Except that the kernel is, by far, NOT the only encrypted portion of the OS X substructure that requires crack-patching in order to run on a frankenbox.
Nothing more than format-shifting? If only it were so. Psystar is applying the equivalent of a crack-patch to the copy before shipping it to you. That constitutes modification of a copyrighted work before reselling. That is only legal with permission from the original copyright holder.
You'd then still be perfectly within your rights to do with the software what you pleased. However, if you decided to then sell or give your software to someone, you'd be redistributing an unlicensed derivative of a copyrighted work.
And yet you lack the right to authorize Pystar to violate the terms of the licensing agreement on retail boxes of Mac OS X
How they gonna make a copy without breaking the shrinkwrap sticker what says "Breaking this sticker constitutes acceptance of the license?"
But seriously...
Psystar isn't just making a copy. To quote from section (b) of that 17 USC 117 you love so much:
"Any exact copies prepared in accordance with the provisions of this section may be leased, sold, or otherwise transferred, along with the copy from which such copies were prepared, only as part of the lease, sale, or other transfer of all rights in the program. Adaptations so prepared may be transferred only with the authorization of the copyright owner."
Psystar is making an adaptation, not a copy. They do not have permission from the copyright owner to do so.
Case closed.
Heh. I guess you haven't heard of the first sale doctrine. They can resell whatever they want.
No. They cannot. Nor can you make photocopies of that Harry Potter hardback you just purchased and sell them on the street at a profit.
You've glossed over an important point. Psystar doesn't just copy the disc onto the computer for you, they copy the software off, and then apply the equivalent of a crack-patch, decrypting and/or replacing multiple segments of it so that it can run on their hardware. They not only do this, they claim it as a service that's part of a package including the hardware they derive their profit from.
If they just shipped a blank hard drive, a shrink-wrapped retail OS X box, and an instruction pamphlet pointing users to the osx86 project, there would be absolutely nothing to see here. But they are claiming that their hardware arrives with OS X on it, and running, and using that claim to move product. They are no longer "end users", they are competitors.
This means that, by selling PCs with OSX on them, they're either:
1. Violating the DMCA by decrypting portions of the OS without owning the attendant hardware keys (which are inside every legitimate Mac)
2. Violating the SHIT out of Apple's various software patents, by competing with them in the same market, using frankensteined hacks of Apple's own code without any permission whatsoever.
And your definition is an equally meaningless 31 word assertion that the acronym "PC" implies IBM-descended hardware with an Intel/x86 CPU. And that's been complete bullshit for almost twenty-five years, ever since the AMSTRAD PC hit the market. PC stands for Personal/Professional Computer, and the buck stops there. It is no less ambiguous than that in this modern age. Drop your crotchety geek-cred one-upmanship and roll into the 21st century already.
Actually there were two lawsuits. Lexmark filed one, where it invoked the DMCA in an attempt to prevent Static Control from distributing a reverse-engineered version of their DRM chip. They lost that case, and rightly so.
And another one was filed against Lexmark, by the Arizona Cartridge Remanufacturers Association, in which ACRA complained that Lexmark was stifling competition by requiring purchasers to send their empty cartridges back to Lexmark ONLY, as a condition for a discounted purchase price.
Lexmark won that suit. Companies _are_ allowed to restict your usage of a product in a point-of-sale contract in order to protect their patent rights. And there are so many patents tied up in OS X that just counting them would make your head spin.
I never said that Apple hasn't written DRM-style code into OS X. It has. That fact, however, is NOT RELEVANT. Sorry Sparky, that red herring just don't hunt.
This is not a debate over whether you are allowed to run software you purchase under emulation. That is why the compatibility of said software across various devices is a moot point. And _that_ is why it is irrelevant whether the incompatibilities built into the software that prevent you from running it unmodified or unassisted on other hardware are due to what you think you can classify as DRM. You yanked DRM into this discussion, and you can just yank it back out again. The debate is not about any of these things; it is about whether you are allowed to SELL A PRODUCT THAT USES THE SOFTWARE AS AN INTEGRAL COMPONENT, even when you obtained the software after agreeing to license restrictions SPECIFICALLY FORBIDDING YOU FROM DOING SO. It's a debate about the marketplace behavior about COMPANIES SELLING PRODUCTS, not about YOU, Mr. John Q End User, and your frothing contempt for any software that would restrict the movement of bits from one device to another. Go home and take your red herring with you.
