:
>> Yes, but Palm took it a step further, didn't they, and added syncing as
>> well.
>> That's what triggered the threat- if the iTunes store is more about
>> supporting high-margin iPod hardware sales than a profit center in its
>> own
>> right, Apple has a vested interest in keeping it "in the family" rather
>> than allow it to become a generic music sync tool like Windows Media
>> Player
>> is.
>
> Well, yes, of course. That's my point - even though it's not
> necessarily in their own interests, Apple did what was in their
> customers' interests and changed iTunes to deliver DRM-free music.
> Once they did that, it became impossible for them to prevent other
> companies making their devices sync with that music - whether
> directly through iTunes or through some tiny add-on makes little
> difference.

One could argue that Apple was forced to go to DRM-free due to competitive
forces (Amazon) rather than any "customer interest."

Having said that, I don't think Apple ever really WANTED to sell DRM- it was
just a way to make digital music sales palatable to content providers. It's
probably in Apple's interest (as a hardware manufacturer, anyway) to allow
free "sharing" of music, (even illegally!), since it increases the
consumer's value proposition of buying an iPod rather than a portable CD
player, much the same way "illegally" recording your LPs to cassette helped
the Walkman/portable cassette player industry, or recording TV shows
cemented the success of the VCR.

>>> > 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?
>>
>> Not at all. They're stil pushing their $15/month unlimited download
>> subscription service.
>
> I was thinking of "MSN Music store", which they shut down.
> When they did so, they screwed over everyone who had ever bought music
> from it, by shutting down the DRM servers too.

Oh, "Plays For Sure"- the DRM servers are actually still open today (of
course you can no longer buy content), and should stay open until at least
2011. After that, the music will still play on the last five PCs you last
authorized prior to shutting the service down. Not a perfect solution, no,
but that gave customers several years to move the music to a non-DRM format,
like burning it to CD. On the bright side, that debacle is probably what
led to DRM-free music from Amazon then Apple as a viable business model.
Nothing fosters change better than a large angry mob of consumers!


>> The iPhone is a huge success _despite_ its flaws and limitations,
>> not _because_ of them!
>
> I think you have that wrong. Everything about the iPhone is a
> compromise between the competing interests of mobile phone companies,
> media companies, consumers, and Apple itself. I think Apple have done
> a pretty good job of balancing these interests, and this is what has
> lead directly to the iPhone being a success.

The iPhone is only a success if people buy and use it. How does
compromising the consumer's interest benefit a consumer at all? It might be
neccessary to do so to secure a particular profitable deal, but that doesn't
directly benefit the consumer, hence my use of "in spite of."

If, as a company, your interest is to sell more units of product, typically
the consumer's interest is the same as yours, since catering to their
interests will make the product more desirable. Can ANY consumer seriously
say "I'm glad my iPhone only syncs music with one computer!" Or "it's
certainly more convenient that I can't use Skype over 3G. It's less
confusing that way!" Neither of those things will be a deal-breaker for the
majority of consumers, but they don't _contribute_ to the iPhone's success.
They're simply very minor inconveniences in the totality of the product's
advantages and disadvantages, therefore, again, "success in spite of..."

There's a point, when a company becomes the 800 lb. gorrila in an industry
when you can tell your vendors to get stuffed and dictate the terms of many
agreements. You accuse Microsoft of abusing their monopolistic power (and
they have from time to time), but there are times when that's in the
consumer's best interest. Apple negotiating better prices or higher quality
parts benefits consumers, for example. Apple clearly "owns" both the
portable digital music player market, and the digital content distribution
market (iTunes store) right now, making them the 800 lb. gorilla. This puts
them in the position to tell record company execs "our customers can use
whatever damn song they please as their ringtone, just they can on any Nokia
phone. Making them rebuying the same songs again for another buck is just
kicking them when they're down!" Unfortunately, though, when the gorilla
gets a cut from the extra buck, he finds himself in less of a fightin'
mood...

Sadly, therefore, Apple's position as both a vendor of hardware and content
can easily create an anti-consumer conflict of interest. Again, look at the
good ol' cassette Walkman. If you're simply a hardware manufacturer, as
Sony was in the 1970s, or a blank tape manufacturer, you're automatically in
favor of as liberal a "fair use" definition as the law can give, and will
even vigorously defend those "rights" in court (the "Betamax" case.) You
want consumers to buy as many blank tapes as possible, and as many players
to play them on as they can carry. Look at Sony's position in the days
before they owned content: they gave us the VCR and the Walkman. Devices
whose marketplace appeal are enhanced by, if not predicated on, the easy
ability to duplicate copyrighted materials.

If Apple never had an iTunes store, don't you think perhaps they might have
designed some parts of the iPod/iPhone experience differently over the
years? Perhaps integrated FM radio with a direct record from FM feature?
Line input mode to copy songs from your buddy's unit from headphone jack to
headphone jack, or even wirelessly? I'm not neccessarily suggesting this
would be a superior iPod to today's, just that the design decisions and
feature set would be predicated on a completely different set of users'
scenarios, far more focused on giving the consumer more "power," if only to
keep him or her from buying competitors' devices.

If AT&T had slammed the door in Apple's face rather than enter a multi-year
exclusivity agreement, don't you think we'd have seen a different iPhone,
designed to give "control" to the consumer to make the iPhone as powerful as
possible despite what roadblocks mobile operators tried to throw at it?
They'd have to if they were trying convince consumers to eschew cheaper
subsidized phones in favor of an unsubsidized iPhone. And you could be
damned sure it'd have tethered right out of the box!


> For example, the iPhone has the "flaw/limitation" that you can't
> tether it (or, in 3.0, you can but only if the carrier lets you).
> This is obviously done to make the carriers happy, but in return
> it means that iPhone carrier contracts tend to offer genuinely
> unlimited data access (barring roaming). So this "flaw" enables
> a benefit for the consumer (no hidden/unexpected charges).

Except, at least in the US, that's not true. EVERY mobile operator here
offered unlimited data plans before the iPhone existed, as long as the data
is only used on the phone, rather than by a tethered PDA or comuter. The
only difference is that on most phones it's not as easily enforced by the
operator, since most other phones do not block tethering without getting the
operator's "permission"!


>> I'm certainly not making a case to close the app store! It's a
>> phenominal idea, executed well. I'm just asking why distribution
>> is _limited_ to it (for all intents- I'm ignoring internal corporate
>> distribution as outside the point of this discussion.)
>
> Why are you asking this when you know the answer? (a) Apple want to
> protect the reputation of their product (which is a reasonable goal),
> and (b) they make a margin on all sales (which in my view is
> reasonable for the service that they are providing the app developer).

Yes, I know the answer, but was illustrating an example where a feature was
clearly not in the consumer's best interest!
If it was truly a case of putting the consumer first, "(a)" could be easily
handled by the appropriate warning dialog, much like computers or other
phones have "non-certified" or "non-signed" app warnings, and "(b)" wouldn't
have to be "handled," as both consumers and developers could easily see the
advantages of the using a centralized store. Paying $1 for an app at the
app store for an instant download would be easier and more convenient than
buying directly from a developer's website for $0.70 and having to install
it from your computer via iTunes, or whatever.

> You're perfectly free to disagree with their decision and say they
> should have done something else, but it's fairly obvious why they
> have done things the way they have, and I don't think any of it
> is particularly consumer-hostile.

And you're perfectly free to believe that, but I don't. I'm also not
suggesting that these (alleged!) consumer-hostile decisions "ruin" the
phone, any more than closed distribution methods "ruin" the Sony Playstation
platform. I'm just saying that removing the restrictions would make them
better products for consumers.

> Ah, OK, I haven't tried jailbreaking my phone. I just haven't heard of
> any complaints from jailbreak users due to Apple going out of their
> way to stop them. At the very least, for example, when updating the
> iPhone OS iTunes could detect the jailbreak and refuse to update
> ("phone in non-standard state, warranty voided, cannot upgrade").

That would be difficult, since reflashing the phone to an "official" release
would make it indistinguishable from a never-jailbroken one. If Apple tried
to prevent that, I suspect the jailbreakers would simply have a different
tool to reflash.


> With other phones, unlocking them was always a rather nervous affair
> as there was the possibility of bricking the phone or causing some
> other hard-to-undo problem, but with the iPhone as far as I'm aware it
> doesn't matter what you do, you can always just reset and restore from
> backup. It practically encourages hacking! ;-)

Pretty much that's the way any other smartphone works as well, unless the
user does something pretty stupid, like flash firmware for model "A" onto
model "B".

The Windows Mobile ROM flashing tools I've used to flash unofficial ROMs
were actually the real factory tools themselves, slightly modified to hide
the phone's current ROM level. (Like with the iPhone, WinMo phone's
generally don't let you revert to an older revision. The software simply
tells you you're already using a more recent upgrade then aborts. The WinMo
"hack" upgrade tools are the real tools fixed to always "read" your phone's
current firmware level as 1.0.0, so EVERY firmware, regardless of how old,
looks like an "upgrade" and is, therefore, flashable. A smart guy with a
spare weekend and a hex editior could probably rig iTunes' upgrade module in
a similar fashion.)

