I think this refers only to their "residential" service. I'm on a business account, and haven't really had many issues with them except for some technical issues (orders not being put in and adding static ip's for a couple of examples).
This isn't to say "buy a higher tier service, or suck it," but perhaps comcast should just put hard speed caps in place and only advertise up to that speed, and not outrageous speed 'but only for what we approve.' Not only that, but where are a lot of their problems happening? Is it on the nodes in local areas or is it in their back end connection to the whole of the internet. I don't know much about the super technical workings of TCP/IP but isn't there a way that they could route p2p traffic between their customers inside their network and infrastructure without jamming up traffic to external sources with little to no impact to other services?
One thing I'd like to know is, how are Comcast and other cable ISPs connected to the internet? Are they all networked together through a cable system with endpoints at telcos?
Ok, so what I'd like to know about their statistics, is "what times of day are these 5% using 50% of the network?" I'd like to think that tech savvy users do their heaviest work late at night when fewer people are utilizing the network. Myself, I do most of my heavy downloading late late at night (between 11pm and 5am) when most normal people are fast asleep. I'm sure others set up a download and then run off to bed.
Assuming that this is the case, exactly what impact on performance is this having on web usage to the "average" consumer? In my opinon, I'd say none. A better option to me, if their numbers are right, would be to shape traffic during times of day. Say, throttling non http/smtp/IM traffic increasing the performance during the day for "consumer" level usage that many small businesses use for communication or what have you. Later in the day, increase the speeds on the throttled traffic up a percentage, creating a "prime time" for those people who use other services like itunes/youtube/whatever file sharing they wouldn't normally use during the day. Then once this "prime time" traffic has died down, open the floodgates.
Granted an option like this doesn't help with them taking more of your money, but it would be an interesting approach to the problem that doesn't really cost them anything either.
That's what I'd like to know. If my phone is locked do I have to unlock it for them (certainly it can't contain contraband or weapons). Also, and maybe this is thinking of it in wrong terms, at what point is data stored elsewhere considered to be "on the phone" in the terms of email viewed through a web portal and not stored directly on the phone.
Can they search my phone if I'm not driving and I don't own the car? I've always assumed they could (and would) go through my phone if it were in their possession and the device is out of sight. I'm also interested to know how it should be handled if a medical/legal professional is arrested and the police want to start digging through emails and txts. Like, where does their search end and attorney/client privilege begin?
I feel pretty much the same way you do. My first thought when reading this was "this coming from the guy who re-invents every new thing to come out..." It's hard to believe he thinks about anything unless it will directly benefit him in some way.
I'm not sure if this is relevant or not. I use Giganews (a company that comcast sub-contracts out for usenet access) for poking around on usenet. They have a 10 concurrent connection limit on downloads etc. The problem is, that if I use all ten of them at the speeds I should be allowed, my modem kills itself. I occasionally use bittorrent and have never achieved the speeds that would make bt stand out as a network resource hog.
I'm curious, are RST's the reason I have to get up and reset my cable modem late at night during file transfers? If so, then it's not just bt suffering. It's anyone doing any kind of high speed (as in maxing out your connection) transfers. I used to think that it was just Giganews sending data too fast and effectively DoS'ing my connection but news like this makes me wonder. Has anyone else had a similar experience with comcast and giganews/highspeed transfers?
I'm fully alert and watching everything because it's unfamiliar to me? I would be interested in statistics but it would be my guess that familiarity breeds laziness, not good driving:)
That's an excellent point I hadn't thought of (being that I'm an excellent driver who would never do such dangerous things that you mentioned...;)
Cheers
What do I see right away? Well your belief that secondary roads are much safer than highways doesn't seem entirely right - for 2005 I see 44.5k deaths on major roads vs 56.5k deaths on smaller roads. A difference sure, but not all that massive.
Maybe it's been a long day for me, but I don't see those numbers you're quoting in the link provided. That said, my interpretation of the poster's statement that we're safer on highways than on secondary roads, is the amount of traffic they accomodate over a specific period of time, the speeds involved, the number of stops along any given stretch of secondary road, etc.. I'm sure the interstate sees way more cars per any given time period than a smaller two lane highway, with a four lane highway being somewhere in between the two (at least in my best estimation and more than a couple of hours driving around the US). Some places use and cross highways as secondary roads. When an accident occurs at one of these intersections (a truck driver blowing a stoplight and nailing a car crossing the highway comes to mind) which roadway gets the points?