Okay, so let's assume a competing Ford "knock-off" manufacturer got their firmware from some hypothetical Ford-only Ford Car Firmware Upgrade Disc that sells for five bucks. A programmer with good forensics tools cuts the incompatible portions of it out. Then they happily sell a product running great Ford firmware, and avoid paying any of the R&D costs for it. They justify this sale by pointing out that the purchaser of their product also gets a copy of the Ford-only Car Firmware Upgrade disc. Basically passing the legal risk down to their customers, while still pocketing the full amount of their sale. Do you actually think this tactic should be considered fair market practice?
IT DOESN'T MATTER if another manufacturer can provide the end user with a "superior experience", and thus turn a profit, by selling a car with hacked Ford firmware in it. Even if they got it from some hypothetical Ford-only Ford Car Firmware Upgrade Disc. Just because a programmer with good forensics tools can cut the incompatible portions of it out does not mean that he has suddenly removed all legal limitations from the use of the remaining portions. Do you actually think such a tactic should be considered fair market practice?
And now you bring up DRM because you've just realized you can't adequately attack the car firmware analogy. You're probably the kind of person who thinks it's a "cool cultural statement" to subvert DRM by Bittorrenting DVDs and posting your serial numbers online. Back in my day, we simply called it piracy, and didn't waste our breath trying to make ourselves out like Che Guevara. Bottom line: You are avoiding a purchase for the following reasons: 1. you can. Everything else derives from that simple fact, and ultimately has nothing to do with DRM or the fact that some products consist of data while others don't. DRM can rise or fall entirely on it's own merit as a component in a product in a marketplace, like any other, and your conflating it with Psystar selling franken-boxes containing unlicensed software components is pure handwavium.
The Casual Investor Is Usually Neither
on
Apple After Jobs
·
· Score: 1
I'm pretty sure I speak for everyone here when I say, who gives a crap about the "casual investor". The "casual investor" is a sick spawn of the unholy marriage between the internet and the stock exchange during this decade, who exists for the purposes of being fleeced by the companies that carry their transactions. To them, investing is synonymous with touring Las Vegas, except the motto is not "What happens here stays here", it's "Every day is IPO day!", and the guy in the trenchcoat selling cheat-sheets outside the casino bears a suspicious resemblance to the dealer at the blackjack table inside.
The concept of "free competition for buying" a single offering produced by a single company is a contradiction in terms, like saying that Nintendo has "a monopoly" on the Nintendo DS. Your argument does not even make grammatical economic sense. Also, you have it backwards. OS X comes INCLUDED with every purchase of a Mac. The only way to be exposed to tying is to buy OS X when you don't own a Mac, which makes OS X the product that is doing the tying, NOT the product being tied. And even THEN, you are not required by the EULA to go out and purchase a Mac to run OS X on. You can just shove the DVD in a drawer. So there is not even any tying taking place. The only sensible legal question raised by the EULA and Pystar is about fair use: Are they allowed to prohibit you from hacking the software to run on whatever hardware you choose? Are they allowed to prohibit a company from selling hardware/software/services that facilitate this? This Clayton Act nonsense is a pleasant geek diversion being bandied about by Slashdotters who think they can interpret law like they can read code fragments.
Apple puts DRM hardware in Macs already. Installing OS X with a non-Mac motherboard requires what is essentially a large crack patch (among other things).
Besides, your own quote of the Clayton Act explains why OS X does not constitute an illegal tying arrangement:
"The seller must have sufficient economic power with respect to the tying product to appreciably restrain free competition in the market for the tied product."
