Thursday
Oct042007
Not Dead Yet
Thursday, October 4, 2007 at 6:15PM 
People seem to have misinterpreted my "dead cow" analogy and are assuming that I bricked my iPhone. Nope. I have both the original iPhone, upgraded to 1.1.1, and the unlocked iPhone still and forever at 1.0.2. I'm donating the latter to The Lab for further experimentation. I'll keep the locked phone around so I can continue to cover the platform, which was the reason I bought it in the first place.
It's not for myself that I am whining, or even others I know whose phone were bricked. My point is that it's punitive for Apple to intentionally damage unlocked iPhones, and I believe that's wrong.
To those who say we can't know Apple's intention, I'd respond that it would have been a simple bit of coding to checksum the modem firmware and refuse to update if it had been modified. In fact, that would have been a prudent precaution no matter what. By choosing not to do so Apple is making its intent clear, and absent any statement to the contrary from Cupertino I'm going to continue to think Apple wishes unlockers ill, no matter what Fake Steve Jobs says.
To prove I still have a working iPhone, here are two pictures from my hotel window in Vancouver. One with the iPhone and one with the Nokia N95. You tell me which you prefer.
Nokia
Apple
Oh, and incidentally on the Nokia and the unlocked iPhone uploading these images in full quality to Flickr takes one click using third party apps (ShoZu on the N95 and Send Picture on the iPhone). On the locked iPhone I had to dock to my Mac, import the photo into iPhoto, export it, and then upload to Flickr. That's one of the reasons I want to be able add third-party apps to my mobile phones. Now I'm going to run to the Fatburger next door and have a veggie burger. No more dead cows for me. Good night.tagged Camera Phone, Gear, N95, Photos, Technology, iPhone in Blog
Camera Phone, Gear, N95, Photos, Technology, iPhone in Blog
Reader Comments (73)
definately the nokia has a better pic then apple. the apple photo seems to have an all blue tint on everything
Nokia for deff - N95 best bloody phone - iPhone, looks nice but doesn't perform well.
"To those who say we can’t know Apple’s intention, I’d respond that it would have been a simple bit of coding to checksum the modem firmware and refuse to update if it had been modified. In fact, that would have been a prudent precaution no matter what. "
But what if my phone has become corrupted? This would mean I could never reload the firmware.
I don't know how they could have made it any clearer *not* to update a modified phone.
And before you label me as having Stockholm Syndrome, let me say I'm not happy about this either. I was using iToner (but no other hacks/unlocks) and now I am unable to use my own ringtones (which aren't even songs, but sound effects I downloaded with the express point that they were created to be ringtones). But some of the other fixes were worth it to me, so I won't try going back to 1.02.
Leo,
Apple having code to check the checksum is nice but really, is it their responsibility to test the phone to make sure you did not do anything to it first?
However, I do think Apple should assist honest hackers with bringing the phone back from it's bricked state instead of leaving it to the hacking community. For a charge of course. Maybe a $30 charge and they de-brick the phone for you. (in store only).
I don't think any of my pictures have that much blue in them.
So are you still a journalist, because you seem to have completely lost your ability to be objective in regards to this update. All indications are that not only did Apple not intentionally brick unlocked phones, they did a lot of work to prevent any bricking.
Before you go accusing me of being brainwashed, I'd like to point out that the iPhone is incredibly complicated and Apple has not worked out all of the software kinks. 1.1.1 is very different under the hood than 1.0.2, to the point of being almost a complete rewrite. The jailbreak and unlock software depend on software vulnerabilities in order to work, so if Apple fixes those bugs, of course the hacks will break. Normally, fixing bugs like that (the ones that can allow for arbitrary code injection and execution) in a timely manner is a good thing.
Remember that it took Apple around nine years for OS X to become excellent. It will take Apple some time to make the iPhone OS similarly stable. If you think that OS development is easy, just ask Palm (Garnet is how old now) or Microsoft, which has been trying to make a decent mobile OS for what, 15 years now? Maybe you can explain why Apple making the iPhone OS more robust and secure is a bad thing for consumers?
The Nokia picture looks like a sunset, and also kind of like a HDR image, and kind of surreal. It's also kind of weird how un-blue the sky is.
The iPhone, by comparison, looks like it was shot at dusk, after sunset, and has a much more natural looking blue sky.
Which one's better depends on how much air pollution &/or fog there is in Vancouver.
(Irony note: Apple's spell check thinks Nokia should be Nikon)
I love my iPhone, but the onboard camera is garbage. Clearly the Nokia is exceptional. I have noticed the auto white balance on the iPhone sometimes doesn't work very well, but I'm always carrying at least one other camera with me anyway. Still, if you're in a pinch, I suppose the iPhone camera is better than no camera. But just barely.
Leo, I enjoy your shows and will continue listening to them but i think your wrong. Wrong wrong wrong.
Leo, I thought you were going to give the unlocked iPhone to Amber...?
Seeing these two pictures I guess there is nothing more to be said - the N95 has a digital camera in it, the iPhone has a hole in the back.