What would be interesting to drill down into, is how many of the interstate accidents are by factors other than driver error (deer, weather, construction) causing a fatal accident on an interstate vs. secondary roads. Another interesting way to compare the data would be to break it down to similar lengths of road with similar conditions et al. over a given time/traffic amount.
Also, as a final thought, do any of these statistics take into account a driver's familiarity with the roads compared to people who aren't familiar with the roads? For instance if someone from Kansas comes to my small Indiana town are he and I held to the same amount of risk factor even though I know about subtleties in the roads and routes through town that this person (for the sake of argument) wouldn't?
I'd respectfully have to say that would be very illogical (captain). If anything the logical solution would be to not include ANY web browser, GUI FTP client, or whatever made by anyone, except....... the government as a way to get to your choice of browser. Nissan isn't required to tell you about NAPA replacement parts for your car. They'd rather sell you Nissan parts.
If I were microsoft I'd simply say "Screw you guys. You don't want IE? Fine. You can figure out another way to download an alternative." (if that's all this were about). Not everyone is FTP savvy, especially from a command line.
Cutting Microsoft up because they included a web broswer is silly, and I don't believe is what the AT case was all about.
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought it was because IE was so tightly integrated into the OS. For instance, clicking on "my computer" would open up a window that you could also type a url into and instantly the window was IE. I didn't think it was that big of a deal, since I always used Netscape and then later Firefox, before getting a mac and using Safari. I didn't see it as a powerplay as much as a way to keep people stupid. Though, maybe that was the point.
I say wahtever makes it easier for people in general. Those who care, will look for alternatives, those who don't won't. At the very least you need some sort of interface by default to get an alternative (at least easily...put your usb drives down).
Thank you. I'm glad to see another person spout some common sense when it comes to hacking an iPhone. If you bought it to hack it, then you should be full aware of the risks you take. Especially since the terms and specs of the iPhone had been and are made public from apple directly, all the way down to slashdot forums. If you can't afford to lose, then don't take the risk.
I was noticing something similar to this earlier. There were quite a few domain names ending in.cn. Seemed mostly like junk domain names, but were very odd for ending in.cn
I agree with you wholeheartedly. I'm not familiar with how jury selection works other than they ask you some questions and decide if they want you on their jury or not. AFAIK I don't think there are any requirements other than being over 18 and not a felon. It would seem to me that in situations like this having people with a telecom/IT/IS background or proven familiarity with the subject matter at hand would be the closest a couple of corporations could hope to get as "peers."
Certainly in a case like this though, where it's one company against another Sprint's peers would be the other large telcos that are probably waiting in the wings chomping at the bit to be the next to sue Vonage. Vonage's peers would be akin to larger mom and pop ISP's.
I don't know if this would be an alternative, but here's what I suggest:
When one company wants to sue another, make the CEOs of the companies appear to testify and stay there through the whole trial as the plaintiff and defendant. Currently it seems like it's just two teams of lawyers duking it out in some courtroom and pretty much isolated from the companies at hand. I think if the CEOs of companies had to actually appear and be present at all the proceedings, I bet we'd see a lot less of these kinds of things. I mean really.... Sitting in court is boring. If you had millions of dollars is that really where you'd want to be sitting?
You're definitely right though. Something is broken.
Fleeced or not, they all have a choice. I don't have to have a cell phone. I don't have to give my money to a church. I don't have to buy whatever they are selling.
No, I don't have any kind of vested interest in Apple or the iPhone. I am not a pro-apple crusader, or at least I'm not attempting to be one. I'm more of an anti-moron crusader. (not a slam against you) The idea that all of these people bought a phone to use on a different network after being consistently told it would only work with ATT, then crying foul when this policy is enforced through a voluntary update.
Someone had brought up the DMCA in another post here, and mentioned the idea of restricting firmware upgrades from bricking unlocked phones at the possible expense of future improvements and additional features. As someone who as paid for an iphone and uses it on ATT's network, I'd be punished by that because of what others have done. Though, like bricking the iphone with this next update, that too is speculation.
I don't disagree with unlocking phones and I've unlocked a few phones as well. I don't like that we would pay full price for a device and then be locked in. I do understand however that when I buy a product and use it in a method that is counter to the operating manual, I am not going to cry foul when something I've been warned not to do suddenly causes me a problem.
If anything the fact that the iPhone was cracked as quickly as it was is a subtle pointing of the finger by apple at who the real culprit and reason for locking is: ATT.
As far as spelling america with a K, you can do that all day long. I just don't think it really lends any credibility to your cause or to rational reasoned discourse in general.