By most measurements, Apple doesn't even have ten percent market share in either the "computer industry" or the "computer operating system industry".
Try again, in ten years, when Apple approaches 20%... If, by then, anyone still cares.
The company (Psystar) is based in Miami. If this was linked on Fark it would be under the "FLORIDA" tag,... and we'd all know everything we need to know.
It syncs with one computer. Just like the iPod. You honestly didn't realize that? I have no sympathy for you. Maybe next time you'll read the frickin' online users guide BEFORE you drop FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS on a PHONE.
Ahh, you're so close to having it right. Investment analysts don't bother trying to predict the future swing in the froth of Apple stock. They are - and have been - busily engineering that swing for their own ends. Basically, they, and/or the agencies they work for, are in communication with online pundits and review sites, who publish glowing praise of Apple products when they want the price to go up, and hack-job reviews when they want the price to go down. The froth in the Apple stock that they manipulate is US. You and me. As long as we're nervous nellies who will buy or sell - instead of SIT ON a stock like we SHOULD BE DOING - they will take a nice bite out of the margins our transactions create.
Engadget, posted a story claiming the expected June launch of the iPhone would be delayed until October - and the Leopard October debut would be postponed until January. Engadget's credited its source as coming from an internal Apple e-mail. The e-mail tip turned out to be false. But before anyone figured this out Apple's stock tumbled 3 percent losing US$4 billion in value by the end of the trading day.
Just adding my two cents here, because this flame war amuses me.
-- it allows you to surf the web (the real web), calendaring, email, music, video, pictures, etc. and contrary to your belief most non-smartphones DON'T do that.
- Maybe they don't in the US (since the US appears to be in the stone-age when it comes to telephony), but in Europe they do and have for quite a while.
While this pretzel arguing is impressive, it's going to be moot in about three weeks, when an SDK for the phone emerges. The iPhone will then be considered a smartphone, period. Then you can shut up.
- No, that's not the case at all. As previously stated, I only have 1 problem with Apple. Their computer kit is pricey but pretty reasonable (I personally wouldn't buy it, but I would recommend it to some people). I have no problem with the iPhone itself, other than the fact that it is massively overpriced for the feature set and is locked to a single provider. If they drop the price down to the same levels as other non-smartphones and unlocked it it would be pretty good.
"Massively overpriced" is a "fact", you say? It sold like hotcakes and then Apple cut the price by A THIRD. Then it sold like... more hotcakes. As for vendor lock-in, RTFA. This is apparently the price some people are willing to pay for a product that is different. If it bothers YOU, well then, jailbreak it. You don't want to jailbreak it? Then whatever.
- I quite clearly did not mention Apple at all. Sure, Apple was included in the term "company" but it wasn't explicit. If you trust _any_ company to do something they haven't been contracted to do then you are nuts, and yes, this includes Apple. I haven't said they *won't* do it, I just said you have no guarantee that they will do it. If you are incapable of reading a comment without adding your own spin to push your argument then that's your business - I was quite clear with my wording.
... Said the cut-rate attorney.
-- It's a brand new phone, with a brand new OS, with no widespread consumer testing behind it.
- You're saying that Apple released a product without doing significant consumer testing on it? That seems like complete crazyness - *every* device manufacturer does extensive consumer testing before release.
It's considered bad form to follow mock incredulity with an obvious falsehood.
-- Anyone who would immediately allow 3rd party apps to be installed would be asking for trouble.
- Funny, Palm (or US Robotics as it was then), Symbian (Psion) and Microsoft have all allowed 3rd party apps from from the release of their platforms. Were they asking for trouble? On the contrary - they realised that third party developers would be they key to their success.
I disagree with both sides of thread, but would like to point out that Apple is a newcomer to the celphone industry. It's sensible that their development teams would want to take this process a bit slow. And again, three weeks and we see an SDK. This hair-splitting becomes moot.
-- If Apple really was trying to lock everyone out then why are the about to let everyone in via the SDK?