I mean, such a gorgeous display, but if I want some decent pictures to look at on it, I'd probably have to upload them as the integrated 'camera' surely cannot provide them.
Oh, and come on - "Paul" is Scott Bourne and we all know it! ;-)
Oh, and it kind of sucks that your only counterpoint on your podcasts is Scott Bourne, who seems to hold Apple in some kind of religious reverence. Maybe you can get Erica Sadun on the next Macbreak Weekly or TWIT? It would be good to hear from someone who's really in the trenches and has more or less universal respect.
@Thomas: KMA
Scott Bourne talks about legal threats and crap like that and is just as much under the impression that Apple intentionally bricked phones. I'm talking about technical reasons why bricking occurred and why Apple is not "currently" (Apple's word choice BTW) allowing native development. Even Engadget doesn't believe that Apple intentionally bricked any phones. All I'm suggesting is that instead of assuming things without any supporting evidence, Leo and Scott should act like actual journalists and talk to people who actually know things, like Erica or even Ryan Block. You think Scott Bourne could even bring himself to say that?
{Disclaimer: I have not read up on much of this iPhone unlocking business... everything I know about this is from Leo's podcasts and a few websites I read daily that cover mostly Mac stuff, so I may say things that are not factual}
First, I like the Apple picture better, even though it's not true to life and the resolution is obviously not going to be as good (since I think you said the Nokia has a 3MP advantage). To me, It's a much more emotional and moody picture....but this is purely up to individual taste. The Nokia is "meh, I could have taken that with any camera". But, I understand what you're getting at.
Second, while I understand the idea of why you'd want to unlock the phone, I must point out that since Apple's not allowing unlocking (as per the EULA, according to you guys), why *would* they have to run a checksum on the modem firmware? They would have been the only people that have *touched* the modem, so they know with certainty what the modem *should* be at. To be honest, I'm not sure why you'd want to SIM unlock the phone unless you lived outside NA where there are actually more than 2 carriers anyway (since that's the only reason to do a full unlock.....doing the part-way unlock doesn't brick your phone, from what I understand)
Third, I understand the drive to do all sorts of things to the iPhone to give it features that Apple hasn't included yet and to change things you don't like. But, Apple chose to make a closed platform that obviously is not *easy* to breach. They do this, I believe, primarily to ensure that the user experience is the same across all handsets--and that that experience is consistently good. I think that if you want an open phone, you go to some other company and buy their product. I believe that something as mission-critical as a phone *should* be a somewhat closed system, because I don't know about you, but I'd prefer my phone be rock steady, rather than trust its stability to third party developers who can't possibly test their software with every other piece of software (and other combinations of other software).
I believe that the iPhone is a 1.0 product, and I believe that Apple is *going* to keep on improving this product (an SDK *will* be coming especially since Apple's now seen all the interest in running 3rd party apps...you may think Apple's stupid, but they're not *that* stupid)--introducing new features and possibly opening up the platform a little bit as time goes on. If you are not patient enough to wait for this to happen or you don't like the way Apple's doing things, then you need to jump ship and get something else... I'm sure there's something out there that will better suit what you want in a phone.
One last thing...I have no evidence for or against this, but isn't there a possibility that Apple didn't sell the iPhone as an unlocked phone because
1) it would cost even more, since Apple wouldn't be able to recoup the R&D cost from both the phone and plans--it'd have to recoup the cost from the phone sales alone. If a BlackBerry is going for some $600 unlocked and has fewer features than the iPhone, and is not built by a "prestige" company, can you imagine how much an iPhone would cost?
2) Is there not a chance that they *needed* a carrier to participate in order to get one of the killer features--visual voicemail--to become a reality? If this was an unlocked phone, would AT&T and Verizon just go "why the hell would I spend money making this if there's only one handset that will use it?" (or more likely "okay, we'll build this, but if you want it, that's an extra $10 a month). And, I'm not sure about this, but up here in Canada, the plans are insane if you want unlimited data (in fact, unless I'm mistaken, you can't even *get* unlimited data plans)...is it not possible that Apple convinced AT&T to invent a "special" iPhone plan? I hope that when the phone lands up here, Rogers will be offering a reasonably priced cell plan with it, since I'm not paying $300 or whatever a month just so I can use an iPhone, thankyouverymuch. I'd sooner duct tape an iPod Touch, my v3i, and my SD800IS together and call it a day.
Sorry for going on so long, but I've had this bottled up for a while. Am I an Apple fanboy? Yes (except for when they stop making OS9-capable machines a couple years too early--that really pissed me off [I'm in IT in education...so you can understand why it takes us so long to move to X--I still have a few schools that don't have the money to do this]). Am I a jealous Canadian who is sick of hearing Americans bicker about the (what I consider) minor downfalls to a device I think is AWESOME but I can't buy and use without jumping through hoops? Abso-fricken-loutley, eh. Do I love and respect basically everything Leo does? Yes. Do I think that Leo's blowing this whole thing way out of proportion (possibly because he's pissed at Scott Bourne for being so dismissive)? Yes. Calm down, Leo. It's not good for your health.
iPhone? Awesome...but it's just a phone. Don't like it? Don't buy it... buy something else or wait until Apple fixes what you don't like about it.