>> (Though you can't really blame Apple- an pgrade wipes the entire
>> device, and only Apple's excellent backup/restore mechanism in
>> iTunes gives the illusion the OS is upgraded "in place" without
>> disturbing data. The data, in fact, is simply restored.
>
> Indeed, it is very pleasing when I get a replacement phone and
> I take it out of the box, plug it into iTunes and twenty minutes later
> it's magically turned into "my" phone. So much better than previous
> phones I had where I had to spend ages re-entering my entire contact
> list.


That's more of an issue of just not having the right tools. I've been
transferring phone books from one mobile to another long before there was
such a thing as a "smartphone." With smartphones it's not much different
than with the iPhone. With my last WinMo phone, (that I received by mail
order,) I opened it but was running late for an appointment, so rather plug
it into a computer and sync, I stuck my SIM and microSD card from my old
phone in the new, entered my operator's data settings (it was unlocked so
they weren't preset), my server's settings, and restored the phone's data
over cellular on the way to the appointment. (As you could do with the
iPhone as well, since it supports Exchange and MobileMe.)

What the iPhone DOES do better than anyone else, without question, is
firmware upgrades. You can still botch the procedure, but it practically
takes intentional malice to do so! I'll happily give Apple and the iPhone
their "props" when they're due, and that is as well an executed feature as
I've ever seen on a mobile device.

"Jon Ribbens" <jon+usenet@unequivocal.co.uk> wrote in message
news:slrnh4n8th.c30.jon+usenet@snowy.squish.net...
> On 2009-06-30, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@aNOoSPAMl.com> wrote:
>> Yes, but Palm took it a step further, didn't they, and added syncing as
>> well.
>> That's what triggered the threat- if the iTunes store is more about
>> supporting high-margin iPod hardware sales than a profit center in its
>> own
>> right, Apple has a vested interest in keeping it "in the family" rather
>> than allow it to become a generic music sync tool like Windows Media
>> Player
>> is.
>
> Well, yes, of course. That's my point - even though it's not
> necessarily in their own interests, Apple did what was in their
> customers' interests and changed iTunes to deliver DRM-free music.
> Once they did that, it became impossible for them to prevent other
> companies making their devices sync with that music - whether
> directly through iTunes or through some tiny add-on makes little
> difference.

One could argue that Apple was forced to go to DRM-free due to competitive
forces (Amazon) rather than any "customer interest."

Having said that, I don't think Apple ever really WANTED to sell DRM- it was
just a way to make digital music sales palatable to content providers. It's
probably in Apple's interest (as a hardware manufacturer, anyway) to allow
free "sharing" of music, (even illegally!), since it increases the
consumer's value proposition of buying an iPod rather than a portable CD
player, much the same way "illegally" recording your LPs to cassette helped
the Walkman/portable cassette player industry, or recording TV shows
cemented the success of the VCR.

>>> > 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?
>>
>> Not at all. They're stil pushing their $15/month unlimited download
>> subscription service.
>
> I was thinking of "MSN Music store", which they shut down.
> When they did so, they screwed over everyone who had ever bought music
> from it, by shutting down the DRM servers too.

Oh, "Plays For Sure"- the DRM servers are actually still open today (of
course you can no longer buy content), and should stay open until at least
2011. After that, the music will still play on the last five PCs you last
authorized prior to shutting the service down. Not a perfect solution, no,
but that gave customers several years to move the music to a non-DRM format,
like burning it to CD. On the bright side, that debacle is probably what
led to DRM-free music from Amazon then Apple as a viable business model.
Nothing fosters change better than a large angry mob of consumers!


>> The iPhone is a huge success _despite_ its flaws and limitations,
>> not _because_ of them!
>
> I think you have that wrong. Everything about the iPhone is a
> compromise between the competing interests of mobile phone companies,
> media companies, consumers, and Apple itself. I think Apple have done
> a pretty good job of balancing these interests, and this is what has
> lead directly to the iPhone being a success.

The iPhone is only a success if people buy and use it. How does
compromising the consumer's interest benefit a consumer at all? It might be
neccessary to do so to secure a particular profitable deal, but that doesn't
directly benefit the consumer, hence my use of "in spite of."

If, as a company, your interest is to sell more units of product, typically
the consumer's interest is the same as yours, since catering to their
interests will make the product more desirable. Can ANY consumer seriously
say "I'm glad my iPhone only syncs music with one computer!" Or "it's
certainly more convenient that I can't use Skype over 3G. It's less
confusing that way!" Neither of those things will be a deal-breaker for the
majority of consumers, but they don't _contribute_ to the iPhone's success.
They're simply very minor inconveniences in the totality of the product's
advantages and disadvantages, therefore, again, "success in spite of..."

There's a point, when a company becomes the 800 lb. gorrila in an industry
when you can tell your vendors to get stuffed and dictate the terms of many
agreements. You accuse Microsoft of abusing their monopolistic power (and
they have from time to time), but there are times when that's in the
consumer's best interest. Apple negotiating better prices or higher quality
parts benefits consumers, for example. Apple clearly "owns" both the
portable digital music player market, and the digital content distribution
market (iTunes store) right now, making them the 800 lb. gorilla. This puts
them in the position to tell record company execs "our customers can use
whatever damn song they please as their ringtone, just they can on any Nokia
phone. Making them rebuying the same songs again for another buck is just
kicking them when they're down!" Unfortunately, though, when the gorilla
gets a cut from the extra buck, he finds himself in less of a fightin'
mood...

Sadly, therefore, Apple's position as both a vendor of hardware and content
can easily create an anti-consumer conflict of interest. Again, look at the
good ol' cassette Walkman. If you're simply a hardware manufacturer, as
Sony was in the 1970s, or a blank tape manufacturer, you're automatically in
favor of as liberal a "fair use" definition as the law can give, and will
even vigorously defend those "rights" in court (the "Betamax" case.) You
want consumers to buy as many blank tapes as possible, and as many players
to play them on as they can carry. Look at Sony's position in the days
before they owned content: they gave us the VCR and the Walkman. Devices
whose marketplace appeal are enhanced by, if not predicated on, the easy
ability to duplicate copyrighted materials.

If Apple never had an iTunes store, don't you think perhaps they might have
designed some parts of the iPod/iPhone experience differently over the
years? Perhaps integrated FM radio with a direct record from FM feature?
Line input mode to copy songs from your buddy's unit from headphone jack to
headphone jack, or even wirelessly? I'm not neccessarily suggesting this
would be a superior iPod to today's, just that the design decisions and
feature set would be predicated on a completely different set of users'
scenarios, far more focused on giving the consumer more "power," if only to
keep him or her from buying competitors' devices.

If AT&T had slammed the door in Apple's face rather than enter a multi-year
exclusivity agreement, don't you think we'd have seen a different iPhone,
designed to give "control" to the consumer to make the iPhone as powerful as
possible despite what roadblocks mobile operators tried to throw at it?
They'd have to if they were trying convince consumers to eschew cheaper
subsidized phones in favor of an unsubsidized iPhone. And you could be
damned sure it'd have tethered right out of the box!


> For example, the iPhone has the "flaw/limitation" that you can't
> tether it (or, in 3.0, you can but only if the carrier lets you).
> This is obviously done to make the carriers happy, but in return
> it means that iPhone carrier contracts tend to offer genuinely
> unlimited data access (barring roaming). So this "flaw" enables
> a benefit for the consumer (no hidden/unexpected charges).

Except, at least in the US, that's not true. EVERY mobile operator here
offered unlimited data plans before the iPhone existed, as long as the data
is only used on the phone, rather than by a tethered PDA or comuter. The
only difference is that on most phones it's not as easily enforced by the
operator, since most other phones do not block tethering without getting the
operator's "permission"!


>> I'm certainly not making a case to close the app store! It's a
>> phenominal idea, executed well. I'm just asking why distribution
>> is _limited_ to it (for all intents- I'm ignoring internal corporate
>> distribution as outside the point of this discussion.)
>
> Why are you asking this when you know the answer? (a) Apple want to
> protect the reputation of their product (which is a reasonable goal),
> and (b) they make a margin on all sales (which in my view is
> reasonable for the service that they are providing the app developer).

Yes, I know the answer, but was illustrating an example where a feature was
clearly not in the consumer's best interest!
If it was truly a case of putting the consumer first, "(a)" could be easily
handled by the appropriate warning dialog, much like computers or other
phones have "non-certified" or "non-signed" app warnings, and "(b)" wouldn't
have to be "handled," as both consumers and developers could easily see the
advantages of the using a centralized store. Paying $1 for an app at the
app store for an instant download would be easier and more convenient than
buying directly from a developer's website for $0.70 and having to install
it from your computer via iTunes, or whatever.

> You're perfectly free to disagree with their decision and say they
> should have done something else, but it's fairly obvious why they
> have done things the way they have, and I don't think any of it
> is particularly consumer-hostile.

And you're perfectly free to believe that, but I don't. I'm also not
suggesting that these (alleged!) consumer-hostile decisions "ruin" the
phone, any more than closed distribution methods "ruin" the Sony Playstation
platform. I'm just saying that removing the restrictions would make them
better products for consumers.

> Ah, OK, I haven't tried jailbreaking my phone. I just haven't heard of
> any complaints from jailbreak users due to Apple going out of their
> way to stop them. At the very least, for example, when updating the
> iPhone OS iTunes could detect the jailbreak and refuse to update
> ("phone in non-standard state, warranty voided, cannot upgrade").