Nobody has to participate in the tech market or any market for that matter. His point if I"m not mistaken, is that evil corporations control the masses and are syphoning cash out of consumers' wallets without any return. That is simply not true. If you don't like the actions of a company, then you don't buy their product or anyone that uses their product to build theirs. I don't have any personal sanctions against any companies per se, but I don't go out and buy products I don't like, nor is any corporation actively sucking cash out of my pocket without me knowingly and voluntarily giving it to them in exchange for something I want. If I don't like the way they are selling it, I won't buy it.
I wanted an iPhone. I bought one and reupped my service with Cingular/Att. I did it knowing full well that in order to use the iPhone I'd be stuck with ATT. Don't like it? Don't get an iPhone. It really is that simple. Mobile internet/email/phone calling/messaging is not exclusive to ATT nor are the functions provided by the iphone exclusive to apple.
I see your point and would agree with you if that were an accurate analogy. The thing is, this is less like someone from ford coming out and sabotaging you for racing against their advisement. It's more like them telling you that you shouldn't race the car, you race it anyways, then call them up, tell them you were racing, then take it in voluntarily to have them pull the spark plugs.
Regardless I still stand by the fact that Apple only promised this phone would work with ATT. At this point though, if you have an iphone and use it with another carrier, you're stuck with the firmware version you've got now (assuming this next patch is verified to actually break unlocked phones).
So I guess the answer is yes. It would be wrong to take back a product you intentionally voided the warranty on, then bricked your phone during a voluntary update. Especially since the news is out that the next update could potentially break your new phone. I would hope that anyone smart enough to know about phone unlocking and has actually unlocked their phone, would keep up with things enough to see this warning from apple about the potential to brick the phone, and take the appropriate steps to protect their device.
I guess in my mind the four things that are overlooked in all of this mess, are that 1, nobody forced you to buy an iPhone 2, you were only promised it would work with att 3, you don't have to apply the firmware updates from apple 4, bricking the iphone with this next upgrade is still only speculation.
I hope that Apple is just taking the middle of the road stance "we don't promise anything in regards to unlocked phones" as a way to cover their asses in regards to their deal with ATT, and isn't actively shutting down unlocking paths as I'd like to unlock my phone when my contract is up.
Well yeah, apple shouldn't support third party mods. I do agree that once you are out of your contract with att the phone is yours to do with as you please. Especially once your contract is up. Considering someone had mentioned the DMCA allows for unlocking of phones and that the phone as it comes now out of the box is still unlockable, the only thing you can't do with an unlocked iphone is update to the latest firmware, and even now all of the posts here about this are conjecture. There's no promise this next round is going to fudge anything up.
Well, if you don't have one and don't plan on ever getting one, why do you care?
Sure I have what the corporations want. Money. Disposable income like lots of others. That's why they are in business. They want to take my money. In return they give me something I want. If I don't want it I don't give them my money. Yes, I have an iPhone. I think it's a pretty sweet piece of hardware. Steve Jobs didn't send goons to my house and make me buy it. Nor did he make me buy my MBP or the powerbook before it. Practical first hand experience and my own choice are the reasons I went with Macs.
Why do you hate successful companies so much?
At the very least you have two options when it comes to dealing with corporations. Buy their stuff or don't buy it. You imply that America is run by big evil corporations, yet, you forget where they get their money from and in turn who holds the real power.
But hey, at least you're not a follower and have a totally unique view about corporations, and are just subversive and cool enough to spell America with a K instead of a C.
I guess it would be interesting to test this. At the moment with the firmware currently present on the phones they can be unlocked and aren't breaking the DMCA (at least as I understand what you've stated).
Since updating the firmware is optional after purchase, does the DMCA apply here? If the phone comes "unlock-able" straight out of the box (currently) and the method of undoing the unlocking requires a conscious effort by the end user, it would/will be interesting to see how this plays out.
Ooo.... you spelled America with a K. That's too witty for me.
Ha ha ha ha. Good one. You're absolutely right. I only come to slashdot to read the big words, so I have something that sounds smart to say next time I'm in a meeting.
I guess I missed the part where these people unlocking their iphones were somehow mislead into believing the phone would function elsewhere. I'm certainly not oblivious to the fact the hardware will work with other carriers. I just seemed to have missed the part where you were guaranteed that your phone would still work outside of att's network. I must have been drinking the Kool Aid when Steve mentioned that....
Seriously though, if you don't like the terms attached to the iPhone and can't afford the risks involved with hacking it, why did you get one?