What I have not seen in all the discussion is anyone bringing up the fact that Apple evidently has limited programming resources.
After all, Leopard was pushed back six months in order for those programmers to finish the iPhone. Presumably after the iPhone shipped, the bulk of those programmers moved back to Leopard.
Could the problem with the update be related to lack of resources? Maybe that combined with the knowledge that unlocked phones threatened not just AT&T but all of Apple's cell partners worldwide made them more likely to want to send a message.
Perhaps there's no single reason why the update bricked phones. I think too often people come up with explanations for events that are too simplistic and based on little to no actual inside knowledge.
It's all just speculation.
Either the 100 rebate has falsely caused Leo to think that Apple should care or Leo intentionally threw a wrench in this debate to ruffle our feathers.
This is one reason why I'd prefer not to have a camera in my phone. I have a camera, thank you very much.
That doesn't gel with this third party developer who had this to say:
I'm frustrated, honestly. With iToner, we worked very, very hard to make sure we did things the right way. We didn't hack into the phone at all, we didn't "jailbreak" it - we used the same APIs that iTunes uses to put files on the iPhone, and we put those ringtones in the user area of the phone. This is why iToner ringtones survived OS updates.
Then Apple rolled out their iTunes music store sale of ringtones... and they broke iToner. The way they broke it seemed excessive, but understandable from a programming point of view, so we rapidly came out with a fix. The first few weeks of iToner's life was nothing but coffee, code, and sleepless nights for people here at Ambrosia, so as such, sure, it's frustrating that it's broken yet again.
We're not putting anything but data on the iPhone, and we're doing it in the right way, and we're putting it in the user area of the iPhone. Apple is intentionally making sure that products like ours don't work. That I think is a mistake - it's as if in an iPhone OS update, Apple decided that MP3s you got from ripping a CD should no longer play on your iPhone, and you should instead buy them from their store.
http://tinyurl.com/23ufgv
::Before you go accusing me of being brainwashed, I’d like to point out that the iPhone is incredibly complicated and Apple has not worked out all of the software kinks. 1.1.1 is very different under the hood than 1.0.2, to the point of being almost a complete rewrite. The jailbreak and unlock software depend on software vulnerabilities in order to work, so if Apple fixes those bugs, of course the hacks will break. Normally, fixing bugs like that (the ones that can allow for arbitrary code injection and execution) in a timely manner is a good thing.
No contest the Nokia picture wins hands down. The iPhone must not be too happy it has a serious case of the blues.
I dig your shows and netcasts, love your point of view! Sucks that you've lost interest in the iPhone, but you must see alot of cool stuff, and the nokia pic looks amazing! What other things can it do? P.s. Scott is cool because even though I disagree, he is who he is and not some "Leo yesman" anyway hello from Australia :)
The Nokia picture looks like you took it with a digital camera, not a camera phone.
-A
I'll keep this short:
As customers of Apple we can do one of two things:
1. We can stop buying the products that do not have the features we need, namely the ability to "unlock" the phone.
or
2. We can do what many EU nations have done which is make it illegal to sell locked cell phones in the US.
I agree with leo.
One thing I'd like to point out, however, is that I think everyone in the medias is getting a little crazy with the expression "bricking".
Re-locking your phone is not "bricking". As you know very well, brick means you can't do anything with your device at all, you can't fix it. It becomes a brick.
So while I'm very critical of apple, I think there is blog/media hysteria going on.
i already written an email to the giz wiz(es), asking:
why does no one talk about the nokia e90? what should i buy? iphone or e90?
but seeing on the pure mass of comments here: emailing to any wiz is rather pointless *gg*
greetings from germany :)
markus
p.p.s. On the apple iPhone page there is a part for "tell us your iPhone story" I wonder what great stories they have "waited in line forever, paid insane roaming fees, watched the iphone price/nerd tax drop, watched everyone i know buy cheaper iphones then unlock them, see them get more signal than me, watch them install neat free apps. Only to have apple brick my non unlocked phone!" that's enough to have a man love a nokia :)
Apple doesn't live in a vacuum. They had to be aware of all of the unlock methods and had to test all of them with the new firmware, since a primary function of the new firmware was to stop unlocking.
There is a principle in tort law regarding negligence that is often referred to as 'the duty to trespassers'.
While a property owner is not bound to exercise care or diligence to keep his premises in repair for trespassers, he does owe the duty, even to such persons, not to suffer them to receive harm. For the owner, with the knowledge that a person is in danger of harm from fault of his, would show wanton or reckless disregard for the person's safety.
Now, I know that battery against a person and battery against an iPhone are two very different things. Nonetheless, Apple had the knowledge and information to prevent the damage before it happened -- by more than a mere verbal warning. To not have done so is to show wanton or reckless disregard for another person's property.