Thoughts On Today's Ruling About "Legal" iPhone Jailbreaking [u]

First, Jailbreaking was never really illegal. If legality is what kept anyone from doing it I think they were misinformed. It was a gray area awaiting a ruling either way; Apple wanted the court to settle the question as to whether jailbreaking violated copyright, and they did, though not in Apple's way.

There is zero evidence to support Apple would have gone after individual jailbreakers (had the ruling gone the other way), any more than they go after one-off Hackintoshers. 

I believe Apple wanted the shield of illegality not to go after geeks, hobbyists, etc., but rather to stop the unscrupulous who may now crawl out of the woodwork to make a quick buck on this. 

I can practically see "Jailbreak Kits" for sale already. Their marketing copy gushing about how this once forbidden activity is now available to the general public. They'll publish a link to the Library of Congress statement that few will read and fewer will understand. They sure as heck won't dwell on the practice being unsupported, or that the next iOS release will likely kill it. Money in hand, they're off to the next sucker leaving their current "customers" yelling at Apple as if it's Apple's fault. 

Finally, Apple will continue to "break" jailbreaks. Not only does the statement not mean Apple must allow the activity, but I believe every jailbreak so far relies on a security exploit. Of course Apple's going to plug that hole. They better. 

[UPDATE:] See this excellent post for more information what today's copyright ruling really says.

Comments (3)

Jul 26, 2010
braker1nine said...
Agreed one hundred percent. I think this will have little to no effect on the current jailbreaking community.

I want to say that I wish people wouldn't be dumb enough to go downloading "jailbreak kits" off the internet, but the amount of spyware and crap on PCs shows that that's not the case.

That said I don't think it's a big deal. I'd so most people have no idea what jailbreaking is or what the point of it is. And the law can only go so far to protect people from themselves....

Jul 26, 2010
EB said...
I'm more excited and curious on the unlocking. What I want is the gov't to force Apple to unlock iPhones after your 2 year contract is up. I want an unlocked iPhone, I want MY iPhone unlocked without resorting to a hack. Once I have paid it off, it should be MINE, end of discussion!
Jul 26, 2010
James Bailey said...
Considering that there still is no jailbreak for the iPhone 3GS this ruling may have come too late. I know that the iPhone hackers keep claiming that they have a iOS 4 jailbreak but the evidence is sketchy to say the least. The only current jailbreaks for the 3GS are if you have old boot-roms and already did a jailbreak on a pre 3.1.2 version of iOS.

If you have a recently purchased 3GS or you upgraded to iOS 4, currently nothing will jailbreak your iPhone.

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