Slashdot Mirror
me too... :D
I think this refers only to their "residential" service. I'm on a business account, and haven't really had many issues with them except for some technical issues (orders not being put in and adding static ip's for a couple of examples).
This isn't to say "buy a higher tier service, or suck it," but perhaps comcast should just put hard speed caps in place and only advertise up to that speed, and not outrageous speed 'but only for what we approve.' Not only that, but where are a lot of their problems happening? Is it on the nodes in local areas or is it in their back end connection to the whole of the internet. I don't know much about the super technical workings of TCP/IP but isn't there a way that they could route p2p traffic between their customers inside their network and infrastructure without jamming up traffic to external sources with little to no impact to other services?
One thing I'd like to know is, how are Comcast and other cable ISPs connected to the internet? Are they all networked together through a cable system with endpoints at telcos?
Ok, so what I'd like to know about their statistics, is "what times of day are these 5% using 50% of the network?" I'd like to think that tech savvy users do their heaviest work late at night when fewer people are utilizing the network. Myself, I do most of my heavy downloading late late at night (between 11pm and 5am) when most normal people are fast asleep. I'm sure others set up a download and then run off to bed.
Assuming that this is the case, exactly what impact on performance is this having on web usage to the "average" consumer? In my opinon, I'd say none. A better option to me, if their numbers are right, would be to shape traffic during times of day. Say, throttling non http/smtp/IM traffic increasing the performance during the day for "consumer" level usage that many small businesses use for communication or what have you. Later in the day, increase the speeds on the throttled traffic up a percentage, creating a "prime time" for those people who use other services like itunes/youtube/whatever file sharing they wouldn't normally use during the day. Then once this "prime time" traffic has died down, open the floodgates.
Granted an option like this doesn't help with them taking more of your money, but it would be an interesting approach to the problem that doesn't really cost them anything either.
That's what I'd like to know. If my phone is locked do I have to unlock it for them (certainly it can't contain contraband or weapons). Also, and maybe this is thinking of it in wrong terms, at what point is data stored elsewhere considered to be "on the phone" in the terms of email viewed through a web portal and not stored directly on the phone.
Can they search my phone if I'm not driving and I don't own the car? I've always assumed they could (and would) go through my phone if it were in their possession and the device is out of sight. I'm also interested to know how it should be handled if a medical/legal professional is arrested and the police want to start digging through emails and txts. Like, where does their search end and attorney/client privilege begin?
I feel pretty much the same way you do. My first thought when reading this was "this coming from the guy who re-invents every new thing to come out..."
It's hard to believe he thinks about anything unless it will directly benefit him in some way.
It's about phreaking time.
I'm not sure if this is relevant or not. I use Giganews (a company that comcast sub-contracts out for usenet access) for poking around on usenet. They have a 10 concurrent connection limit on downloads etc. The problem is, that if I use all ten of them at the speeds I should be allowed, my modem kills itself. I occasionally use bittorrent and have never achieved the speeds that would make bt stand out as a network resource hog.
I'm curious, are RST's the reason I have to get up and reset my cable modem late at night during file transfers? If so, then it's not just bt suffering. It's anyone doing any kind of high speed (as in maxing out your connection) transfers. I used to think that it was just Giganews sending data too fast and effectively DoS'ing my connection but news like this makes me wonder. Has anyone else had a similar experience with comcast and giganews/highspeed transfers?
Don't forget to ask for a receipt
Maybe it's been a long day for me, but I don't see those numbers you're quoting in the link provided. That said, my interpretation of the poster's statement that we're safer on highways than on secondary roads, is the amount of traffic they accomodate over a specific period of time, the speeds involved, the number of stops along any given stretch of secondary road, etc.. I'm sure the interstate sees way more cars per any given time period than a smaller two lane highway, with a four lane highway being somewhere in between the two (at least in my best estimation and more than a couple of hours driving around the US). Some places use and cross highways as secondary roads. When an accident occurs at one of these intersections (a truck driver blowing a stoplight and nailing a car crossing the highway comes to mind) which roadway gets the points?
What would be interesting to drill down into, is how many of the interstate accidents are by factors other than driver error (deer, weather, construction) causing a fatal accident on an interstate vs. secondary roads. Another interesting way to compare the data would be to break it down to similar lengths of road with similar conditions et al. over a given time/traffic amount.
