Jailbreaking Could Soon Become Illegal Again 239
Diggester writes "Back in July 2010, the United States government approved a few exemptions in a federal law which made jailbreaking/rooting of electronic devices (iPhones and Android devices) legal. The court ruling stated that every three years, the exemptions have to be renewed considering they don't infringe any copyrighted material. The three-year period is due to expire and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is looking to get the exemptions renewed. In order to do so, they have filed a petition which aims at government to declare jailbreaking legal once again. In addition to that, EFF is also asking for a change in the original ruling to include tablet devices." Here's the EFF's own page on the issue.
Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
You should care. If you don't, you're just handing the reins over to someone who will fuck you over with force of law.
And if you don't care, you're half the problem.
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
The crazier the intellectual property laws get the less respect people will have for intellectual property laws. I care quite a bit, but at this point it may be easier to just let "big content" hang themselves.
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure how much less respect people can have for "intellectual property laws".
Any possibility for respect was wasted when "95 years from publication or 120 years from creation whichever is shorter" became the length of a copyright. Or when advocates for "intellectual property" sought penalties in the hundreds of thousands of dollars for downloading songs via bittorrent.
There just isn't a compelling reason why anyone should respect copyright laws. Especially considering how little of the financial benefit of those laws actually goes to the creator.
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
Especially considering how little of the financial benefit of those laws actually goes to the creator.
The copyright length is definitely absurd (I'd argue in most cases 2-3 years would allow recovering the investment made into it and the majority of future profits), and removing casual copying of content probably would not result in much of an increase in sales, I agree. But it is still a huge benefit to content creators in one way - it keeps organized, commercial piracy (that is so common in Asian countries) to a minimum in many countries.
Imagine if there were *no* laws against copying someone else's work - say anyone could legally copy a studio's movie print and show it in their own theater, or copy DVDs, CDs, or books and sell them in a retail store along side the "official" copies, etc. Those copiers don't have to make back the time and money put into creating the work, only the trivial cost of duplicating it. I'd call preventing that a definite financial benefit to the creator...
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Yes, the major expense involved is the initial setup of a print run. After that, the cost per volume is trivial.
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Is that what's happening? Do you see pirated DVDs and CDs on the shelves at Best Buy? Can you tell me which theaters are showing pirated films?
Why do the apologists for the ridiculous "intellectual property" laws always have to go to imaginary scenarios to try to make their case?
In the real world, can you provide proof that artists are making less money because of illegal copies than they would have if there had been no illegal copies? Because I can show you the opposite. Yes, I can show you instances of artists who would have made much less money if their work had not been passed around on torrent sites.
Hell, there are artists who got their start by distributing their work on bittorrent sites. Without that "illegal copying" those artists would never have gotten a record contract.
So, if you can lay out some evidence that the violation of copyright is actually lessening artists' incomes, then we can talk. Until then, I maintain that the current "intellectual property" laws do more harm than good - for customers and artists alike.
Talk about "whoosh". GP said that this is what would happen if there were no IP laws, not that it is what is happening today.
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And as I said, so little of the money involved actually goes to the artists that even if those pirated CDs were sold at Best Buy, they probably wouldn't cut into their incomes.
Let's just not pretend that the intellectual property laws are working to protect the incomes of creators, OK?
Massive logical fallacies... (Score:5, Insightful)
How the <REDACTED> did this get modded up??
Yes, in countries that meet the criteria specified in the post you responded to, and even quoted: places where there are "*no* [effective] laws against copying somebody else's work" such as many of the Asian nations I've been to (Malaysia, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Indonesia, etc.), and a lot of Africa as well. Also certain parts of South America, though it's slightly less widespread there (in my experience).
Well, they don't have Best Buy in those countries, but everywhere that you can buy a CD or DVD, from a streetside vendor's cart to a chain of media retailers with a presense in most large malls, is selling mostly if not entirely pirated CDs and DVDs, yes.