That would be difficult, since reflashing the phone to an "official" release
would make it indistinguishable from a never-jailbroken one. If Apple tried
to prevent that, I suspect the jailbreakers would simply have a different
tool to reflash.


> With other phones, unlocking them was always a rather nervous affair
> as there was the possibility of bricking the phone or causing some
> other hard-to-undo problem, but with the iPhone as far as I'm aware it
> doesn't matter what you do, you can always just reset and restore from
> backup. It practically encourages hacking! ;-)

Pretty much that's the way any other smartphone works as well, unless the
user does something pretty stupid, like flash firmware for model "A" onto
model "B".

The Windows Mobile ROM flashing tools I've used to flash unofficial ROMs
were actually the real factory tools themselves, slightly modified to hide
the phone's current ROM level. (Like with the iPhone, WinMo phone's
generally don't let you revert to an older revision. The software simply
tells you you're already using a more recent upgrade then aborts. The WinMo
"hack" upgrade tools are the real tools fixed to always "read" your phone's
current firmware level as 1.0.0, so EVERY firmware, regardless of how old,
looks like an "upgrade" and is, therefore, flashable. A smart guy with a
spare weekend and a hex editior could probably rig iTunes' upgrade module in
a similar fashion.)

>> (Though you can't really blame Apple- an pgrade wipes the entire
>> device, and only Apple's excellent backup/restore mechanism in
>> iTunes gives the illusion the OS is upgraded "in place" without
>> disturbing data. The data, in fact, is simply restored.
>
> Indeed, it is very pleasing when I get a replacement phone and
> I take it out of the box, plug it into iTunes and twenty minutes later
> it's magically turned into "my" phone. So much better than previous
> phones I had where I had to spend ages re-entering my entire contact
> list.


That's more of an issue of just not having the right tools. I've been
transferring phone books from one mobile to another long before there was
such a thing as a "smartphone." With smartphones it's not much different
than with the iPhone. With my last WinMo phone, (that I received by mail
order,) I opened it but was running late for an appointment, so rather plug
it into a computer and sync, I stuck my SIM and microSD card from my old
phone in the new, entered my operator's data settings (it was unlocked so
they weren't preset), my server's settings, and restored the phone's data
over cellular on the way to the appointment. (As you could do with the
iPhone as well, since it supports Exchange and MobileMe.)

What the iPhone DOES do better than anyone else, without question, is
firmware upgrades. You can still botch the procedure, but it practically
takes intentional malice to do so! I'll happily give Apple and the iPhone
their "props" when they're due, and that is as well an executed feature as
I've ever seen on a mobile device.

On 2009-07-01, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@AnoOspamL.com> wrote:
> One could argue that Apple was forced to go to DRM-free due to competitive
> forces (Amazon) rather than any "customer interest."

You certainly could argue that, yes ;-)

> Having said that, I don't think Apple ever really WANTED to sell DRM- it was
> just a way to make digital music sales palatable to content providers.

I think you are right, and this was very much the case.

> The iPhone is only a success if people buy and use it. How does
> compromising the consumer's interest benefit a consumer at all?

It's hardly in the consumer's interest if their "phone + music player"
device doesn't work on any networks because the mobile operators
refuse to support it, and has no media content because the media
companies refuse to supply any for it.

> Can ANY consumer seriously say "I'm glad my iPhone only syncs music
> with one computer!"

I don't think that's a feature at all. I think it's just something
which is tricky to get to work well, and which not enough people
want for Apple to prioritise adding it.

> Or "it's certainly more convenient that I can't use Skype over 3G.

That's obviously for the benefit of the mobile network operators,
as I said.

> There's a point, when a company becomes the 800 lb. gorrila in an industry
> when you can tell your vendors to get stuffed and dictate the terms of many
> agreements.

Apple can, perhaps, do that to an extent to the media companies,
nowadays. Not so much in the past. And what has happened? The
situation Apple has brought about is pretty much all to the benefit
of the consumer (no DRM, no restrictions).

Apple cannot do that to the mobile operators. It's quite remarkable
that they managed to achieve as much as they did when they originally
launched the iPhone 2G.

> If Apple never had an iTunes store, don't you think perhaps they might have
> designed some parts of the iPod/iPhone experience differently over the
> years? Perhaps integrated FM radio with a direct record from FM feature?
> Line input mode to copy songs from your buddy's unit from headphone jack to
> headphone jack, or even wirelessly?

Possibly. But if people really wanted those things, they'd have bought
devices that had them, and not iPods.

> If AT&T had slammed the door in Apple's face rather than enter a multi-year
> exclusivity agreement, don't you think we'd have seen a different iPhone,
> designed to give "control" to the consumer to make the iPhone as powerful as
> possible despite what roadblocks mobile operators tried to throw at it?
> They'd have to if they were trying convince consumers to eschew cheaper
> subsidized phones in favor of an unsubsidized iPhone. And you could be
> damned sure it'd have tethered right out of the box!

And mobile network operators would have just blocked your SIM if you
tried to use it. Hardly a win for the consumer.

> Except, at least in the US, that's not true. EVERY mobile operator here
> offered unlimited data plans before the iPhone existed, as long as the data
> is only used on the phone, rather than by a tethered PDA or comuter.

And how do they know you're not breaking the rules and tethering
anyway?

> If it was truly a case of putting the consumer first,

It isn't a case of putting the consumer first. I said that explicitly
in my post!

> "(a)" could be easily handled by the appropriate warning dialog,
> much like computers or other phones have "non-certified" or
> "non-signed" app warnings,

I don't think that "handles" it at all. Nobody pays any attention to
warning messages like that. In Windows they're so common you just
click through without reading.

>> Ah, OK, I haven't tried jailbreaking my phone. I just haven't heard of
>> any complaints from jailbreak users due to Apple going out of their
>> way to stop them. At the very least, for example, when updating the
>> iPhone OS iTunes could detect the jailbreak and refuse to update
>> ("phone in non-standard state, warranty voided, cannot upgrade").
>
> That would be difficult, since reflashing the phone to an "official" release
> would make it indistinguishable from a never-jailbroken one.

But how would you reflash it back to an "official" release?

> If Apple tried to prevent that, I suspect the jailbreakers would
> simply have a different tool to reflash.

I suspect that's not possible.

>> With other phones, unlocking them was always a rather nervous affair
>> as there was the possibility of bricking the phone or causing some
>> other hard-to-undo problem, but with the iPhone as far as I'm aware it
>> doesn't matter what you do, you can always just reset and restore from
>> backup. It practically encourages hacking! ;-)
>
> Pretty much that's the way any other smartphone works as well, unless the
> user does something pretty stupid, like flash firmware for model "A" onto
> model "B".

I haven't owned any other "smartphones" personally. The phone
I had before the iPhone was the Nokia N80 (unless that counts
as a "smartphone"?), if I remember right, because no other phone
had been made that was better from my point of view.

> A smart guy with a spare weekend and a hex editior could probably
> rig iTunes' upgrade module in a similar fashion.)

As above, I suspect that, no, they couldn't. In fact, in the case of
the 3G(S) in particular, no, they definitely can't.

> That's more of an issue of just not having the right tools. I've been
> transferring phone books from one mobile to another long before there was
> such a thing as a "smartphone."

My first mobile was in 1997. It was a long time before you could do
anything of that sort ;-)

On 2009-07-01, nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>> They could, but they don't - it seems to be a simple XML file
>> "iTunes Music Library.xml". In fact, not only do they not try and
>> hide this information - they deliberately make it easy to get at!
>
> right now it's easy, but if they really wanted to shut people down,
> they could encrypt it, for example

Well, yes. Like I just said "They could, but they don't". So Apple
are being nice and consumer-friendly, even though they don't have to
be.

>> Only because Apple let you. They could have made it so that the
>> "recovery mode" could be disabled, if they'd wanted to.
>
> right, but there's no point in disabling a normal firmware upgrade
> unless you also disable the recovery mode, and that would make fixing
> them harder.

It'd still be easy for Apple themselves to fix them, and they could
charge a nice fat fee for your non-warranty repair too!

> some of the phones could be fixed with a restore but apple did warn
> that the possibility existed that unlocking could cause 'irreparable
> damage'.

"Well they would say that, wouldn't they?" ;-)

Todd Allcock wrote:

> Apple looked at the marketplace and fixed everything that could be a
> potential problem... ...for APPLE! They crippled developer access to
> hardware to "increase stability,"- the lockout of unapproved apps
> circumventing the app store commissions was just a lucky side benefit. The
> ban on "duplicate functionality" that might otherwise allow alternate media
> players that could use competing music stores simply "prevents user
> confusion."

There's an old adage, design a system that an idiot can use, and only an
idiot will want to use it. Still, I think most iPhone buyers go into the
iPhone experience with a fairly good idea of what it can and can't do.

Still, there's certainly a market for a device where applications that
can't be done well are not done at all, rather than done in a way that
frustrates the non-techie consumer.

> John Dvorak joked in a recent column, that if Microsoft had produced the
> iPhone instead of Apple, with the same restrictions, someone would've
> started a class-action lawsuit already.

It would have happened. The whole EU would have sued Apple.

> I'm not as funny as Dvorak, so I typically just ask aloud that if the next
> line of Macs and MacBooks had the same restrictions as the iPhone - a
> centralized app distribution system preventing apps to be sourced anywhere
> else, no user-accessible file system, with files only available to the app
> that created them, media files not transferable to other computers (because
> only pirates do THAT!), and the next Mac OS preventing more than one third-
> party app from running at a time, would the Mac users all agree this was
> beneficial to the user experience as the iPhone users seem to believe?