-Because they realised that locking people out wasn't going to work - interested parties will continue to hack them to unlock the functionality Apple tried to restrict. The unsuccessful efforts to prevent this were creating bad press for Apple so they have been pushed into either continuing to fight a battle they can't win against the developers, or give in and provide an official SDK.
Actually, the functionality that Apple wants to restrict is still quite firmly un-hacked. To access the hardware directly, software authors need what essentially amounts to a private key. No one has been able to reverse-engineer the hardware piecewise and extract this key. Why? Go read a book on the subject. One reason is, if you're clever enough to have access to the specialize
Riiight. Because developers develop software for the benefit of the company that makes the platform. Not, say, for their own personal benefit, or the benefit of their fellow enthusiasts and users.
Ironic statements aside, compare the number of developers of Windows applications to the number of developers of OS X applications. Would you look at those numbers and declare that Microsoft must have a larger "fan base"??
I understand: I know people who won't use any computer program that they can't obtain the source code to. Seems we all have our different tolerances for lock-in.:)
Actually it has little to do with Steve and everything to do with the interface.
It's main function is to be a phone, and though the size is indeed strange, it performs as a phone just fine - at least, according to the vast majority of users. Part of this may be due to actual functionality, but part of this is simply due to the interface:
When the phone rings with a second caller, you are presented with a BIG BUTTON inviting you to conference the newcomer in. Believe it or not, this simple fact can cause a phone user to take advantage of the feature more often, contributing to a slightly better experience overall. Yeah, it's a conference call, whoop-dee-doo. Been available for years. But now people may actually use it.
Same with looking up other information while talking to someone. The interface remains virtually the same when you're on the line. A user is more compelled to manipulate the phone in other ways while connected, because they have confidence that they will not accidentally drop their caller. The superior performance is illusory - ALL phones have supported this for ages - but the clarity of the interface affects the attitude of the user.
Because of this attitudinal difference, the average user will do things with the phone that they didn't have the tenacity to do with their old one. Say you're walking around downtown and your friend calls you, and you want her to meet you at the corner. When you bring up the map application to find the route between her and you, you are exercising skills that you already know - from doing the same routine in front of a computer. There is no whole new interface to learn about - you essentially use your finger as a mouse, and drag and zoom around the map like it was a window in a web browser. Which buttons scroll? Which buttons zoom? How do I select something? You already know these things. A phone that shows a map is NOTHING new. But clearly that is not all that's going on.
Yes, the iPhone is not a usable PDA. But on the other hand, it is not meant to be a PDA. It has PDA-like services, but it is officially labeled as an "Internet Device". The general pattern is that you can read from and interact with it, but not write to or change it (with a few exceptions). This suits most people who want a portable web browser just fine - and if those people want a portable web browser that actually functions like they expect a web browser to, the iPhone is, in all seriousness, their ONLY choice right now. Because of the screen real-estate, landscape mode, and ease of movement around a page, users find themselves regularly visiting sites they would never have the patience to navigate through on another phone.
For example, my wife and I played scrabble in a diner late one night. She wanted to verify that a word I used was legitimate, so she pulled out the iPhone and googled for an official scrabble dictionary page. Then she used two fingers to zoom right in to the text entry field where you enter the word for verification, so it filled the display. She left it there, zoomed in on that field, and entered words in it a dozen more times as the evening progressed. Dead simple. On the other hand, if I was to toss her a typical PDA phone, that was ringing, and ask her to simply answer the call, she would become anxious - because the damn thing has 30 buttons on the front.
As for being tied to a contract and provider "they" wouldn't have chosen "otherwise", let's have a closer look at this. "They" can be divided into two groups. People who were already with AT&T and were unaffected by the lock-in, and people who actively switched from some other carrier just to be able to use the iPhone. What do you expect from these two groups? The first group is going to say nothing. The second group is going to gripe about how they were "forced" to switch. It's practically a given - it doesn't even matter if the service is the same, they're still going to gripe. The question then becomes:
Slashdot Mirror
Except that the kernel is, by far, NOT the only encrypted portion of the OS X substructure that requires crack-patching in order to run on a frankenbox.