In those countries? (Almost?) all of them. The hard part would be finding one which *isn't* doing so. The better ones will use copies that were made with something better than a handheld video camera pointed at the screen, but it will still have stupid things like subtitles in a language nobody in the country speaks (not English).
You'll also find photocopied "books" printed on standard-size paper and bound with plastic rings, CDs/DVDs listing 5 different popular pieces of software plus cracks and/or keygens, and copies of well-known photos or other graphical art (either in printed form or in bulk on a CD).
The interesting thing about all this copyright-ignored media is that, aside from a few pieces from successful "locals" (literally, fewer than ten per nation), it's produced elsewhere in the world - in the US, Canada, the EU, NZ, or Australia, typically - because in such countries it's feasible for people to actually make a living creating such content.
What do you have to smoke that you can quote somebody's post, including the conditions under which it is stted to apply and still completely fail to understand that it is not being stated to apply universally? Are you one of those idiot Americans (I'm a US citizen myself, for the record) who thinks that the USA is the entire world, or are you simply completely deluded?
You can't even construct a logical argument out of your own words, never mind when using anybody else's. If the copyright owner is putting the content online for redistribution, it's hardly "illegal copying" anymore. Copyright law allows for the owner of the copyright to distribute their works however they like.
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You are pointing at countries where peoples average monthly salary is less than a BR or a trip to the movies (Denmark) and saying "hey lookie lookie, no IP laws and pirates are rampant".
Personally I belive IP laws are killing competition and producing worse content. Most of those illegal copies you mention are crap and will be bought by those who can't afford the real thing anyways. Make big companies compete with the pirates and soon you will see products consumers want, e.g. DVDs that goes straight to the
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Is that what's happening? Do you see pirated DVDs and CDs on the shelves at Best Buy? Can you tell me which theaters are showing pirated films?
Uh, yes it is. In countries that don't respect copyright, those things happen. Have you never been out of the US?
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Re:Who cares (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd rather give money to a company that allows me to do what I want than fight the more controlling companies.
So would I, but in some cases that I've seen, "the more controlling companies" control virtually all of a market.
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If I buy a carrier independent Android compatible phone then I don't have to jailbreak it.
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Interesting)
If I buy a carrier independent Android compatible phone
With the mess of protocols (CDMA2000 vs. GSM/UMTS), bands (AWS vs. standard), and plans (no discount for not taking a subsidized phone) that is the U.S. cell phone market, do you have a plan for making this practical in the United States?
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The Galaxy Nexus is pentaband, supporting AWS and "standard" GSM. That just misses wimax and CDMA.
The Galaxy Nexus doesn't need SIM unlocking.
The Galaxy Nexus can be "jailbroken" simply by running fastboot oem unlock. No hacks needed, fastboot is a tool provided by Google.
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You are confused between sim-unlocking (allws the phone to be used with different carriers) and jailbreaking (allows different firmware to be loaded or features enabled).
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Interesting)
As someone who recently jailbroke his iPad2, its one of the best things to ever happen to my iPad!
I bought a WiFi only model - as for my purposes, the onboard GPS is *very* substandard. When then trying to use a normal bluetooth GPS, I find out that you need a GPS that speaks "Apple" at $99USD + shipping to your country. After the jailbreak, a $5 donation to the guy who wrote a part of a bluetooth driver and bingo, now it works with ANY bluetooth GPS.
Theres also this awesome extension called "Mail Extender" that adds all the features that mail clients have developed over the last 10 years when Apple decided that you shall not send anything but plain text emails.
Thankfully, I live in a country where console modchips and other methods for device compatibility are 100% legal - and tested in court.
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
So do I, which is why I still use my N900.
You have no choice. Look at the primary opponent of this: Apple. Look at their results. You cannot simply avoid them, their influence on the market is so stupidly huge that even if you don't buy their product, they can still directly impact your ability to choose other options in the future.
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Interesting. The iPhone Reality Distortion Field is, in fact, the tidal gravitation zone of their humongous black hole's event horizon. The entire smartphone industry is stuck in the iPhone accretion disk, and there's almost no escape.