Yes.

On Wed, 1 Jul 2009 16:48:11 -0600, "Todd Allcock"
<elecconnec@AnoOspamL.com> wrote in <eJR2m.9785$iU7.414@newsfe01.iad>:

>What the iPhone DOES do better than anyone else, without question, is
>firmware upgrades. You can still botch the procedure, but it practically
>takes intentional malice to do so! I'll happily give Apple and the iPhone
>their "props" when they're due, and that is as well an executed feature as
>I've ever seen on a mobile device.

There are other phones with consumer friendly update tools, including my
Sony Ericsson TM506, and still other phones that can be updated OTA
(over the air).

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do fans keep making excuses for it?

On Wed, 01 Jul 2009 18:18:37 -0500, Jon Ribbens
<jon+usenet@unequivocal.co.uk> wrote in
<slrnh4nrmd.g57.jon+usenet@snowy.squish.net>:

>On 2009-07-01, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@AnoOspamL.com> wrote:

>> Can ANY consumer seriously say "I'm glad my iPhone only syncs music
>> with one computer!"
>
>I don't think that's a feature at all. I think it's just something
>which is tricky to get to work well, and which not enough people
>want for Apple to prioritise adding it.

Get serious.

>> Except, at least in the US, that's not true. EVERY mobile operator here
>> offered unlimited data plans before the iPhone existed, as long as the data
>> is only used on the phone, rather than by a tethered PDA or comuter.
>
>And how do they know you're not breaking the rules and tethering
>anyway?

Actually pretty easy to tell from the traffic.

>> "(a)" could be easily handled by the appropriate warning dialog,
>> much like computers or other phones have "non-certified" or
>> "non-signed" app warnings,
>
>I don't think that "handles" it at all.

Everyone other than Apple seems to think so.

>Nobody pays any attention to
>warning messages like that. In Windows they're so common you just
>click through without reading.

That's the choice of the consumer, and not for the manufacturer.

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do fans keep making excuses for it?

On Wed, 01 Jul 2009 17:13:11 -0700, SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com>
wrote in <GOS2m.3279$vO4.2814@flpi145.ffdc.sbc.com>:

>There's an old adage, design a system that an idiot can use, and only an
>idiot will want to use it. Still, I think most iPhone buyers go into the
>iPhone experience with a fairly good idea of what it can and can't do.

I think just the opposite based on many new iPhone users I know. They've
heard it's very cool, but have no idea why.

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do fans keep making excuses for it?

In article <jovn45h3cl4kf8d29tmhpmk231opnd8auj@4ax.com>, John Navas
<spamfilter1@navasgroup.com> wrote:

> >> Can ANY consumer seriously say "I'm glad my iPhone only syncs music
> >> with one computer!"
> >
> >I don't think that's a feature at all. I think it's just something
> >which is tricky to get to work well, and which not enough people
> >want for Apple to prioritise adding it.
>
> Get serious.

he is.

> >> Except, at least in the US, that's not true. EVERY mobile operator here
> >> offered unlimited data plans before the iPhone existed, as long as the
> >> data
> >> is only used on the phone, rather than by a tethered PDA or comuter.
> >
> >And how do they know you're not breaking the rules and tethering
> >anyway?
>
> Actually pretty easy to tell from the traffic.

unless the iphone tattles, it's not as easy as you imply.

In article <GOS2m.3279$vO4.2814@flpi145.ffdc.sbc.com>, SMS
<scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:

> > I'm not as funny as Dvorak, so I typically just ask aloud that if the next
> > line of Macs and MacBooks had the same restrictions as the iPhone - a
> > centralized app distribution system preventing apps to be sourced anywhere
> > else, no user-accessible file system, with files only available to the app
> > that created them, media files not transferable to other computers (because
> > only pirates do THAT!), and the next Mac OS preventing more than one third-
> > party app from running at a time, would the Mac users all agree this was
> > beneficial to the user experience as the iPhone users seem to believe?
>
> Yes.

nonsense.

At 01 Jul 2009 18:18:37 -0500 Jon Ribbens wrote:

> > The iPhone is only a success if people buy and use it. How does
> > compromising the consumer's interest benefit a consumer at all?
>
> It's hardly in the consumer's interest if their "phone + music player"
> device doesn't work on any networks because the mobile operators
> refuse to support it, and has no media content because the media
> companies refuse to supply any for it.

Why would MOs treat an iPhone any differently than the myriad of unlocked
unbranded smartphones already available in the marketplace? Releasing an
unlocked phone with no carrier support is hardly a newsWorthy event,
particularly in Europe, and often, popular unlocked handsdts eventually get
picked up by MOs for subsidies based on consumer demand- take the Nokia
N95. It sold nearly a million units, IIRC, before any MO picked it up.

> > Can ANY consumer seriously say "I'm glad my iPhone only syncs music
> > with one computer!"
>
> I don't think that's a feature at all. I think it's just something
> which is tricky to get to work well, and which not enough people
> want for Apple to prioritise adding it.

Ironically, the virtually identical iPod Touch syncs media with multiple
computers, as designed, so the only two explanations I Can imagine are that
there's a two year-old bug in the iPhone they still haven't licked, or it's
by design. (Who this restriction might "benefit" is a mystery to me,
however, yet a lingering bug surviving a handful of firmware updates,
including two point-ohs seems unlikely.)


> > Or "it's certainly more convenient that I can't use Skype over 3G.
>
> That's obviously for the benefit of the mobile network operators,
> as I said.


Which again points out how anti-consumer single-point distribution is.
Since Apple owns and operates the store, they assume responsibility for its
content. On any other platform it's a non-issue. Microsoft, or HTC, or
Nokia, et al, have no control over what Skype includes or doesn't include
in software that end-users download directly from Skype.com. But if it's
in the app store, it becomes Apple's business.


If you look at the restrictions on developers in Microsoft's upcoming copy-
cat app store, they're just as draconian as Apple's, but that's ok, because
the Windows Marketplace will NOT be the sole source of content.
> > There's a point, when a company becomes the 800 lb. gorrila in an
industry
> > when you can tell your vendors to get stuffed and dictate the terms of
many
> > agreements.
>
> Apple can, perhaps, do that to an extent to the media companies,
> nowadays. Not so much in the past. And what has happened? The
> situation Apple has brought about is pretty much all to the benefit
> of the consumer (no DRM, no restrictions).

"The situation Apple has brought about?" Perhaps, if you credit Apple for
responding to competitive pressure!

> Apple cannot do that to the mobile operators. It's quite remarkable
> that they managed to achieve as much as they did when they originally
> launched the iPhone 2G.

What exactly did they "acheive" that wasn't completely self-serving? Sell
unsubsidized handsets and negotiate backend kick-backs, which simply
diverted the benefit of the subsidy from the consumer to Apple? Appe
didn't really wrangle any extra concessions from opertors, they convinced
them to screw over their customers to Apple's benefit.


> > If Apple never had an iTunes store, don't you think perhaps they might
have
> > designed some parts of the iPod/iPhone experience differently over the
> > years? Perhaps integrated FM radio with a direct record from FM
feature?
> > Line input mode to copy songs from your buddy's unit from headphone
jack to
> > headphone jack, or even wirelessly?
>
> Possibly. But if people really wanted those things, they'd have bought
> devices that had them, and not iPods.


iTunes is a value add that might have compensated for lack of features, and
the simplistic iPod UI was also a powerful tool, essentially the same
argument I'm making about the iPhone- the positives outweight the negatives
to such a degree for most people that the device is a success.

> > If AT&T had slammed the door in Apple's face rather than enter a multi-
year
> > exclusivity agreement, don't you think we'd have seen a different iPhone,

> > designed to give "control" to the consumer to make the iPhone as
powerful as
> > possible despite what roadblocks mobile operators tried to throw at it?
> > They'd have to if they were trying convince consumers to eschew cheaper
> > subsidized phones in favor of an unsubsidized iPhone. And you could be
> > damned sure it'd have tethered right out of the box!
>
> And mobile network operators would have just blocked your SIM if you
> tried to use it. Hardly a win for the consumer.

And I spread FUD? Name a single MO anywhere that has blocked a GSM-based
device based on its abilities. That's the beauty of GSM- your SIM card has
service, not your device. You stick your card in the compatible device of
your choice, regardless of its origin. My T-Mobile USA two-line family
plan doesn't have a T-Mo phone on it- it has my AT&T Tilt and my wife's
AT&T iPhone. Why doesn't T-Mo "block" these handsets? Perhaps because I
give them 72 reasons not to, every month, each with George Washington's
portrait on it.

> > Except, at least in the US, that's not true. EVERY mobile operator
here
> > offered unlimited data plans before the iPhone existed, as long as the
data
> > is only used on the phone, rather than by a tethered PDA or comuter.
>
> And how do they know you're not breaking the rules and tethering
> anyway?

They don't. Because most phones don't squeal on their owners. Or,as I
like to joke, while my phone is uglier and clumsier to use than my wife's
iPhone, my phone knows who owns it.


> > If it was truly a case of putting the consumer first,
>
> It isn't a case of putting the consumer first. I said that explicitly
> in my post!