"mac fanboi": The new slashdot slur of choice.
Oh did I say new? I meant: Older than slashdot.
Nothing more than format-shifting? If only it were so. Psystar is applying the equivalent of a crack-patch to the copy before shipping it to you. That constitutes modification of a copyrighted work before reselling. That is only legal with permission from the original copyright holder.
You'd then still be perfectly within your rights to do with the software what you pleased. However, if you decided to then sell or give your software to someone, you'd be redistributing an unlicensed derivative of a copyrighted work.
And yet you lack the right to authorize Pystar to violate the terms of the licensing agreement on retail boxes of Mac OS X
How they gonna make a copy without breaking the shrinkwrap sticker what says "Breaking this sticker constitutes acceptance of the license?"
But seriously...
Psystar isn't just making a copy. To quote from section (b) of that 17 USC 117 you love so much:
"Any exact copies prepared in accordance with the provisions of this section may be leased, sold, or otherwise transferred, along with the copy from which such copies were prepared, only as part of the lease, sale, or other transfer of all rights in the program. Adaptations so prepared may be transferred only with the authorization of the copyright owner."
Psystar is making an adaptation, not a copy. They do not have permission from the copyright owner to do so.
Case closed.
Heh. I guess you haven't heard of the first sale doctrine. They can resell whatever they want.
No. They cannot. Nor can you make photocopies of that Harry Potter hardback you just purchased and sell them on the street at a profit.
You've glossed over an important point. Psystar doesn't just copy the disc onto the computer for you, they copy the software off, and then apply the equivalent of a crack-patch, decrypting and/or replacing multiple segments of it so that it can run on their hardware. They not only do this, they claim it as a service that's part of a package including the hardware they derive their profit from.
If they just shipped a blank hard drive, a shrink-wrapped retail OS X box, and an instruction pamphlet pointing users to the osx86 project, there would be absolutely nothing to see here. But they are claiming that their hardware arrives with OS X on it, and running, and using that claim to move product. They are no longer "end users", they are competitors.
This means that, by selling PCs with OSX on them, they're either:
1. Violating the DMCA by decrypting portions of the OS without owning the attendant hardware keys (which are inside every legitimate Mac)
2. Violating the SHIT out of Apple's various software patents, by competing with them in the same market, using frankensteined hacks of Apple's own code without any permission whatsoever.
And your definition is an equally meaningless 31 word assertion that the acronym "PC" implies IBM-descended hardware with an Intel/x86 CPU. And that's been complete bullshit for almost twenty-five years, ever since the AMSTRAD PC hit the market. PC stands for Personal/Professional Computer, and the buck stops there. It is no less ambiguous than that in this modern age. Drop your crotchety geek-cred one-upmanship and roll into the 21st century already.
Your untenable assertion is Pretty much useless.
Actually there were two lawsuits. Lexmark filed one, where it invoked the DMCA in an attempt to prevent Static Control from distributing a reverse-engineered version of their DRM chip. They lost that case, and rightly so.
And another one was filed against Lexmark, by the Arizona Cartridge Remanufacturers Association, in which ACRA complained that Lexmark was stifling competition by requiring purchasers to send their empty cartridges back to Lexmark ONLY, as a condition for a discounted purchase price.
Lexmark won that suit. Companies _are_ allowed to restict your usage of a product in a point-of-sale contract in order to protect their patent rights. And there are so many patents tied up in OS X that just counting them would make your head spin.
I never said that Apple hasn't written DRM-style code into OS X. It has. That fact, however, is NOT RELEVANT. Sorry Sparky, that red herring just don't hunt.
