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back to article Motorola: Apple will not open the iPhone

The senior director of entertainment products at Motorola questions whether Apple will truly "open up" the iPhone. "We've yet to see Apple's SDK [software developers' kit], and I'm sure there will be some level of [Apple] control that goes along with it. I guarantee you that you will not see a Napster music service on the …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Leopard sandboxing = Symbian capabilities

    "Sandboxing" on Leopard looks like a way to restrict applications to accessing a subset of the APIs, and a subset of the available disk storage.

    That sounds a lot like Symbian OS 9 capabilities and data caging.

    Oh, and application signing showed up too.

    So I think it's a fair bet that the iPhone will follow a similar model: applications can be installed by the user, so long as they require some small, safe set of capabilities and disk access.

    Anything more complex will require approval/signing/etc. by Apple.

    At a guess, the differences will be:

    1) Apple will do the signing and packaging process much more smoothly, so it isn't the massive impediment to third party development that it is on Symbian. Apple will ensure it "just works". But...

    2) Apple will somehow arrange the set of freely available capabilities to protect its own commercial interests, as opposed to purely security interests. In particular they somehow want to prevent people writing iTunes-equivalents. That either means restricting net access, or sound playback, or perhaps available disk storage - unless you get your application signed. (None of these things are restricted on Symbian OS.) I don't see how they can get away with pretending net or sound restrictions are in the interests of security, so I bet it's the latter but it'll be interesting to see...

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  2. John G

    You take no Candle!

    8 out of 10 owners who expressed a preference

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  3. Branedy

    ADC center

    http://developer.apple.com/iphone/devcenter/

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  4. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Horns

    Why...

    with Apple's history would ANYONE expect that they will open the phone up?

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  5. jai

    whole new pricing tier

    "There are [people] who are willing to pay a lot for a phone."

    But the thing is, Motorola can't just put out a Razr3 and charge 400quid for it - people are willing to pay a high price for a phone, but it has to do lots of things and it has to work easily.

    i bought a SE M600i when they first came out and the software on that keeps crashing and needing to be reset. cos it was cheap i've coped with it for the last year. but i'd be livid if i'd paid 400 quid for it and it didn't work

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  6. Kieran

    Napster

    I fully agree. After years of windows-based developers treating the Mac with contempt and refusing to port their apps - Apple should certainly bend over backwards and shoot wildly at their own feet to help these people make a buck.

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  7. Stu
    Stop

    They'd better make the SDK pretty open...

    ...I bought the device worth paying for - the iPod Touch. Its all the same thing minus all the mobile network gubbins and bluetooth.

    A grand total of £199 for the 8Gb model. I'm still short of filling it up despite packing it with videos. That is opposed to the >900 that Apple and O2 are going to be asking for the iPhone over 18 months.

    One of the reasons why I picked it up (aside from the fact that its ultra kewwwwll) is because of this SDK announcement.

    Has anybody tried to get the Google Maps working via maps.google.co.uk in Safari on the iPhone/iTouch? It doesn't work too well at all. I'm hoping the likes of a workable Google Maps (updated via wireless internet) can be developed for the iTouch specifically.

    I had an idea from the get go it might be a crippled SDK, now I hear it may only be released to serious developers for some moolah.

    They'd better not!

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  8. Vernon Lloyd
    Stop

    Simple Ansa

    Just don't buy the damn over priced Jesus Phones.

    I can get 500 mins and 100 texts a month for just under £20.

    If the iPhone was every released for that price then I would consider it.

    FFS the bottom line it is a Frigging phone with many extras. At the end of the day most people will use it for Music, Video, Sending/Receiving Calls/Texts and the executives may use a email client.

    Guess what my phone does that with a fantasic camera (shite camera on iPhone). Why oh Why would I want a phone on contract I have to sell my soul for.

    /rant over

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  9. evilbobthebob
    Thumb Down

    They're all the same...

    Microsoft, Apple...the words 'monopoly' and 'total control' spring to mind whenever I hear these two mentioned.

    Not that I hate them, but someone really needs to explain the word 'competition'

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  10. Daniel B.
    Thumb Down

    Mac to PC? PC to Mac?

    "After years of windows-based developers treating the Mac with contempt and refusing to port their apps"

    Hm... I remember the reverse thing happening back when Mac was THE desktop OS of choice. Hell, even Works and Word/Excel were first seen in the Mac, IIRC. Hypercard kicked Powerpoint's butt even for "simple" presentations.

    That said, I doubt the iPhone will really kick in without an SDK, which I doubt Jobs wants to release. We're talking about the same Jobs announcing 'you can run webapps and do the same things a native app can' much in the same manner Gates said '640K is enough for anyone'.

    Me? I'll keep on coding my MIDP apps.

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  11. Pooper Scooper
    Stop

    Yahoo's "telling" stat

    I think what this actually means is that no one was using Yahoo! anymore before the iPhone made it its mail service provider.

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