Well, I'll still keep jailbraking, and they won't catch me.
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And when no manufacturer sells such a phone/tablet/whatever? What will you do then?
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Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
Are they immoral? If so disobey them.. if not obey them and work to change them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_disobedience [wikipedia.org]
The question is are your action out of Love or Selfishness.
Out of concern for the common good , or just being a tool.
If you are actually looking to create a better world around you people will have more respect for your position ,even if they don't agree with it, they are still likely to jail, crucify or otherwise attack you, but your actions will have slow effect towards justice and you might have a chance at changing things because, often times people know when they are wrong even if they don't admit it.
If your motivations are selfish than it will show too and no-body will listen to you because you aren't just being a cry baby when you put in jail for doing what you knew was illegal.
That's the real problem with the occupy movement, they don't offer solutions , only complaints, they aren't making any useful demands on what would actually make things better, based on concern for the public good, they are simply saying they don't like the way things are.
News flash, nobody likes the way things are, the world will never be perfect this side of the grave.
The only question is , what are you going to do about it!
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The copyright lobby has not dropped SOPA/PIPA. Even a watered-down version of these could make it very difficult for communities to develop around rooting/jailbreaking phones so that, unless you can figure out your own jailbreak, you may not be able to download the information and binaries req
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Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
You care. Because not only is it illegal for you to jailbreak, it is illegal for someone else to help you. As in to provide the tools to do the jailbreaking. So unless you are an uberhacker, you won't be doing much jailbreaking.
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
And you're under prior-restraint to keep silent about such methods!
Don't you love how the DMCA violates the First Amendment for the sake of corporate interests?
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They've just never had a chance to challenge the issue directly. The courts have sidestepped this as much as possible to narrowly rule on technicalities. The truth is, prior restraint isn't suddenly invalid as a defense because of the DMCA but courts are always very hesitant to fight against laws created by congress. Isn't it great? Even in the supreme court. This is how broken our system of branches of gov't is as it exists.
It becomes: Legislative branch -> judicial branch (Judicial rolls over 99% of th
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Just because the laws are bad doesn't mean we shouldn't try to fix them. You might think that it won't have any effect, just wait until people get convicted for posting jailbreaking methods or linking to those posts.
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[i]Illegal or not i'll do whatever i want with my phone[/i]
YOU do something that no one will know about is not the problem.
The problem are the people who are creating the tools. If creation, or possession of the tools becomes illegal, or advocation and instruction on how to use them becomes illegal... then all those websites you can easily "google" today to learn how to do it will VANISH.
You're welcome to reinvent the wheel in your basement, but more than likely you'll simply saying "fuckit" and move on...
Re:Who cares / Exactly Badly Needed Semantics (Score:5, Insightful)
Everyone, 'stop calling it jailbreaking', and start calling it a Free Country..
Re:Who cares / Exactly Badly Needed Semantics (Score:5, Insightful)
or call it what it is. Modifying my own property.
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Everyone, 'stop calling it jailbreaking', and start calling it a Free Country..
Apparently, some legislators disagree with you, about your country being a Free Country.
Re:Who cares (Score:5, Insightful)
In the vast majority of cases, unless the owner of the device has considerable spare time and skills far outside the norm, their ability to do what they want with their device depends largely on the public availability of tools for doing so. Those tools are the ones that are most likely to get harder to find should their legal status shift(architecturally, prosecuting individuals who tamper with a GUID-bearing, cellular-modem-connected, user-account-data-correlated, device would actually be comparatively practical, make one mistake in your jailbreak, hit a tripwire or a tilt-bit somewhere, and run the risk that the hardware will phone home and report you; but unlikely to be a good PR move...)
Against a complex system, you are only as good as your tools, which becomes a much greater limitation if those become contraband.