Also, as a final thought, do any of these statistics take into account a driver's familiarity with the roads compared to people who aren't familiar with the roads? For instance if someone from Kansas comes to my small Indiana town are he and I held to the same amount of risk factor even though I know about subtleties in the roads and routes through town that this person (for the sake of argument) wouldn't?
YMMV
I'd respectfully have to say that would be very illogical (captain). If anything the logical solution would be to not include ANY web browser, GUI FTP client, or whatever made by anyone, except....... the government as a way to get to your choice of browser. Nissan isn't required to tell you about NAPA replacement parts for your car. They'd rather sell you Nissan parts.
If I were microsoft I'd simply say "Screw you guys. You don't want IE? Fine. You can figure out another way to download an alternative."
(if that's all this were about). Not everyone is FTP savvy, especially from a command line.
Cutting Microsoft up because they included a web broswer is silly, and I don't believe is what the AT case was all about.
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought it was because IE was so tightly integrated into the OS. For instance, clicking on "my computer" would open up a window that you could also type a url into and instantly the window was IE. I didn't think it was that big of a deal, since I always used Netscape and then later Firefox, before getting a mac and using Safari. I didn't see it as a powerplay as much as a way to keep people stupid. Though, maybe that was the point.
I say wahtever makes it easier for people in general. Those who care, will look for alternatives, those who don't won't. At the very least you need some sort of interface by default to get an alternative (at least easily...put your usb drives down).
Then what should I put on my xserve? Boot camp with win2k server?!!?!?!?!?!
Or pop a lot of popcorn for your neighborhood. :D
Thank you. I'm glad to see another person spout some common sense when it comes to hacking an iPhone. If you bought it to hack it, then you should be full aware of the risks you take. Especially since the terms and specs of the iPhone had been and are made public from apple directly, all the way down to slashdot forums. If you can't afford to lose, then don't take the risk.
I was noticing something similar to this earlier. There were quite a few domain names ending in .cn. Seemed mostly like junk domain names, but were very odd for ending in .cn
I agree with you wholeheartedly. I'm not familiar with how jury selection works other than they ask you some questions and decide if they want you on their jury or not. AFAIK I don't think there are any requirements other than being over 18 and not a felon. It would seem to me that in situations like this having people with a telecom/IT/IS background or proven familiarity with the subject matter at hand would be the closest a couple of corporations could hope to get as "peers."
;) Cheers!
Certainly in a case like this though, where it's one company against another Sprint's peers would be the other large telcos that are probably waiting in the wings chomping at the bit to be the next to sue Vonage. Vonage's peers would be akin to larger mom and pop ISP's.
I don't know if this would be an alternative, but here's what I suggest:
When one company wants to sue another, make the CEOs of the companies appear to testify and stay there through the whole trial as the plaintiff and defendant. Currently it seems like it's just two teams of lawyers duking it out in some courtroom and pretty much isolated from the companies at hand. I think if the CEOs of companies had to actually appear and be present at all the proceedings, I bet we'd see a lot less of these kinds of things. I mean really.... Sitting in court is boring. If you had millions of dollars is that really where you'd want to be sitting?
You're definitely right though. Something is broken.
Just my two cents
Fleeced or not, they all have a choice. I don't have to have a cell phone. I don't have to give my money to a church. I don't have to buy whatever they are selling.
No, I don't have any kind of vested interest in Apple or the iPhone. I am not a pro-apple crusader, or at least I'm not attempting to be one. I'm more of an anti-moron crusader. (not a slam against you) The idea that all of these people bought a phone to use on a different network after being consistently told it would only work with ATT, then crying foul when this policy is enforced through a voluntary update.
Someone had brought up the DMCA in another post here, and mentioned the idea of restricting firmware upgrades from bricking unlocked phones at the possible expense of future improvements and additional features. As someone who as paid for an iphone and uses it on ATT's network, I'd be punished by that because of what others have done. Though, like bricking the iphone with this next update, that too is speculation.
I don't disagree with unlocking phones and I've unlocked a few phones as well. I don't like that we would pay full price for a device and then be locked in. I do understand however that when I buy a product and use it in a method that is counter to the operating manual, I am not going to cry foul when something I've been warned not to do suddenly causes me a problem.
If anything the fact that the iPhone was cracked as quickly as it was is a subtle pointing of the finger by apple at who the real culprit and reason for locking is: ATT.
As far as spelling america with a K, you can do that all day long. I just don't think it really lends any credibility to your cause or to rational reasoned discourse in general.
Cheers.
