iPhone was launched with AT&T and Apple made a promise that iPhone won't work on any other operator's network. But only a week later, people were using the iPhone on any cellular network across the globe. This phenomenon was called iPhone Unlocking!! I'm sure AT&T was tearing its hair off, but now there is more to be angry about.
Apple also didn't allow any other application to be installed on the iPhone. Apple warns that the warranties will be void on the iPhone, if any other 3rd party softwares are installed on the iPhone or if its been unlocked!! So Apple has tried its best to warn the users and keep AT&T happy, but today we have VoIP software maker, Truphone (which advertises itself as a Nokia VoIP app maker) demo'ed their application on an iPhone. You can watch a video of this here.
This means that its even more bad news for AT&T. Atleast they was expecting people who were not unlocking the iPhone to use their network and pay for the airtime charges. But now it seems that people will use the VoIP and just pay for the data services or even better use the office WiFi connections for free!! So, this app is really a pain for AT&T, but is good news for those iPhone owners who are scared of unlocking. Is it only the beginning of the end of the deal with AT&T, or does Apple do a firmware upgrade and change the runtime environment to stop those VoIP apps?? Do we in the near future see Skype for iPhone or YahooVoice Chat on iPhone?? It really isn't very tough to make a 1-1 voice chat software these days and I guided some under-grad students on a low-bandwidth VoIP project!! So may be you can make one for yourself and give people free calling on the iPhone!!
4 comments:
That sounds interesting ! Give some more information on that and your source of information too ! Elaborate on ' unlocking' the i phone!
I have been reading many blogs on unlocking of the i phone. I have read the steps of unlocking and also watched the video showing that unlocking actually works ! But there was one blogger who could unlock it but received the same message all the time-' log on to i tunes'. This one failed actually ! I have not been able to get myself to open up my i phone but I will do that surely ! By the way the policy of Apple of locking the software up and mandatory contract with AT&T is a stupidity in today's free world !
You really do not need to open the iPhone to unlock it anymore. There are a host of softwares that can do it!! You can read about those at engadget.com, but remember ur warranty will be void after the unlock!!
I think Apple also needs to think about profitability and its getting a lot of share from AT&T, when any customer buys an iPhone with connection... So I think the locking is really not a completely bad decision in today's free world!!
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