You said "It is a benefit for the people who don't want tethering and don't
want to have to pay for it..." which doesn't make sense- you don't pay for
tethering just because your phone has the ability, you pay to use that
ability.

You also suggested that preventing tethering was some kind of quid pro quo
to carriers: " in return it means that iPhone carrier contracts tend to
offer genuinely unlimited data access (barring roaming). So this "flaw"
enables a benefit for the consumer (no hidden/unexpected charges)" yet I
really don't see evidence of that- MOs that tende
to sell unlimited data on other phones offer it for iPhones, and MOs with
caps on other phones' plans seem to cap iPhones as well.


> > "(a)" could be easily handled by the appropriate warning dialog,
> > much like computers or other phones have "non-certified" or
> > "non-signed" app warnings,
>
> I don't think that "handles" it at all. Nobody pays any attention to
> warning messages like that. In Windows they're so common you just
> click through without reading.

So you're advocating a device's design should be built around the needs of
it stupidest users?


> >> Ah, OK, I haven't tried jailbreaking my phone. I just haven't heard of
> >> any complaints from jailbreak users due to Apple going out of their
> >> way to stop them. At the very least, for example, when updating the
> >> iPhone OS iTunes could detect the jailbreak and refuse to update
> >> ("phone in non-standard state, warranty voided, cannot upgrade").
> >
> > That would be difficult, since reflashing the phone to an "official"
release
> > would make it indistinguishable from a never-jailbroken one.
>
> But how would you reflash it back to an "official" release?

With the same tool I currently Jailbreak with, except by deselecting the
"jailbreak" option, I expect.

> > If Apple tried to prevent that, I suspect the jailbreakers would
> > simply have a different tool to reflash.
>
> I suspect that's not possible.

Obviously the device is designed to be flashed, using iTunes. Therefore,
iTunes has the ability to tell the device to open wide and swallow a
firmware upgrade. Hackers figure out how iTunes makes the iPhone say
"aaah," simulates that in a third-party tool, and as my friends across the
pond say, Bob's your Uncle...

> >> With other phones, unlocking them was always a rather nervous affair
> >> as there was the possibility of bricking the phone or causing some
> >> other hard-to-undo problem, but with the iPhone as far as I'm aware it
> >> doesn't matter what you do, you can always just reset and restore from
> >> backup. It practically encourages hacking! ;-)
> >
> > Pretty much that's the way any other smartphone works as well, unless
the
> > user does something pretty stupid, like flash firmware for model "A"
onto
> > model "B".
>
> I haven't owned any other "smartphones" personally. The phone
> I had before the iPhone was the Nokia N80 (unless that counts
> as a "smartphone"?), if I remember right, because no other phone
> had been made that was better from my point of view.

The N80 fits my definition- runs an OS and has user-installable third-party
app support.


> > That's more of an issue of just not having the right tools. I've been
> > transferring phone books from one mobile to another long before there
was
> > such a thing as a "smartphone."
>
> My first mobile was in 1997. It was a long time before you could do
> anything of that sort ;-)

Au contraire, mon ami. I moved the phone book from my circa-1997 Nokia
5120 (my first phone that supported a data cable and phone book transfer)
to my circa-1999 Nokia 7160 via my PC. The 7160, which, in addition to
phone book transfer, also supported on-phone WAP browsing and tethering via
cable and infrared (at blinding 1G speeds of up to 14.4kbps!) I tethered
my first Windows Mobile device (long before they called it Windows Mobile!)
a Casio E-100, through that phone, and could even beam contacts between the
PDA and phone via IR.
I vowed then never to use a phone that required a cable to sync ever again,
and I haven't. Every phone I've used since has had IR, bluetooth or both.
I transfered my contacts via IR from phone to phone. (7160 to Nokia 3360
to Nokia 8290- my first GSM phone) then from the 8290 to my first smartphone,
a Symbian-based Nokia 3650, via SIM card, then from there it's all been
Outlook and WinMo.

On Thu, 2 Jul 2009, Todd Allcock posted:
>> The
>> situation Apple has brought about is pretty much all to the benefit
>> of the consumer (no DRM, no restrictions).
> "The situation Apple has brought about?" Perhaps, if you credit Apple for
> responding to competitive pressure!

And only in the US. Apple's non-US iTunes stores still have DRM. I know
this for a fact in the Japanese store.

Apple doesn't give a damn about the consumer. Apple only cares about
making money. The sooner people realize this fundamental fact, the
better.

> What exactly did they "acheive" that wasn't completely self-serving? Sell
> unsubsidized handsets and negotiate backend kick-backs, which simply
> diverted the benefit of the subsidy from the consumer to Apple? Appe
> didn't really wrangle any extra concessions from opertors, they convinced
> them to screw over their customers to Apple's benefit.

Which is why Apple ended up with AT&T - the US MO with the second worst
customer service (after SPRINT).

> And I spread FUD? Name a single MO anywhere that has blocked a GSM-based
> device based on its abilities.

AT&T. iToy.

> My T-Mobile USA two-line family
> plan doesn't have a T-Mo phone on it- it has my AT&T Tilt and my wife's
> AT&T iPhone. Why doesn't T-Mo "block" these handsets? Perhaps because I
> give them 72 reasons not to, every month, each with George Washington's
> portrait on it.

On the other hand, AT&T will block any iToy IMEI that doesn't have an iToy
plan. Try putting a GoPhone SIM inside an iToy.

It is ridiculous to argue that, somehow, a consumer is ripping off AT&T by
using a smartphone with GoPhone service. GoPhone service allows data -
including tethering! - at exhorbitant packet rates. AT&T gets paid quite
well for GoPhone usage. What's different is that with prepay services
like GoPhone, a light user may end up paying a lot less than a flat-rate
user.

>> And how do they know you're not breaking the rules and tethering
>> anyway?
> They don't. Because most phones don't squeal on their owners. Or,as I
> like to joke, while my phone is uglier and clumsier to use than my wife's
> iPhone, my phone knows who owns it.

Actually, even without a squeal, they can detect tethering.

However, with ordinary phones, either you are pay-per-use for data, or you
have a data plan on top of your phone; either way the MO does not care if
you tether.

Tethering is only an issue with the discounted data plans which are
intended to be used for specific purposes: iPhone plans, BlackBerry plans,
Verizon's V-CAST service. In order to sell these services, these plans
are offered at a lower cost than the normal data plan. It didn't take
long for hackers to figure out that this was a cheap way of tethering;
hence the bans.

> You said "It is a benefit for the people who don't want tethering and don't
> want to have to pay for it..." which doesn't make sense- you don't pay for
> tethering just because your phone has the ability, you pay to use that
> ability.

The basic notion behind the cheap data plans is that if you only use those
services, most people won't use anything near what they are allocated.
That's a good wager; my BlackBerry data plan is 5GB, but my BB typically
consumes about 50MB to 70MB/month. Except when I tether.

It's no different for iToy users. Once you disregard a few outliers, most
iToy users use less than 100MB month.

So, you sell a half-price data plan to suckers who use maybe 1-2% of what
you sold them. That's pure profit.

Then you have the outliers - a very small number. If they're using your
media store, you don't care because you're making money off of them that
way. If they're tethering, you catch them and make them upgrade to a
full-price data plan. Verizon does this quite well.

> I tethered
> my first Windows Mobile device (long before they called it Windows Mobile!)
> a Casio E-100, through that phone, and could even beam contacts between the
> PDA and phone via IR.

Sheesh. What is it about American cell phones and their lack of IR,
anyway? IR is *damn* useful and much easier to do a casual contact
transfer than Bluetooth.

-- Mark --

http://panda.com/mrc
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to eat for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.

On 2009-07-02, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@aNOoSPAMl.com> wrote:
> Ironically, the virtually identical iPod Touch syncs media with multiple
> computers, as designed, so the only two explanations I Can imagine are that
> there's a two year-old bug in the iPhone they still haven't licked, or it's
> by design. (Who this restriction might "benefit" is a mystery to me,
> however, yet a lingering bug surviving a handful of firmware updates,
> including two point-ohs seems unlikely.)

Yes, it is odd. As you say, it's hard to see who it's for the benefit
of though if it's some evil conspiracy against the consumer.

>> > Or "it's certainly more convenient that I can't use Skype over 3G.
>>
>> That's obviously for the benefit of the mobile network operators,
>> as I said.
>
> Which again points out how anti-consumer single-point distribution is.

No, that simply brings us back to my argument that the restriction is
*not* anti-consumer.

> "The situation Apple has brought about?" Perhaps, if you credit Apple for
> responding to competitive pressure!

Hey, *you* were the one saying Apple is the "800 lb gorilla" which can
do whatever it likes. Now suddenly if it does a good thing it's
actually not a gorilla after all, and it had no choice? You can't have
it both ways ;-)

>> Apple cannot do that to the mobile operators. It's quite remarkable
>> that they managed to achieve as much as they did when they originally
>> launched the iPhone 2G.
>
> What exactly did they "acheive" that wasn't completely self-serving?

It seems to me they shifted the power noticeably away from the network
operators and towards the handset manufacturers.

> iTunes is a value add that might have compensated for lack of features, and
> the simplistic iPod UI was also a powerful tool, essentially the same
> argument I'm making about the iPhone- the positives outweight the negatives
> to such a degree for most people that the device is a success.