Nobody has to participate in the tech market or any market for that matter. His point if I"m not mistaken, is that evil corporations control the masses and are syphoning cash out of consumers' wallets without any return. That is simply not true. If you don't like the actions of a company, then you don't buy their product or anyone that uses their product to build theirs. I don't have any personal sanctions against any companies per se, but I don't go out and buy products I don't like, nor is any corporation actively sucking cash out of my pocket without me knowingly and voluntarily giving it to them in exchange for something I want. If I don't like the way they are selling it, I won't buy it.
I wanted an iPhone. I bought one and reupped my service with Cingular/Att. I did it knowing full well that in order to use the iPhone I'd be stuck with ATT. Don't like it? Don't get an iPhone. It really is that simple. Mobile internet/email/phone calling/messaging is not exclusive to ATT nor are the functions provided by the iphone exclusive to apple.
I see your point and would agree with you if that were an accurate analogy. The thing is, this is less like someone from ford coming out and sabotaging you for racing against their advisement. It's more like them telling you that you shouldn't race the car, you race it anyways, then call them up, tell them you were racing, then take it in voluntarily to have them pull the spark plugs.
Regardless I still stand by the fact that Apple only promised this phone would work with ATT. At this point though, if you have an iphone and use it with another carrier, you're stuck with the firmware version you've got now (assuming this next patch is verified to actually break unlocked phones).
So I guess the answer is yes. It would be wrong to take back a product you intentionally voided the warranty on, then bricked your phone during a voluntary update. Especially since the news is out that the next update could potentially break your new phone. I would hope that anyone smart enough to know about phone unlocking and has actually unlocked their phone, would keep up with things enough to see this warning from apple about the potential to brick the phone, and take the appropriate steps to protect their device.
I guess in my mind the four things that are overlooked in all of this mess, are that 1, nobody forced you to buy an iPhone 2, you were only promised it would work with att 3, you don't have to apply the firmware updates from apple 4, bricking the iphone with this next upgrade is still only speculation.
I hope that Apple is just taking the middle of the road stance "we don't promise anything in regards to unlocked phones" as a way to cover their asses in regards to their deal with ATT, and isn't actively shutting down unlocking paths as I'd like to unlock my phone when my contract is up.
Cheers.
Well yeah, apple shouldn't support third party mods. I do agree that once you are out of your contract with att the phone is yours to do with as you please. Especially once your contract is up. Considering someone had mentioned the DMCA allows for unlocking of phones and that the phone as it comes now out of the box is still unlockable, the only thing you can't do with an unlocked iphone is update to the latest firmware, and even now all of the posts here about this are conjecture. There's no promise this next round is going to fudge anything up.
Well, if you don't have one and don't plan on ever getting one, why do you care?
Sure I have what the corporations want. Money. Disposable income like lots of others. That's why they are in business. They want to take my money. In return they give me something I want. If I don't want it I don't give them my money. Yes, I have an iPhone. I think it's a pretty sweet piece of hardware. Steve Jobs didn't send goons to my house and make me buy it. Nor did he make me buy my MBP or the powerbook before it. Practical first hand experience and my own choice are the reasons I went with Macs.
Why do you hate successful companies so much?
At the very least you have two options when it comes to dealing with corporations. Buy their stuff or don't buy it. You imply that America is run by big evil corporations, yet, you forget where they get their money from and in turn who holds the real power.
But hey, at least you're not a follower and have a totally unique view about corporations, and are just subversive and cool enough to spell America with a K instead of a C.
I guess it would be interesting to test this. At the moment with the firmware currently present on the phones they can be unlocked and aren't breaking the DMCA (at least as I understand what you've stated).
Since updating the firmware is optional after purchase, does the DMCA apply here? If the phone comes "unlock-able" straight out of the box (currently) and the method of undoing the unlocking requires a conscious effort by the end user, it would/will be interesting to see how this plays out.
I'd opt not to buy the kick in the balls and instead punch you in the face. ;)
Ooo.... you spelled America with a K. That's too witty for me.
Ha ha ha ha. Good one. You're absolutely right. I only come to slashdot to read the big words, so I have something that sounds smart to say next time I'm in a meeting.
I guess I missed the part where these people unlocking their iphones were somehow mislead into believing the phone would function elsewhere. I'm certainly not oblivious to the fact the hardware will work with other carriers. I just seemed to have missed the part where you were guaranteed that your phone would still work outside of att's network. I must have been drinking the Kool Aid when Steve mentioned that....
Seriously though, if you don't like the terms attached to the iPhone and can't afford the risks involved with hacking it, why did you get one?