This is not a debate over whether you are allowed to run software you purchase under emulation. That is why the compatibility of said software across various devices is a moot point. And _that_ is why it is irrelevant whether the incompatibilities built into the software that prevent you from running it unmodified or unassisted on other hardware are due to what you think you can classify as DRM. You yanked DRM into this discussion, and you can just yank it back out again. The debate is not about any of these things; it is about whether you are allowed to SELL A PRODUCT THAT USES THE SOFTWARE AS AN INTEGRAL COMPONENT, even when you obtained the software after agreeing to license restrictions SPECIFICALLY FORBIDDING YOU FROM DOING SO. It's a debate about the marketplace behavior about COMPANIES SELLING PRODUCTS, not about YOU, Mr. John Q End User, and your frothing contempt for any software that would restrict the movement of bits from one device to another. Go home and take your red herring with you.
Okay, so let's assume a competing Ford "knock-off" manufacturer got their firmware from some hypothetical Ford-only Ford Car Firmware Upgrade Disc that sells for five bucks. A programmer with good forensics tools cuts the incompatible portions of it out. Then they happily sell a product running great Ford firmware, and avoid paying any of the R&D costs for it. They justify this sale by pointing out that the purchaser of their product also gets a copy of the Ford-only Car Firmware Upgrade disc. Basically passing the legal risk down to their customers, while still pocketing the full amount of their sale. Do you actually think this tactic should be considered fair market practice?
IT DOESN'T MATTER if another manufacturer can provide the end user with a "superior experience", and thus turn a profit, by selling a car with hacked Ford firmware in it. Even if they got it from some hypothetical Ford-only Ford Car Firmware Upgrade Disc. Just because a programmer with good forensics tools can cut the incompatible portions of it out does not mean that he has suddenly removed all legal limitations from the use of the remaining portions. Do you actually think such a tactic should be considered fair market practice? And now you bring up DRM because you've just realized you can't adequately attack the car firmware analogy. You're probably the kind of person who thinks it's a "cool cultural statement" to subvert DRM by Bittorrenting DVDs and posting your serial numbers online. Back in my day, we simply called it piracy, and didn't waste our breath trying to make ourselves out like Che Guevara. Bottom line: You are avoiding a purchase for the following reasons: 1. you can. Everything else derives from that simple fact, and ultimately has nothing to do with DRM or the fact that some products consist of data while others don't. DRM can rise or fall entirely on it's own merit as a component in a product in a marketplace, like any other, and your conflating it with Psystar selling franken-boxes containing unlicensed software components is pure handwavium.
I'm pretty sure I speak for everyone here when I say, who gives a crap about the "casual investor". The "casual investor" is a sick spawn of the unholy marriage between the internet and the stock exchange during this decade, who exists for the purposes of being fleeced by the companies that carry their transactions. To them, investing is synonymous with touring Las Vegas, except the motto is not "What happens here stays here", it's "Every day is IPO day!", and the guy in the trenchcoat selling cheat-sheets outside the casino bears a suspicious resemblance to the dealer at the blackjack table inside.
The concept of "free competition for buying" a single offering produced by a single company is a contradiction in terms, like saying that Nintendo has "a monopoly" on the Nintendo DS. Your argument does not even make grammatical economic sense. Also, you have it backwards. OS X comes INCLUDED with every purchase of a Mac. The only way to be exposed to tying is to buy OS X when you don't own a Mac, which makes OS X the product that is doing the tying, NOT the product being tied. And even THEN, you are not required by the EULA to go out and purchase a Mac to run OS X on. You can just shove the DVD in a drawer. So there is not even any tying taking place. The only sensible legal question raised by the EULA and Pystar is about fair use: Are they allowed to prohibit you from hacking the software to run on whatever hardware you choose? Are they allowed to prohibit a company from selling hardware/software/services that facilitate this? This Clayton Act nonsense is a pleasant geek diversion being bandied about by Slashdotters who think they can interpret law like they can read code fragments.
Apple puts DRM hardware in Macs already. Installing OS X with a non-Mac motherboard requires what is essentially a large crack patch (among other things).
Besides, your own quote of the Clayton Act explains why OS X does not constitute an illegal tying arrangement:
"The seller must have sufficient economic power with respect to the tying product to appreciably restrain free competition in the market for the tied product."