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You will care when you cant access any tools to do it if they are all blocked, and perhaps even be logged that you tried to access the tools, or if you get them and succeed in jail breaking your service goes dark and a warrant is automatically issued .( it can be detected by the carriers if its a cell phone ya know.. )
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Illegal or not i'll do whatever i want with my phone
So, where do I get all the tools that geohot wrote, so that I can jailbreak my PS3?
The problem with software being illegal is that it makes it harder to get that software, which discourages people who might have done so otherwise. I have no problem finding the PS3 jailbreaking tools, but a lot of other people would. Further, do you really want hackers to be arrested, deported, and so forth just for writing or distributing such tools? Do you really want to have to go on Tor or Freenet to find them?
Hold up wait what? (Score:2)
Re:Hold up wait what? (Score:4, Informative)
The DMCA makes circumventing digital security illegal - and this could include jailbreaking your phone / tablet / computer if it ever comes to that.
It has a provision for making exceptions, but unlike the DMCA the exceptions only last for three years. If they're not renewed they automatically lapse.
Re:Hold up wait what? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, wouldn't it be nice if the DMCA had a sunset provision too? Personally, I think all new laws should have sunset provisions without some sort of actual constitutional amendment-like system to make them permanent. I also think they should need to be read in their entirety, on record in the house and senate before they get to vote on them every time.
Re:Hold up wait what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because of this:
- Jailbreaking breaks the security on the iPhone, thus putting the tools in violation of the DMCA
- The LoC granted an exception to the DMCA for jailbreaking tools in the interest of enabling compatibility.
It's part of the DMCA, and its complete and total pro-corporate bias. All you jailbreaking Apple fans should watch as Apple fights the exemption renewal. They hate you and want you back in the box, and to never talk about it.
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The reason that it expires (just like a lot of tax loopholes) is so that another round of fund raising can begin for both sides of a divisive issue.
Setting it to expire is how they keep the campaign coffers full.
It is the government version of vendor lock in.
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Except that this isn't going through Congress. It goes through the Library of Congress.
Re:Hold up wait what? (Score:5, Funny)
Don't confuse the issue. We all know how evil, corrupt, and greedy* those librarians are! This is clearly an attempt to ensure they're not completely obsolete as books become irrelevant.
*Source: firsthand knowledge. My wife is a librarian, and she steals the bedsheets every night.
Re:Hold up wait what? (Score:4, Insightful)
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It's a property of the legal system that mandates laws to have a start date and allows for an optional expire date. This is mostly used to limit the duration of an executive order or decree, but it's not limited to just that.
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Because the open platform and the power to do with it what you want was what convinced you to invest money in the hardware. Now that they've got you, they're tightening the leash.
Haven't you learned anything from how free samples of crack work?
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Asked my herbs guy if I could get some
He's already got you paying. Why spread your discretionary cash around between multiple vendors?
then charged me a 10% premium on my herbs
You paid it too. Didn't you?
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Its a tactic to get their way by making people think they are getting their way, but in a few years it quietly expires and goes the way of what congress really wanted if no one notices.
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And one of those two could be Newt Gingrich! Says everything about the process of picking candidates. Look at his record on marriage, lobbying/money, racist [food-stamp president, what sort of shit is that?], together with levels of hypocrisy beyond invention. Incredible. The idea of President Gingrich was laughable 10 years ago. What changed?
Specifying by shape??? (Score:5, Insightful)
Perversely, I sometimes wonder if the situation would be improved if makers of 'traditional' categories of objects, like cars and appliances and firearms, were to start getting their DRM on and building systems that cryptographically verify every FRU's TPM on start and enter a lockout that can only be cleared by an authorized dealer if any tampering is suspected... Yeah, it'd make those product categories horribly worse; but it might finally give the computer-clueless some idea of just how insane the world of EULAs, DRM, and assorted device lockdown really is...
Re:heartbreakingly pathetic (Score:2)
Perfect phrase! .gov pulverizes us with new copyright treaties, then we have to ASK to KEEP the exceptions! Trouble is, y'all have followed the pace of things, the climate is WAY worse than 3 years ago - the Corp-Gov hydra is smelling blood and wants to go for the kill.
