Slashdot Mirror
German Court Rules iPhone Locking Legal
l-ascorbic writes "A German court has overturned Vodafone's temporary injunction against T-Mobile. Two weeks ago, the British mobile network won an injunction forcing T-Mobile to sell iPhones that were not locked to its network. Vodafone argued that locking is an anti-competitive practice, and sought to force the German network to permanently allow the use of the phones on other networks. After the injunction was granted, T-Mobile offered the unlocked phones for €999 ($1473), and these will now be withdrawn from sale."
The "if you don't like it don't buy one" logic only works to an extent, every single time a vendor locks a phone it squeezes the market place a little more. The bottom line is I should be able to do what i want with something i pay for, and apple can fuck off and die if they think their control should extend past the sale (or any vendor for that matter)
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
If I had mod points, I'd use 'em. But I don't, so I'll just voice my agreement instead:
If it's my stuff (ie, not leased, or rented, or otherwise owned by another party), then I'll be doing whatever the fuck I please with it, as long as it is legal, and nobody can stop me.
The free market works in a lot of different ways. The same ideology that states "if you don't like the Terms of Service, don't buy it" also states "if Apple doesn't want people fucking with the hardware they sell, then they should stop selling it to people."
Kid-proof tablet..
A significant premium indeed, 600 Euro extra NOT to be locked into a T-Mobile contract. For that reason alone, you can be pretty sure that phones sold as unlocked, will stay that way (and functional). Consumer protections are pretty strong in Germany. If a firmware update would re-lock or brick those phones, Apple or T-Mobile would face a class-action lawsuit, and surely lose it.
Probably more interesting is how Apple will provide firmware updates for these unlocked phones, as compared to updating phones that are locked to a specific provider. If it works exactly the same for locked and unlocked phones, that should give clues for a reliable/safe hack (that doesn't risk bricking your phone with future updates). If the procedure is different, that should give good info as to what exactly makes the phone locked. Either way, the mere existence of legally unlocked phones should be a boon for hackers (thank Vodafone for this side-effect of the temporary injunction).
Although it's a nice piece of hardware, I'd rather throw my money at one of these OpenMoko phones (when they're released as consumer-ready).
Because they are actually funded directly by the people. And not by corporates.
Take for instance BBC: It is a public funded news organisation and is the exact opposite of FOX. So BBC has no incentive to like corporate-sponsored candidates and they can actually be true reporters.
Take France: They always hate monopolies, hate corporatocracy, hate anything US-mass made. So for them to rule against Apple is understandable.
Germany: Tricky case. The judiciary is fiercely anti-monopolistic but yet corporate friendly. The parliment is neutral and they are bound by EU laws. And secondly German-made products are faaar superior in quality than chinese-products.
Poland: Fiercely anti-monopolistic and strongly pro-consumer. Alarms corporates a lot.
Finland/Norway/Sweden: All these 3 have totally different but radically same policy: As long as its made in EU they support it. If not in EU, they have a NIH syndrome.
Italy: Let them first get their postal service to work.
Belgium: They can't decide if they want to remain an independent country.
To conclude: EU is mostly pro-consumer and is not awed by corporate money power primarily because EU member presidents and parliments are funded by taxes and public funds, and not by corporates directly.
So they can afford to be altruistic !
"Doing what i can, with what i have." ~ Burt Gummer
You're actually quite wrong here. I am an American who lived in the UK for more than a year. Mobile phones from the big companies are locked in many cases and its not seen as wrong. A trip down to any High Street will yield a few cell phone unlocking shops.
The more expensive handsets, such as my Nokia E61 or my housemate's Nokia N95, were unlocked. Why? Vodafone's contracts are written differently than any US carriers. When I sign up for a cell phone I agree to pay a lump-sum amount of cash in 12, 18, or 24 monthly payments depending on the length of the contract. Incentives increase with the length of the contract. If I cancel the contract at any time, then I must pay the remainder of the sum and forfeit the monthly payment schedule. In this way, Vodafone is already promised a certain amount of cash in exchange for the handset. They don't care if you leave at that point since they've already made the money.
I really find it disturbing that Slashdot heralds Europe as some panacea in the cell world. It's really not as bright and wonderful as you people try to make it out to be. Ultimately these corporate entities are out to make money within a certain set of rules. Cell phone locking, unfortunately, is a fact of life in the UK. When it isn't, its because of the way the contract is written.
You are an idiot, AC. And while I doubt that you'll ever read this, I believe that there are many other mistaken individuals out there who will.
If I sell you something, you're free to do with it as you wish. Whether or not it is discounted (or even sold at a loss) is not a factor in your future use of that item. You own it. It is yours.
For example, there is a grocery store around the corner from my house which has been there since long before I was born. They discount their milk to such an extent that it is sold at a loss, in the hope that they'll recover some of that loss through additional (or future) purchases.
This is really a fairly common practice in retail, at all levels.
Your mentality suggests that it would be OK for the grocer to dictate how one might use that gallon of milk, just because they sold it at a loss, or to punish someone for not buying more profitable items along with it. Both of which would be totally and obviously absurd.
But it is no less absurd when it is electronics instead of dairy goods. They're still just goods being transacted with money.
Your mentality is unhealthy. It defies logic, and goes against thousands of years of property ownership.
Kid-proof tablet..
Only in theory. If that happened, it would be a political scandal and BBC would cover it happening. Several governments have tried pressuring the BBC, but all they have gotten so far is bad press.
If you read some of Apple's statments when they released the iPhone they mention that they're figuring the revenue differently. They said that the revenue from iPhones would be spread out over the term of the service contract.
When Apple said that, they were referring to realizing the revenue for accounting purposes. Apple is spreading the realization of the revenue for the sale of the phone to the customer over a 2 year period. The reason for this is Sarbanes-Oxley.
Due to Sarbanes-Oxley, Apple cannot provide firmware updates to the phone that add features after they realize the full cost of the phone. To avoid a situation like with the 802.11n issue where they had to charge $1 for the update, they spread the revenue over 2 years and can then do firmware updates without running afoul of the law.
The actual price of the phone has nothing to do with this issue and the revenue from the unlocked phones would still have to be realized over 2 years to avoid legal issues with updates.
(basically, Sarbanes-Oxley says you cannot realize revenue for a sale until you have given the customer the entire product. I believe this was in response to Enron's practise of selling its own subsidiary oil, recording a profit from the sale, and never actually shipping the oil. Since they owned the subsidiary, it never complained, and they could turn around and sell the same oil again to someone else.)
My impression was that AT&T was actually paying Apple a share of the monthly service charges.
That is correct. This revenue is not part of the sale of the hardware, though, so it doesn't count with respect to Sarbanes-Oxley requirements.
Darth --
Nil Mortifi, Sine Lucre
"Cellphone contract changed its terms" - Go elsewhere
"But my cellphone is locked" - Buy another phone
"But my music doesn't play on other phones" - Buy music somewhere else
"But my internet connection throttles other music stores' bandwidth" - Get another internet connection
"But all the ISPs do it" - Start your own
See the problem now? ONE of these restrictions is not a problem because you can "take your business elsewhere" , but when you have this bullshit EVERYWHERE then there's nothing you can do. Now before people start mentioning we have unlocked phones. Yes, we have them TODAY , and laws against this bullshit is sensible to ensure we have them in the future. Now if you think the magical "free market" will save the day then you are mistaken on two counts:
a) That we have a free market.
b) That if we had a free market, it would remain free without anybody stopping companies from doing bullshit like this.