For All the Complaining About Apple...
It seems that Apple's policies toward the iPhone may turn out to actually be rather generous, based on some reports coming out about Palm's own policies towards the Pre (and, I'd guess, future webOS devices). Engadget says,
Even worse for hackers, Palm's taking an unusually aggressive approach to webOS system updates — they're mandatory. According to the support docs, webOS updates are automatically downloaded in the background within two days of being available, and they're required to be installed within a week of the download — after seven days and four install prompts, the phone will give you a ten-minute countdown and then automatically begin installing the update.
Keep in mind, that for all the fuss that Apple's updates have sometimes “bricked” phones, as I have noted before, no one was required to upgrade. Anyone doing something unsupported with the phone should have had the common sense to wait to see what more experienced testers found rather than plunging ahead. If you don't want to play within the rules, don't call the referee when things don't go smoothly.
In any case, many people have advocated the Pre as being a far more open, tolerant, Linux-like answer to the iPhone. It is interesting that in this very context that the Pre has a far more restrictive, big brother styled policy on upgrades. If a Pre ends up being bricked after a forced upgrade… that'll be when people can get upset fairly.
Hopefully Palm will come to its senses. I think the Pre has almost endless possibility, but this sort of thing (and some other misfires Palm has made in recent months) could put at risk its otherwise brilliant strategy.
First, never get your news from only one source. As some of the commentors have correctly stated, this story seems to be rather slanted.
So I did some checking and sure enough, http://gizmodo.com/5290871/palm-warns-about-pre-tethering-hack-+-because-sprint-wont-like-it a much different tone.
“We have been politely cautioned by Palm that any discussion of tethering during the Sprint exclusivity period (and perhaps beyond-we don't know yet) will probably cause Sprint to complain to Palm, and if that happened then Palm would be forced to react against the people running the IRC channel and this wiki.”
When was the last time a large corporation did such a great job of communicating their situation that an internet hacking group made a point to say that the company was polite?
So with cooler heads now prevailing, and all apple fanboy-ism set aside, lets discuss forced upgrades.
1. Assumption that they will brick the device if someone has hacked it? So far their is no evidence to prove that point. I've “hacked” my firefox and not one update for well over 2 years has ever caused any issues. Simply put, applying Apple results to Palm makes no sense. Diff HW, SW, developers, and the more I think about it the more I wonder why you would even consider it.
2. The concept of forced updates. As people on many forums have so correctly pointed out, if the ipwn boys can get around them with Apple's rather closed dev environment, I'm guessing the PalmOS boys will be light years ahead.
So to end, if their updates suck, I will call them out on it, if they don't then good for them. Personally, I'd prefer being given the choice but my Chumby if I recall, has done one forced given the severity of the security flaw they found.
BTW, it's a phone dude, not a religion. Act like a duck and let the bad stuff just slide off your back. You'll feel so much better. lol.
Mark, I didn't say Palm would brick the phones (I'm not saying they won't, either). I think forced updates are bad enough in itself. I have some devices I intentionally choose not to update, because I know the problems with later updates are far more annoying than the things they fix.
The Apple hackers don't have to work around forced updates (per your point 2) because Apple doesn't force updates. That was what I was getting at.
I'm not overly worked up, I'm just noting something rather unfortunate. Personally, I'd like to see webOS take a nice chunk of the still untapped market.
I completely agree with your point Tim. I think that it is a little extreme to force upgrades on the consumer. I myself have several things that I choose not to update, like yourself, because I either like my current version or I fear bugs in the newer version.
If the Pre is supposed to be much more “open”, then forced upgrades seem to be out of character for the new phone.
The technology is still fantastic, but I worry that Palm may be sending the wrong message by forcing updates.
Very true. I hope Palm comes to its senses.
(I also hope they double the storage. The Pre is somewhat of a tough sell with half the storage and, according to early benchmarks, as much as 21% less speed in browsing than the iPhone 3G S.)