By most measurements, Apple doesn't even have ten percent market share in either the "computer industry" or the "computer operating system industry".
Try again, in ten years, when Apple approaches 20%... If, by then, anyone still cares.
The company (Psystar) is based in Miami. If this was linked on Fark it would be under the "FLORIDA" tag, ... and we'd all know everything we need to know.
" ... dorks who think their choice of tech moves them one step closer to the cool-kids table."
I don't know whether that comment says more about their maturity level, or your maturity level.
It syncs with one computer. Just like the iPod. You honestly didn't realize that? I have no sympathy for you. Maybe next time you'll read the frickin' online users guide BEFORE you drop FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS on a PHONE.
Damn, am I that hopelessly behind the times? Are there actually techniques for kernel building that are known as "blackjack" and "hookers" ??
Ahh, you're so close to having it right. Investment analysts don't bother trying to predict the future swing in the froth of Apple stock. They are - and have been - busily engineering that swing for their own ends. Basically, they, and/or the agencies they work for, are in communication with online pundits and review sites, who publish glowing praise of Apple products when they want the price to go up, and hack-job reviews when they want the price to go down. The froth in the Apple stock that they manipulate is US. You and me. As long as we're nervous nellies who will buy or sell - instead of SIT ON a stock like we SHOULD BE DOING - they will take a nice bite out of the margins our transactions create.
From here, I excerpt:
"after 50 years everybody will totally forget you."
...
So? It's our genes that scream for immortality. It doesn't mean that we should.
Just adding my two cents here, because this flame war amuses me.
-- it allows you to surf the web (the real web), calendaring, email, music, video, pictures, etc. and contrary to your belief most non-smartphones DON'T do that.
- Maybe they don't in the US (since the US appears to be in the stone-age when it comes to telephony), but in Europe they do and have for quite a while.
While this pretzel arguing is impressive, it's going to be moot in about three weeks, when an SDK for the phone emerges. The iPhone will then be considered a smartphone, period. Then you can shut up.
- No, that's not the case at all. As previously stated, I only have 1 problem with Apple. Their computer kit is pricey but pretty reasonable (I personally wouldn't buy it, but I would recommend it to some people). I have no problem with the iPhone itself, other than the fact that it is massively overpriced for the feature set and is locked to a single provider. If they drop the price down to the same levels as other non-smartphones and unlocked it it would be pretty good.
"Massively overpriced" is a "fact", you say? It sold like hotcakes and then Apple cut the price by A THIRD. Then it sold like ... more hotcakes. As for vendor lock-in, RTFA. This is apparently the price some people are willing to pay for a product that is different. If it bothers YOU, well then, jailbreak it. You don't want to jailbreak it? Then whatever.
- I quite clearly did not mention Apple at all. Sure, Apple was included in the term "company" but it wasn't explicit. If you trust _any_ company to do something they haven't been contracted to do then you are nuts, and yes, this includes Apple. I haven't said they *won't* do it, I just said you have no guarantee that they will do it. If you are incapable of reading a comment without adding your own spin to push your argument then that's your business - I was quite clear with my wording.
... Said the cut-rate attorney.
-- It's a brand new phone, with a brand new OS, with no widespread consumer testing behind it.
- You're saying that Apple released a product without doing significant consumer testing on it? That seems like complete crazyness - *every* device manufacturer does extensive consumer testing before release.
It's considered bad form to follow mock incredulity with an obvious falsehood.
-- Anyone who would immediately allow 3rd party apps to be installed would be asking for trouble.
- Funny, Palm (or US Robotics as it was then), Symbian (Psion) and Microsoft have all allowed 3rd party apps from from the release of their platforms. Were they asking for trouble? On the contrary - they realised that third party developers would be they key to their success.
I disagree with both sides of thread, but would like to point out that Apple is a newcomer to the celphone industry. It's sensible that their development teams would want to take this process a bit slow. And again, three weeks and we see an SDK. This hair-splitting becomes moot.
-- If Apple really was trying to lock everyone out then why are the about to let everyone in via the SDK?