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distinguished solely by shape
That's better
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I sometimes wonder if the situation would be improved if makers of 'traditional' categories of objects, like cars ... verify every FRU's TPM on start and enter a lockout that can only be cleared by an authorized dealer if any tampering is suspected.
They already do that. Though, I guess "lip mode" may not fully qualify as a "lockout".
I cant wait thousands of 12 year olds in jail.. (Score:5, Funny)
We need to create a new arm of the government now to fight this menace to society.
We need a badass name to instill fear in teenagers to curb their illicit jailbreaking habits.
An elite squad named...
A.J.A.C.K.A.S.S
Anti Jailbreaking And Computer Knowledge Agianst Stupid Senators
Re:I cant wait thousands of 12 year olds in jail.. (Score:4, Funny)
How about:
"Computer-Oblivious, No-Good Repugnant Elitist Sophist Scumbags"
Or just "C.O.N.G.R.E.S.S." for short...
A weird place that USA (Score:5, Insightful)
While the outside world has for many years thought the USofA was the most materialistic nation on earth...
Re:A weird place that USA (Score:4, Insightful)
Ah... how nice is being on the side that makes the rules.
Too bad ALL laws don't expire (Score:5, Interesting)
Law originally passed unanimously: no sunset review needed
Law originally passed 75% to 25%: ok to "bundle" with other laws in a simple majority re-confirmation every 10 years.
Law originally passed with simple majority less than 75%? requires single-issue re-confirmation every 3 years.
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Re:Too bad ALL laws don't expire (Score:5, Insightful)
It would be nice if all laws had a sunset scheme..
If only I had mod points.!
Why stop at laws? Let's make things like copyright expire too!
Unanimous consent (Score:3)
Law originally passed unanimously: no sunset review needed
And guess how both the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and the Copyright Term Extension Act passed.
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Cmon, considering how long it takes Congress to pass NEW laws, if we had a sunset clause like this nothing would ever get done.
That's the whole point!
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Cmon, considering how long it takes Congress to pass NEW laws, if we had a sunset clause like this nothing would ever get done.
And that's different from now, how?
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Are you crazy?? Do you know how many laws there are? They'd be constantly reviewing the old laws, and nothing new would get done...
On second thought, this is a brilliant strategy!
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No way.
I like the fact that as a Freeman of the city of London, I have ancient legal permission to drive my herd of sheep across Tower bridge during rush hour.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/425364.stm [bbc.co.uk]
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So you think that the US constitution should be up for re-confirmation every 10 years?
Game Consoles (Score:2)
Can we get game consoles added as an expemtion as well? Please?
Aspire X1 (Score:5, Informative)
Acer makes an open game console. It's called the Aspire X1 [acer.com], it's about the size of an original Xbox 360 and can use its gamepads, and it runs all PC software. And unlike the major consoles, it has multiple app stores: Steam, Impulse, Desura, and GOG. There's even an adapter called the Retrode that lets it play classic games made for the Super NES and Sega Genesis.
Let's make PCs the fourth console.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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Ahh but thats the catch. They won't tell you that and just stick introducing laws for the software parts of the hardware. You want to mod the phone to run an OS other than the one that came with it, sorry to bad its illegal to remove the drm inorder to remove the original os. Imagine the out cry if all of a sudden you couldn't do ANYTHING with the physical part of the device.
Re:Who's property (Score:4, Informative)
If you buy such a device, it's your property. However, in order to do anything useful, you'll either need to flash the device yourself (this lets you *replace* the software, which is legal), or agree to the software license and then circumvent the software somehow -- and the software does NOT belong to you -- it belongs to the copyright holder, and they let you run it on your device.
If you can reflash (hardware reflash, not software reflash via the software already provided by the manufacturer) the device and install some other system on it, DMCA isn't broken.
Kind of like you can buy a car, but circumventing the on-board software is illegal. Same went for buying a printer and hacking the firmware to let you use any printer cartridge, until this got an exemption for compatibility reasons.
