August 2007: Monthly Archive

There’s no news from the $100 grand reward for free software blog, but I don’t really think you’ll see it. Why the artificial deadline? The big news today is the absurdity of the DMCA where it comes to unlocking. You see, in the USA, we have a right to unlock the phones. But AT&T and/or Apple has no obligation to do so. And the software that does it; that’s technically software that bypasses a security measure, etc., which means that it’s governed by the DMCA. And the DMCA pretty much screws anyone that bypasses a security measure. That’s the root issue at stake: that our telco laws here are bollocks.

At any rate, Ars Technica has probably the best writeup on it that I’ve read this morning.

They link to Ed Felten’s blog, where he states that AT&T is screwed, and that we’ll have an unlock one of these days. Ed Felten is kind of famous in some circles for work with the Govt. in the Microsoft Antitrust trial, his defeat of the SDMI audio watermarking (and the RIAA’s bizarre lawsuit that followed), and his utter defeat of Diebold / Premier Election Solutions e-voting machines on TV. He’s had some experience here, and knows what he’s talking about.

iPod Observer has a good writeup on an article at BusinessWeek that also explores the issue in depth, and BusinessWeek has a bit of their own insightful commentary as well:

“Indeed, this time, hackers may have the law on their side. Remember, decades ago, automakers built their instrument panels so that only authorized radios of their own manufacture would fit in. Eventually, U.S. courts ended that practice.”

And no one ever had trouble installing a car stereo again.

There’s another writeup on the two currently-poised-to-release-unlocking-software-but-not-really-willing-to-until-the-lawyers-say-it’s-ok groups, iPhone Unlocking / John McLaughlin, and iPhoneSimFree. It gives a good view from above if you’ve not heard about it.

MYiTablet found an interesting article at C|Net that postulates that Jobs wants the iPhone hacked and unlocked; that Apple lawyers doesn’t care — Apple’s stake after the sale is tiny:

“Isn’t it ironic that AT&T lawyers went knocking on the doors of the hackers while Apple lawyers sipped tea at home?”

I suppose that’s a rhetorical question, but NO — it’s not irony. It is insightful and interesting, though. What does Apple get for iPhone service plan revenue sharing, $12 the 1st month and $3/month per subscriber thereafter? He’s got a good point, and it’s a good article. As a side note, Don Reisinger has some crazy red lips.

figure 1: Seriously, check out the crazy red lips Don Reisinger’s got.

And finally, there’s a Slashdot discussion about it all too. I don’t have anything stupid to say that I want broadcast to the internet today, so I’ll skip it. But that option is always there.

Some hosers in Montreal successfully managed to get iPhones working on Canada’s Rogers wireless network, with a little help of the rather costly TurboSIM card method. Apparently these chaps are unaware of the 18 million and counting software unlock solutions that cost nothing, or they could have saved themselves the price of 200 maple leaves, eh?

Come on, Canada. The Israelis are making you look like chumps!

Read

I think you can see a bunch of posturing between the two companies that are ‘poised’ to release the iPhone unlock, but both of them have law-talkin’ work to do before they can.

Anyway, here’s a wee bit of posturing from the iPhone Unlocking blog. The unlock video isn’t a good quality video; it’s all done with his Nokia N95; the video is chunky, as shaky as anything could really hope to be. The Windows command-line text that proves the connection and unlock process is all a big blur. Once it’s all said and done, he puts in his sim card, and it appears to work just fine. But if you need to watch it, it’s here. Bonus points for him exposing his friend Liz’s phone number in her voice mail when she doesn’t answer his call.

Erling Ellingsen figured out how to get the iPhone to report data from its accelerometers at a faster rate, which opens the doors to all sorts of fun apps that use the accelerometer. You can see the apps that Ellingsen is thinking about developing on his survey, for example. He gives some proofs of concept on his iPhone in the very brief video above. And he’s posted the source code to it all too. Brilliant! [via]

There’s a Reuters article about iPhone games floating around. They interview the folks of PopCap, who have a few iPod games under their belt; GreyStripe, who does games with web ads; and EA, who doles out the money quotes like candy at a parade. From Travis Boatman, VP of Worldwide Mobile Games at EA:

“Apple wants to be focused on making sure the thing works as a core device.”

“The first few iPods didn’t support games but eventually they did.”

“We’re huge believers in the iPhone and believe that’s going to be a viable market going forward.”

“It has an amazing interface for games and there are lots of beautiful things you can do with that touch interface.”

I asked EA about iPhone games at ShowStoppers, part of CTIA, back in March. They were coy then, too; there had been a few reports of an agreement for games between EA and Apple even then. Needless to say, I was unable to drag any sort of official comment out of their spokesperson there. The tune he sung was to the gist of “if or when Apple puts games on it, we’ll be there.”

figures 1 & 2: some iPhone backgrounds that relate to bricks or bricking.

So a bunch of display iPhones were stolen. Not really news; they took the Treos too (good call on that). The AT&T store guy is unconcerned that the iPhones were stolen, since Apple can brick (deactivate, render useless, turn into a heavy shiny thing, etc) the phones remotely by their serials.

Wait, what?! I can’t decide if I should be discomfited by this or not. I wonder if he’s posturing for AT&T’s sake, or if this is something that Apple can really do.

But for real, if Apple can do this to stolen phones, they can do it to hacked or unlocked phones. Again, that’s if they can do this at all. Or should I perhaps say, if they’re willing to do this at all. Bricking phones willy-nilly across the internet would burn through a lot of the goodwill that they currently enjoy, so I doubt it would happen. Maybe the remote bricking process requires AT&T to ask Apple to destroy the phones really nice. So yeah. No discomfiture.

How much can I stand, for that matter? The New York Times has an interview with Jim of iPhoneSimFree.com.

You can read the interview here. Money quote, I choose you:

“Currently we are working hard to structure the end retail price as low as possible while leaving enough margin for distributors and wholesalers. If we find this formula unsuitable we will simply work backwards and peg the retail price as low as possible to ensure that it is a viable and affordable option for anybody wanting to free their Iphone.”

George Hotz aka Geohot, mentioned yesterday for being on NPR, is now making the rounds in an Associated Press story.

Hotz was able to trade his unlocked iPhone in for 3 other iPhones and a sports car. He gave the iPhones to contributors and co-developers; the car is his and his alone.

[Hotz traded his unlocked iPhone for] “a sweet Nissan 350Z and 3 8GB iPhones.”

“This has been a great end to a great summer.”

He made the trade with Certicell USA, who recondition phone batteries. Certicell also offered him a paid consulting job.

Yup, not a bad trade at all. Not a bad way to start college either.

Is it real or fake? I can’t really tell; it’s probably best that you judge for yourself. I hope that it is real, and that one of the myriad hacking groups that claims to have unlocked the iPhone opts for it, and is justly rewarded with $100,000.

Boxwave released an $8 adaptor to enable the finicky iPhone to charge from your existing USB bricks. Presumably the device adds pull-up resistors to the USB data wires which the iPhone appears to require in order to charge. Many existing USB car and AC adaptors do not have these resistors, and as such the iPhone doesn’t charge when using them.