AT&T Welcomes Programmers for All Phones Except the iPhone

An anonymous reader writes "Apple's reasoning for keeping the iPhone a closed platform is that they don't want to 'potentially gum up the provider's network'. An article in the New York Times, though, points out that there are hundreds of phones out there working on open platforms that don't seem to be causing network interference. AT&T and Palm, in fact, welcome experimentation on their platforms. In AT&T's case ... on every phone but the iPhone. 'Hackers who have explored the workings of the phone say it uses the frameworks and structures that Apple uses on its other platforms to enable development; it just hasn't been documented. So if Apple is going to allow applications later, is there any reason -- other than vindictiveness or obsessive interest in control -- that it would want to cut off those developed by the pioneers who figured things out ahead of the official launch?'"

Comments

Re:vindictiveness?

[Lumpy]

Already there.

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/cellphones/meizu-m8-pricing-revealed-most-affordable-iphone-clone-yet-241069.php

as well as many others. I have touched one of the cooler ones that accepts 2 sim cards. I love it when some of the international sales people come back from HongKong with neat toys.

"Network interference" my butt...

[dpbsmith]

To anyone my age, the bogeyman of "network interference" instantly calls to mind Ma Bell and all the reasons she gave why nobody but AT&T could be trusted with an RJ-11 jack.

Actually, it predated the RJ-11 jack.

Here we go:

The New York Times, February 17, 1951, p. 30: Phone Company Upheld In Ban on Hush-a-Phone

The Hush-A-Phone was a simple cup-like acoustic isolation device that snapped onto a telephone handset and provided a measure of privacy and quiet. No wires, no electrical connection. The phone company banned it as a "foreign attachment." In the Times story, the FCC agreed such devices were subject to A. T. & T. control. The punch line:

"Unrestricted use of the device could, in the commission's opinion, result in a general deterioration of the quality of telephone service."

Yes, seriously.

Later, the phone company was to claim that wired connections to third-party devices (answering machines and, later, modems) could not only bring down the network but put their linemen at risk of electrocution. Anyone who wanted to connect a computer had two choices: buy a very pricey "Dataphone"--never sold, of course, but leased by the month--or buy a third-party modem anduse a pricey phone-company-supplied "Data Access Arrangement" device, which was never sold but only leased by the month.

It took decades to get the FCC to agree that it had the regulatory authority to set specifications for third-party interconnects, and to allow them.

I recall an amusing Racal-Vadic advertisement showing "Ma Bell" depicted as a grandmotherly figure, staring out of her window in horror at a huge dump truck pouring hundreds of DAA boxes onto her lawn, now that Racal-Vadic modems no longer needed them.