It's hard to see that as a negative for the consumer ;-)

>> And mobile network operators would have just blocked your SIM if you
>> tried to use it. Hardly a win for the consumer.
>
> And I spread FUD? Name a single MO anywhere that has blocked a GSM-based
> device based on its abilities.

Based on what you *do* with it? All of them.

> That's the beauty of GSM- your SIM card has service, not your device.

The network knows what device you're using, though.

>> And how do they know you're not breaking the rules and tethering
>> anyway?
>
> They don't.

Yet mysteriously they sell (and people buy) higher-priced contracts
which allow tethering. Why is that, then?

> You said "It is a benefit for the people who don't want tethering and don't
> want to have to pay for it..." which doesn't make sense- you don't pay for
> tethering just because your phone has the ability, you pay to use that
> ability.

If the carrier knows your phone doesn't have that ability, then they
don't have to charge you more for you to subsidize the cost of people
who are doing it even though they are not supposed to.

>> I don't think that "handles" it at all. Nobody pays any attention to
>> warning messages like that. In Windows they're so common you just
>> click through without reading.
>
> So you're advocating a device's design should be built around the needs of
> it stupidest users?

Er, no. The needs of the "common" / "average" users are going to be
quite high on the priority list though! If people were commonly having
problems with their iPhone due to "unofficial" apps misbehaving, they
would hardly be mollified by being told "it's your fault, you clicked
OK".

>> > If Apple tried to prevent that, I suspect the jailbreakers would
>> > simply have a different tool to reflash.
>>
>> I suspect that's not possible.
>
> Obviously the device is designed to be flashed, using iTunes. Therefore,
> iTunes has the ability to tell the device to open wide and swallow a
> firmware upgrade.

You're missing the point. Let's suppose the code which says "no,
actually I refuse to allow that 'upgrade'" is not in iTunes,
it's on the iPhone itself. Then it doesn't matter what tool you
use or what you do, you're not going to reflash the phone with
something it doesn't like.

> Au contraire, mon ami. I moved the phone book from my circa-1997 Nokia
> 5120 (my first phone that supported a data cable and phone book transfer)
> to my circa-1999 Nokia 7160 via my PC.

OK, you're a very long way from being an average user then. In my
experience, data cables for phones of that era were very expensive,
and almost nobody had one. I think the Motorola RAZR V3 was the first
phone I had that came with a data cable in the box, and that came out
at the end of 2004.

At 02 Jul 2009 07:19:39 -0700 Mark Crispin wrote:

> Apple doesn't give a damn about the consumer. Apple only cares about
> making money. The sooner people realize this fundamental fact, the better.


I'm not sure that makes them different than any other company!


> > And I spread FUD? Name a single MO anywhere that has blocked a GSM-
based
> > device based on its abilities.
>
> AT&T. iToy.


The discussion was really a "what if" considering if the iPhone had been
sold unlocked directly from Apple without any deal with AT&T or anyone
else. I'm unaware of any compatible unlocked handsets "blocked" from any
GSM carrier. I realize operators sometimes exert extra control over their
own branded handsets.


> >> And how do they know you're not breaking the rules and tethering
> >> anyway?
> > They don't. Because most phones don't squeal on their owners. Or,as I
> > like to joke, while my phone is uglier and clumsier to use than my
wife's
> > iPhone, my phone knows who owns it.

> Actually, even without a squeal, they can detect tethering.
>
> However, with ordinary phones, either you are pay-per-use for data, or
> you have a data plan on top of your phone; either way the MO does not
> care if you tether.

Here in the states, every carrier (except T-Mobile, who forbids it entirely)
charges a large additional amount ($30-45/month) above and beyond the
regular data price to allow tethering, and then caps the formerly
"unlimited" plan at 5GB. With such a vested interest in only letting the
appropriate 'paid" customers tether, and with tethering as detectable as
you say, many US-carriers seem to running tethering on the "honor system."


> Tethering is only an issue with the discounted data plans which are
> intended to be used for specific purposes: iPhone plans, BlackBerry
> plans, Verizon's V-CAST service. In order to sell these services, these
> plans are offered at a lower cost than the normal data plan. It didn't
> take long for hackers to figure out that this was a cheap way of
> tethering; hence the bans.


Right, and these people continue to do it. Where are the service
cancellations for the "detected"? Many smartphone users place alternate
tethering programs on their devices to escape detection, which would imply
the phone (or more accurately, it's tethering software/drivers) "squeal."


> The basic notion behind the cheap data plans is that if you only use
> those services, most people won't use anything near what they are
> allocated. That's a good wager; my BlackBerry data plan is 5GB, but my BB
> typically consumes about 50MB to 70MB/month. Except when I tether.
>
> It's no different for iToy users. Once you disregard a few outliers,
most iToy users use less than 100MB month.


[Just as an FYI, AT&T says the average iPhone uses 400MB, (probably since
the iPhone uses more data "doing nothing" than other phones, like serving
ads into games.) But this doesn't change your point...]


> So, you sell a half-price data plan to suckers who use maybe 1-2% of what
> you sold them. That's pure profit.

No, that's a win/win. From the miserable adoption rate of metered plans in
the US, consumers have spoken- they don't want data "buckets." Unlimited
plans put customers at ease, and operators can offer them secure in the
knowledge no one will actually use much.

> Then you have the outliers - a very small number. If they're using your
> media store, you don't care because you're making money off of them that
> way. If they're tethering, you catch them and make them upgrade to a
> full-price data plan. Verizon does this quite well.

I'd argue it's because Verizon essentially has no users with non-Verizon
handsets, and like Sprint's, VZW handsets "squeal." A quick peek through
online forums dedicated to Windows Mobile CDMA phones will show that many
have "solved" that problem.

> > I tethered
> > my first Windows Mobile device (long before they called it Windows
Mobile!)
> > a Casio E-100, through that phone, and could even beam contacts between
the
> > PDA and phone via IR.
>
> Sheesh. What is it about American cell phones and their lack of IR,
> anyway? IR is *damn* useful and much easier to do a casual contact
> transfer than Bluetooth.

It's not just America- I can't find any European PDA phones currently
manufactured wth IR. Hard to blame them since very few used it. I liked
it for a variety of reasons, including never needing a proprietary sync
cable for my various phones and PDAs. I had an IR dongle on my PC and was
always ready to sync anything.

In article <alpine.OSX.2.00.0907020644440.10452@hsinghsing.pa nda.com>,
Mark Crispin <mrc@panda.com> wrote:

> Apple doesn't give a damn about the consumer. Apple only cares about
> making money. The sooner people realize this fundamental fact, the
> better.

just like any other public company. in fact, the shareholders demand it.

> > My T-Mobile USA two-line family
> > plan doesn't have a T-Mo phone on it- it has my AT&T Tilt and my wife's
> > AT&T iPhone. Why doesn't T-Mo "block" these handsets? Perhaps because I
> > give them 72 reasons not to, every month, each with George Washington's
> > portrait on it.
>
> On the other hand, AT&T will block any iToy IMEI that doesn't have an iToy
> plan. Try putting a GoPhone SIM inside an iToy.

it works fine.

> It is ridiculous to argue that, somehow, a consumer is ripping off AT&T by
> using a smartphone with GoPhone service. GoPhone service allows data -
> including tethering! - at exhorbitant packet rates. AT&T gets paid quite
> well for GoPhone usage. What's different is that with prepay services
> like GoPhone, a light user may end up paying a lot less than a flat-rate
> user.

and that's why at&t is motivated to restrict it. nothing unusual
there. gophone is for casual users, not heavy users who have an iphone
and want to avoid paying $70/mo.

at&t used to have an unlimited data plan on gophone, but due to abuse
mainly from iphone users, they killed it and a few months later brought
it back as a 100 meg plan for the same price and eliminated the middle
option of 5 meg for $10. so now, it's either a paltry 1 meg for $5 or
100 meg for $20.

On Thu, 02 Jul 2009 13:09:44 -0400, nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid> wrote
in <020720091309442028%nospam@nospam.invalid>:

>In article <alpine.OSX.2.00.0907020644440.10452@hsinghsing.pa nda.com>,
>Mark Crispin <mrc@panda.com> wrote:

>> It is ridiculous to argue that, somehow, a consumer is ripping off AT&T by
>> using a smartphone with GoPhone service. GoPhone service allows data -
>> including tethering! - at exhorbitant packet rates. AT&T gets paid quite
>> well for GoPhone usage. What's different is that with prepay services
>> like GoPhone, a light user may end up paying a lot less than a flat-rate
>> user.
>
>and that's why at&t is motivated to restrict it. nothing unusual
>there. gophone is for casual users, not heavy users who have an iphone
>and want to avoid paying $70/mo.
>
>at&t used to have an unlimited data plan on gophone, but due to abuse
>mainly from iphone users, they killed it and a few months later brought
>it back as a 100 meg plan for the same price and eliminated the middle
>option of 5 meg for $10. so now, it's either a paltry 1 meg for $5 or
>100 meg for $20.

T-Mobile is a much better deal for pay-as-you-go (FlexPay monthly) with
data, offering Unlimited Web and Messaging for $20/month.
<http://www.t-mobile.com/shop/plans/Interstitial.aspx?class=fpaynocontractb>
<http://www.t-mobile.com/shop/addons/services/information.aspx?PAsset=InternetEmail&tp=Svc_Tab_O therPhones>

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do iFans keep making excuses for it?