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Most often the way it works is:
The physical hardware is yours, The software isn't.
You just get a license to run the software. The license usually includes clauses specifically against reverse-engineering or circumnavigating any part of the software or its 'security measures'.
Then they simply find a way to make it that you have to agree to be bound by the licence terms in order to use the product.
or
b) By even turning on the product, you automatically have signified your acceptance of being bound by the licen
The Pigs Are Creating a Counter-Market (Score:2)
In their greed, the pigs are fuel the market for hardware that remains jailbreakable.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:GPL should require vendors to ship with root (Score:4, Informative)
The GPLv3 effectively does require that. It bars the use of GPLv3 software in things that require jailbreaking, or otherwise keep the user trapped and unable to rebuild and replace the GPLv3 binaries. Slightly different terminology, but same effect (the anti-TiVOization clause.)
Not quite. However, that should be something all users are able to do without interference from the manufacturer.
WRT GPLv3, they're already not using the GNU coreutils. And the Linux kernel will never be anything but GPLv2.
But you don't have someone like Chris Dodd, who can go on Fox News and threaten congressmen for not standing up to the American populace to force bad laws through.
Headline correction (Score:5, Informative)
How about "EFF working to keep jailbreaking legal" as a headline? The OP (who has also linked to the article on his own retarded ad-filled site) is just sensationalising this shit to attract traffic / improve his pagerank. Better stories are available here [pcmag.com] and elsewhere [engadget.com].
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Sounds like the shrill cry of a wounded fanboy.
The fact is that Apple would see all jailbreaking be illegal if it were up to them.
The original title is an accurate portrayal of the situation better capturing the fact that jailbreaking would otherwise be illegal. It took consumer lobbying to be declared legal and it will lapse into being illegal again without active consumer lobbying.
This has to be done repeatedly.
The RC could still declare jailbreaking illegal again despite of what the EFF does.
A watered do
Other things that should be illegal too... (Score:2)
root and CarrierIQ (Score:2)
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Nope. Think for a bit why this is the case.
Direct link to the petition.. (Score:2)
Always the same. (Score:5, Insightful)
The white hats have to win every single battle.
The black hats need only win one.
The Solution to all This is Ultra Simple (Score:2)
The solution to all this is simple, wrap your money in a EULA and a plastic bag which says "Opening this bag and depositing the money constitutes acceptance of the Monetary Remuneration End User License Agreement", and then use the EULA to state what the recipient can and cannot do with the money. They *can* use it to give their employees a raise, the *cannot* use it to buy Jaguars and Jacuzzis, etc. Personally, I'd vote for putting some really whacked-out stuff in there, just to get even a bit. Like maybe
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Trick it out too much and the cops will take it away and crush it.
They hate cars faster then theirs.
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Believe it or not, on some makes of cars, the ECM/TCM will check if it is tampered with, and when taken to a service depot, the entire warranty will be voided.
It took about a year for people to "jailbreak" the latest EcoBoost engines so one can run a custom tune on them.
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Re:Revolution! (Score:5, Funny)
Shoot the head of all politicians!
There's nothing up there. Aim for the pocketbook.
Re:Very relevant XKCD (Score:4, Informative)
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On one hand, it would be nice to have sunset provisions, but in reality, I can see what would end up sunsetted if this happened:
The Clean Air/Water Acts.
Acts making national parks/preserves/national forests.
Labor laws.
Minimum wage.
Bank regulations.
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Follow the money, then you will find your answer.
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1 - because you are under contract with a carrier's network and they are requiring it to protect their network
2 - beacuse some industries are fighting for it to protect their content ( like mpaa/riaa )
3 - keep you coming back only to their store for content.
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Android on the phones without a locked bootloader (like all Google-released Android phones) also allows just as much freedom.
That's a large reason why Blackberry's dead - if you really want it your freedom, Android can do it. Android even gives you the freedom of releasing a locked-down device, which is why Android sometimes isn't as free.