So, can I jailbreak my iPhone now..?

[GuyClapperton]

iPhones, including the short-supplied iPhone 4, can now be jailbroken according to a new ruling by the Library of Congress Copyright Office . In other words never mind what Apple says you may and may not install on your phone, you help yourself.

On the surface this makes absolute sense. If I've paid for an iPhone - if indeed you could get them round these parts - it would be my property. It is absurd for Apple or any other manufacturer to tell me what I may and may not do with something which I own.

They can, however, make it a bit of a crazy idea.

There is nothing to stop me installing jailbroken software. Check. There is nothing to stop me putting it in a blender. I've seen people doing that online and probably so have a lot of readers.

There is everything to stop them honouring any warranty if I do any of those things. The blender's an absurd example but why should Apple honour any warranty when the customer has done something they explicitly agreed not to do when they signed the contract for the phone?

So you'll forgive me if I don't break out the champagne and jailbreak my iPhone just yet. I'm much too attached to the little guy working, and if it doesn't I find my right to jump up and down and invoke warranty agreements quite a comfort.

Of course, if you're technically competent and feeling brave there's nothing Apple can do any longer...

[brandonrunyon]

The exceptions made recently in the DMCA only make exceptions for Professors and students under certain conditions. Under those conditions, to circumvent the iPhone's default OS or software is still in breach of the Apple EULA which voiding the warrantee could be the least of your worries even...

The Apple store has recently been granting support to those who have jail broken their iPhones under conditions that they restore the phone to it's original default settings. The iPhone is yours, but unfortunately the software is strictly the property of Apple and do not extend to you the freedom to modify, circumvent, or disassemble in anyway.

There is an appeal from Apple to combat these kinds of acts despite what exceptions have been made in the DMCA through a possible patent on surveillance firmware.
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2010/08/steve-jobs-watching-you-apple-seeking-patent-0