At 02 Jul 2009 10:22:05 -0700 John Navas wrote:

> >at&t used to have an unlimited data plan on gophone, but due to abuse
> >mainly from iphone users, they killed it and a few months later brought
> >it back as a 100 meg plan for the same price and eliminated the middle
> >option of 5 meg for $10. so now, it's either a paltry 1 meg for $5 or
> >100 meg for $20.
>
> T-Mobile is a much better deal for pay-as-you-go (FlexPay monthly) with
> data, offering Unlimited Web and Messaging for $20/month.


The advantage of AT&T's plan, back when it was unlimited, was that you
didn't need to buy a voice plan with it.

At 02 Jul 2009 09:56:59 -0500 Jon Ribbens wrote:

> > And I spread FUD? Name a single MO anywhere that has blocked a GSM-
> > based device based on its abilities.
>
> Based on what you *do* with it? All of them.


The MO allows or blocks certain features, depending on your subscription
services, yes, and, here in the US, might require different data plans for
different category of phone (dumb, smart, PC card/USB stick.)

But as long as you pay for the "correct" plan, our GSM carriers don't care
what phone you use.

> > That's the beauty of GSM- your SIM card has service, not your device.
>
> The network knows what device you're using, though.

Yes, if they care. Here, they only seem to monitor branded devices, and
mostly to insure compliance with rate plans (smartphones using smartphone
plans, etc.)

> >> And how do they know you're not breaking the rules and tethering
> >> anyway?
> >
> > They don't.
>
> Yet mysteriously they sell (and people buy) higher-priced contracts
> which allow tethering. Why is that, then?

Good question. A variety of reasons, probably. "Serious" (business) users
can't afford the hassle of a user being terminated when their account is
audited by the MO. Personal users who do serious amounts of tethering
probably have the same reason, for others it's possibly a morality issue.
For me, since I rarely tether, I opt not to buy a tethering plan and
"sneak" tethering in when I need it- e.g. my home broadband connection goes
down, or the hotel I'm staying at charges for WiFi.


I suspect MOs could "catch" unauthorized tethering, but I doubt it'd be
cost-effective without the willing complicity of the phone manufacturer
(which Apple seems willing to do!)


> > You said "It is a benefit for the people who don't want tethering and
> > don't want to have to pay for it..." which doesn't make sense- you
> > don't pay for tethering just because your phone has the ability, you
> > pay to use that ability.
>
> If the carrier knows your phone doesn't have that ability, then they
> don't have to charge you more for you to subsidize the cost of people
> who are doing it even though they are not supposed to.

Nice theory, but is there a single MO you know of who offers a discount for
phones incapable of tethering? If not, you'r just rationalizing. Many
cheap dumbphones support tethering, and generally have the cheapest data
rates.


> >> I don't think that "handles" it at all. Nobody pays any attention to
> >> warning messages like that. In Windows they're so common you just
> >> click through without reading.
> >
> > So you're advocating a device's design should be built around the needs
> > of it stupidest users?
>
> Er, no. The needs of the "common" / "average" users are going to be
> quite high on the priority list though! If people were commonly having
> problems with their iPhone due to "unofficial" apps misbehaving, they
> would hardly be mollified by being told "it's your fault, you clicked
> OK".


Perhaps not, but the blame could, and should, be placed squarely on the
app, not the phone. If you install some crappy app on your perfectly
stable computer, and that app crashes all the time, do you really blame the
computer?

Are phone users so dim they need handholding? Why should a smartphone or
its users need a nanny? I get the "protect" angle, but if "protecting" the
dumbest users reduces functionality for savvy users, that a lousy design
decision.


> >> > If Apple tried to prevent that, I suspect the jailbreakers would
> >> > simply have a different tool to reflash.
> >>
> >> I suspect that's not possible.
> >
> > Obviously the device is designed to be flashed, using iTunes. Therefore,


> > iTunes has the ability to tell the device to open wide and swallow a
> > firmware upgrade.
>
> You're missing the point. Let's suppose the code which says "no,
> actually I refuse to allow that 'upgrade'" is not in iTunes,
> it's on the iPhone itself. Then it doesn't matter what tool you
> use or what you do, you're not going to reflash the phone with
> something it doesn't like.

How does the phone _know_ it won't like it? Presumably firmware X has no
clues to what firmware Y may contain. Obviously certain signatures,
checksums, etc. might be used, but theoretically they could be faked as well.



> > Au contraire, mon ami. I moved the phone book from my circa-1997 Nokia
> > 5120 (my first phone that supported a data cable and phone book
> > transfer) to my circa-1999 Nokia 7160 via my PC.
>
> OK, you're a very long way from being an average user then.

Of course- otherwise I'd probably be happy with an iPhone!

> In my
> experience, data cables for phones of that era were very expensive,
> and almost nobody had one.

Not terribly- my first was about $35 US from Nokia and included transfer
software, and, IIRC, a driver to use the phone as a modem. They were just
too esoteric an item to "waste" profits bundling them with every phone.
The iPhone dock might be a god analogy. Why bundle it with the 3G when
most 2G users never used them - the few that really want them could buy
them a an accessory andreduce thecost for everyone else..
The point is that the functionality existed for those who cared.


>I think the Motorola RAZR V3 was the first
> phone I had that came with a data cable in the box, and that came out
> at the end of 2004.

Heck, smartphones like the Handspring (eventually Palm) Treo and Windows
"Pocket PC phones" go back to 2002 and included sync cables.

Todd Allcock wrote:

> The advantage of AT&T's plan, back when it was unlimited, was that you
> didn't need to buy a voice plan with it.

Sprint now offers pay as you go 3G data without a voice plan, $20 for
250MB for 30 days, but you have to pay for a USB dongle. Sold only at
Best Buy.

The problems with T-Mobile FlexPay data are three-fold. First, there's
not a lot of 3G yet, second, it's technically for use on the handset
only not for tethering, third, you have to have an expensive flex pay
plan to get it.

I can't wait to see what AT&T does with tethering on the iPhone, and
whether or not they end up cracking down on tethering on other handsets
once they start charging iPhone users extra for tethering.

On Thu, 02 Jul 2009 09:56:59 -0500, Jon Ribbens
<jon+usenet@unequivocal.co.uk> wrote in
<slrnh4pilr.g57.jon+usenet@snowy.squish.net>:

>On 2009-07-02, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@aNOoSPAMl.com> wrote:

>> Au contraire, mon ami. I moved the phone book from my circa-1997 Nokia
>> 5120 (my first phone that supported a data cable and phone book transfer)
>> to my circa-1999 Nokia 7160 via my PC.
>
>OK, you're a very long way from being an average user then. In my
>experience, data cables for phones of that era were very expensive,
>and almost nobody had one. ...

My recollections is that cables were roughly what they are today,
typically in the range of $25-30, and fairly popular among business
users, who were a substantial portion of the market.

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do iFans keep making excuses for it?

On Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:45:01 -0700, SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com>
wrote in <t0g3m.7081$OF1.2014@nlpi069.nbdc.sbc.com>:

>The problems with T-Mobile FlexPay data are three-fold. First, there's
>not a lot of 3G yet,

Actually widely available.

>second, it's technically for use on the handset
>only not for tethering,

Same problem on other carriers.

>third, you have to have an expensive flex pay
>plan to get it.

FlexPay is actually an excellent value.

You're just blowing smoke as usual.

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do iFans keep making excuses for it?

In article <5b6r45legat0qen64rev5c7t02mib1702o@4ax.com>, John Navas
<spamfilter1@navasgroup.com> wrote:

> On Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:45:01 -0700, SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com>
> wrote in <t0g3m.7081$OF1.2014@nlpi069.nbdc.sbc.com>:
>
> >The problems with T-Mobile FlexPay data are three-fold. First, there's
> >not a lot of 3G yet,
>
> Actually widely available.

actually, not as much as other carriers.

> >third, you have to have an expensive flex pay
> >plan to get it.
>
> FlexPay is actually an excellent value.

it is a decent value, but so are offerings from other carriers. it's
not the only choice nor is it the best value for everyone.

> You're just blowing smoke as usual.

ironic, again.

On Fri, 03 Jul 2009 06:42:25 -0400, nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid> wrote
in <030720090642258515%nospam@nospam.invalid>:

>In article <5b6r45legat0qen64rev5c7t02mib1702o@4ax.com>, John Navas
><spamfilter1@navasgroup.com> wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:45:01 -0700, SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com>
>> wrote in <t0g3m.7081$OF1.2014@nlpi069.nbdc.sbc.com>:
>>
>> >The problems with T-Mobile FlexPay data are three-fold. First, there's
>> >not a lot of 3G yet,
>>
>> Actually widely available.
>
>actually, not as much as other carriers.

Depends on what areas you care about. Here in the San Francisco Bay
Area, the area I care about, T-Mobile 3G coverage is very good, on par
with other carriers, and speeds are excellent, as good or better than
other carriers. <http://i42.tinypic.com/2lthdw1.png>

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do iFans keep making excuses for it?

On Jul 3, 3:42*am, nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:

> actually, not as much as other carriers.

There's actually two parts to your "actually." First, in many parts of
the country there is no 3G yet on T-Mobile. Second, at least in the
western region, even if there is technically 3G, T-Mobile coverage is
very lacking.

> it is a decent value, but so are offerings from other carriers. it's
> not the only choice nor is it the best value for everyone.

Flexpay is more expensive than other prepaid plans, plus you have much
poorer coverage that is the hallmark of T-Mobile, at least in the
western region. You wouldn't sign up for FlexPay for voice-only, you'd
only do it if you wanted the $20 unlimited mobile web service.

For example, for less than $33/month you can get 1500 minutes _and_
1500 texts on Verizon's MVNO PagePlus. Far, far better coverage, and
unless you're using 1200 or more off-peak minutes on FlexPay, a lot
more useful for most people to have all their minutes as anytime
minutes, as well as to have texting included at no extra cost. I think
most people would pay the extra $3 for the extra 1200 peak minutes,
plus the 1500 texts, plus the much better coverage.

OTOH, the $20 for unlimited Mobile Web on T-Mobile is a good deal if
you have T-Mobile 3G coverage _and_ if you can tether without them
cutting off your service. If you add MyFaves for $10 a month more you
could essentially get unlimited calling by using Google Voice with one
of the Fave numbers being your Google Voice number, and unlimited
data, for $60/month total. T-Mobile finally put in a tower near my
house so at least I'd have coverage at home!

Personally, I find that WiFi has become so ubiquitous that the times I
need 3G data on the phone or laptop it's cheaper just to pay $1.20/MB
and use it wisely. I think too many people get sucked in by
"unlimited" without realizing that it may not always be the best
option. YMMV.

In article <ltcs45tbmt0r74msvnfvckls19p2md3p3h@4ax.com>, John Navas
<spamfilter1@navasgroup.com> wrote:

> >> >The problems with T-Mobile FlexPay data are three-fold. First, there's
> >> >not a lot of 3G yet,
> >>
> >> Actually widely available.
> >
> >actually, not as much as other carriers.
>
> Depends on what areas you care about. Here in the San Francisco Bay
> Area, the area I care about, T-Mobile 3G coverage is very good, on par
> with other carriers, and speeds are excellent, as good or better than
> other carriers. <http://i42.tinypic.com/2lthdw1.png>

not everyone lives or visits san francisco.

On Fri, 3 Jul 2009 11:22:04 -0700 (PDT), SMS <scharf.steven@gmail.com>
wrote in
<43a63f10-47b4-4560-91ca-6ba643ccf43f@y10g2000prf.googlegroups.com>:

>On Jul 3, 3:42*am, nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>
>> actually, not as much as other carriers.
>
>There's actually two parts to your "actually." First, in many parts of
>the country there is no 3G yet on T-Mobile. Second, at least in the
>western region, even if there is technically 3G, T-Mobile coverage is
>very lacking.

Still not over your anti-GSM agenda, I see -- T-Mobile 3G coverage is
actually quite good here in Northern California, as shown in the
coverage map I posted earlier, and as anyone knows with any actual
experience on the T-Mobile 3G network.

>> it is a decent value, but so are offerings from other carriers. it's
>> not the only choice nor is it the best value for everyone.
>
>Flexpay is more expensive than other prepaid plans, plus you have much
>poorer coverage that is the hallmark of T-Mobile, at least in the
>western region. You wouldn't sign up for FlexPay for voice-only. [SNIP]

Total nonsense.

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do iFans keep making excuses for it?

On Fri, 03 Jul 2009 06:42:25 -0400, nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid> wrote
in <030720090642258515%nospam@nospam.invalid>:

>In article <5b6r45legat0qen64rev5c7t02mib1702o@4ax.com>, John Navas
><spamfilter1@navasgroup.com> wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:45:01 -0700, SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com>
>> wrote in <t0g3m.7081$OF1.2014@nlpi069.nbdc.sbc.com>:
>>
>> >The problems with T-Mobile FlexPay data are three-fold. First, there's
>> >not a lot of 3G yet,
>>
>> Actually widely available.
>
>actually, not as much as other carriers.

Depends on what areas you care about. Here in the San Francisco Bay
Area, the area I care about, T-Mobile 3G coverage is very good, on par
with other carriers, and speeds are excellent, as good or better than
other carriers. <http://i42.tinypic.com/2lthdw1.png>

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do iFans keep making excuses for it?

At 03 Jul 2009 12:18:23 -0700 John Navas wrote:

> >> >The problems with T-Mobile FlexPay data are three-fold. First,
there's
> >> >not a lot of 3G yet,
> >>
> >> Actually widely available.
> >
> >actually, not as much as other carriers.
>
> Depends on what areas you care about. Here in the San Francisco Bay
> Area, the area I care about, T-Mobile 3G coverage is very good, on par
> with other carriers, and speeds are excellent, as good or better than
> other carriers. <http://i42.tinypic.com/2lthdw1.png>


While that's perhaps true, good (or even great,) coverage in any one area
hardly qualifies as "widely available."

I'm as about as big a T-Mo fanboy as you'll find around here, but let's
be realistic- their nationwide coverage is still not up to the levels of
the other big three carriers for voice or data. They sell on the
strength of their value nd customer service, not a bullet-proof network.

At 03 Jul 2009 11:22:04 -0700 SMS wrote:

> > it is a decent value, but so are offerings from other carriers. it's
> > not the only choice nor is it the best value for everyone.
>
> Flexpay is more expensive than other prepaid plans, plus you have much
> poorer coverage that is the hallmark of T-Mobile, at least in the
> western region. You wouldn't sign up for FlexPay for voice-only, you'd
> only do it if you wanted the $20 unlimited mobile web service.


That'd depend on one's needs. Flexpay plans are essentially the same as
T-Mo's regular plans with no credit checks or deposits, so very heavy
users with lousy credit will find value they wouldn't get from
traditional prepaid plans, (or even PP's talk and text,) get features
like "free" M2M and N&W, and have access to more advanced/new phones if
they choose.

(And, BTW, it's actually only $10 for data,
not $20- John is referring to the unlimited data/messaging bundle in his
quote.) The cheapest voice plan is $30, so voice plus unlimited data
starts at $40.

I you REALLY just want unlimited data on T-Mo, you could exploit a
current loophole and setup a phone on regular prepaid, go online and
switch to a "Sidekick plan"- a $1/day unlimited data and messaging plan
intended only for the Sidekick line of "hiptop" phones. You then change
your non-Sidekick's data settings to use the Sidekick's settins, and
you're good to go, at least until T-Mo closes that loophole.


> For example, for less than $33/month you can get 1500 minutes _and_
> 1500 texts on Verizon's MVNO PagePlus. Far, far better coverage, and
> unless you're using 1200 or more off-peak minutes on FlexPay, a lot
> more useful for most people to have all their minutes as anytime
> minutes, as well as to have texting included at no extra cost. I think
> most people would pay the extra $3 for the extra 1200 peak minutes,
> plus the 1500 texts, plus the much better coverage.


Unless you need data- PP is $1.25/MB. "Unlimited" might be overkill
for most people, but average data used by users with data plans is about
30MB/month, IIRC. That'd be suicide on PagePlus.


> OTOH, the $20 for unlimited Mobile Web on T-Mobile is a good deal if
> you have T-Mobile 3G coverage _and_ if you can tether without them
> cutting off your service. If you add MyFaves for $10 a month more you
> could essentially get unlimited calling by using Google Voice with one
> of the Fave numbers being your Google Voice number, and unlimited
> data, for $60/month total. T-Mobile finally put in a tower near my
> house so at least I'd have coverage at home!
>
> Personally, I find that WiFi has become so ubiquitous that the times I
> need 3G data on the phone or laptop it's cheaper just to pay $1.20/MB
> and use it wisely. I think too many people get sucked in by
> "unlimited" without realizing that it may not always be the best
> option. YMMV.


Unlimited, for me, means not having to worry, and not having to
reconfigure my phone's connections. If I'm reading Usenet on my phone
(as I am now) it's far easier to tap the send/receive icon and just use
my unlimited slow EDGE data, than tapping my connection manager icon,
turning on battery-killing WiFi, logging in to an a new access point (if
I haven't used it before,) switching back to my NNTP program and tapping
send/receive. I only use WiFi when the speed will make a significant
difference, like a large upload/download, or browsing "real" web pages.

I only use ancient Windows Mobile phones on PagePlus since they can
easily exploit the PagePlus/Verizon free Quick2Net 14.4kbps loophole. A
moldly-oldy, but new-to-me, Samsung i730 touchscreen QWERTY is coming
from an eBay seller as we speak to upgrade my current non-touchscreen
i600!
The i730 is about the size and weight of a cinderblock, but it has WiFi,
BT, and free Q2N- everything I want in a PP phone!

In article <q0ms451g09an8ldsbvgdi3db2pbpir1fuv@4ax.com>, spamfilter1
@navasgroup.com says...

> >There's actually two parts to your "actually." First, in many parts of
> >the country there is no 3G yet on T-Mobile. Second, at least in the
> >western region, even if there is technically 3G, T-Mobile coverage is
> >very lacking.
>
> Still not over your anti-GSM agenda, I see -- T-Mobile 3G coverage is
> actually quite good here in Northern California, as shown in the
> coverage map I posted earlier, and as anyone knows with any actual
> experience on the T-Mobile 3G network.

They're rolling out in the bigger cities, yes, but there are still a lot
of places, like Victorville, where T-Mo doesn't have 3G yet and there is
no ETA.

We're a little over an hour northeast of Los Angeles.



--
Steve Sobol, Victorville, California, USA
sjsobol@JustThe.net