-Because they realised that locking people out wasn't going to work - interested parties will continue to hack them to unlock the functionality Apple tried to restrict. The unsuccessful efforts to prevent this were creating bad press for Apple so they have been pushed into either continuing to fight a battle they can't win against the developers, or give in and provide an official SDK.
Actually, the functionality that Apple wants to restrict is still quite firmly un-hacked. To access the hardware directly, software authors need what essentially amounts to a private key. No one has been able to reverse-engineer the hardware piecewise and extract this key. Why? Go read a book on the subject. One reason is, if you're clever enough to have access to the specialize
Riiight. Because developers develop software for the benefit of the company that makes the platform. Not, say, for their own personal benefit, or the benefit of their fellow enthusiasts and users.
Ironic statements aside, compare the number of developers of Windows applications to the number of developers of OS X applications. Would you look at those numbers and declare that Microsoft must have a larger "fan base"??
I understand: I know people who won't use any computer program that they can't obtain the source code to. Seems we all have our different tolerances for lock-in. :)
Actually it has little to do with Steve and everything to do with the interface.
It's main function is to be a phone, and though the size is indeed strange, it performs as a phone just fine - at least, according to the vast majority of users. Part of this may be due to actual functionality, but part of this is simply due to the interface:
When the phone rings with a second caller, you are presented with a BIG BUTTON inviting you to conference the newcomer in. Believe it or not, this simple fact can cause a phone user to take advantage of the feature more often, contributing to a slightly better experience overall. Yeah, it's a conference call, whoop-dee-doo. Been available for years. But now people may actually use it.
Same with looking up other information while talking to someone. The interface remains virtually the same when you're on the line. A user is more compelled to manipulate the phone in other ways while connected, because they have confidence that they will not accidentally drop their caller. The superior performance is illusory - ALL phones have supported this for ages - but the clarity of the interface affects the attitude of the user.
Because of this attitudinal difference, the average user will do things with the phone that they didn't have the tenacity to do with their old one. Say you're walking around downtown and your friend calls you, and you want her to meet you at the corner. When you bring up the map application to find the route between her and you, you are exercising skills that you already know - from doing the same routine in front of a computer. There is no whole new interface to learn about - you essentially use your finger as a mouse, and drag and zoom around the map like it was a window in a web browser. Which buttons scroll? Which buttons zoom? How do I select something? You already know these things. A phone that shows a map is NOTHING new. But clearly that is not all that's going on.
Yes, the iPhone is not a usable PDA. But on the other hand, it is not meant to be a PDA. It has PDA-like services, but it is officially labeled as an "Internet Device". The general pattern is that you can read from and interact with it, but not write to or change it (with a few exceptions). This suits most people who want a portable web browser just fine - and if those people want a portable web browser that actually functions like they expect a web browser to, the iPhone is, in all seriousness, their ONLY choice right now. Because of the screen real-estate, landscape mode, and ease of movement around a page, users find themselves regularly visiting sites they would never have the patience to navigate through on another phone.
For example, my wife and I played scrabble in a diner late one night. She wanted to verify that a word I used was legitimate, so she pulled out the iPhone and googled for an official scrabble dictionary page. Then she used two fingers to zoom right in to the text entry field where you enter the word for verification, so it filled the display. She left it there, zoomed in on that field, and entered words in it a dozen more times as the evening progressed. Dead simple. On the other hand, if I was to toss her a typical PDA phone, that was ringing, and ask her to simply answer the call, she would become anxious - because the damn thing has 30 buttons on the front.
As for being tied to a contract and provider "they" wouldn't have chosen "otherwise", let's have a closer look at this. "They" can be divided into two groups. People who were already with AT&T and were unaffected by the lock-in, and people who actively switched from some other carrier just to be able to use the iPhone. What do you expect from these two groups? The first group is going to say nothing. The second group is going to gripe about how they were "forced" to switch. It's practically a given - it doesn't even matter if the service is the same, they're still going to gripe. The question then becomes: