[ale] [OT] White House Petition to Legalize Mobile-Phone Unlocking

[Charles Shapiro]

What?  My understanding was that the DMCA provision affected *only
unlocking* the phone, and that rooting it or installing a 3rd-party OS was
still legal ( although it could theoretically expose you to civil suit).
That said, my desultory research shows it _is_ illegal to jailbreak your
tablet.

http://gizmodo.com/5955130/jailbreaking-is-now-legal-for-smartphonesbut-not-tablets?tag=dmca

Not that any of this makes sense.

-- CHS



On Fri, Feb 22, 2013 at 10:21 PM, Jim Kinney <jim.kinney at gmail.com> wrote:

> Reread the rules. You can't root a phone that under discount-based
> contract. It doesn't belong to you until the contract is over. It's a lease
> to own.
>
> Yes, I want to remove the facebook app that Verizon installs by default on
> my jelly-bean phone. But I can't until I own it free and clear.
>
> This doesn't mean I shouldn't be able to require customer service from
> Verizon and demand they remove the app I don''t want so I have more
> resources for what I do want.
>
> On Fri, Feb 22, 2013 at 7:20 PM, Brian Mathis <
> brian.mathis+ale at betteradmin.com> wrote:
>
>> Why should you need to ask permission to unlock your phone?  You paid
>> for it.  If you want to break the contract that's fine, but you would
>> be subject to a termination fee which should cover the subsidy.  And
>> since most contracts already have large termination fees, they can't
>> argue that it's about that.
>>
>> Worse is that the phone is still locked after the contract is over.
>> If I want to sell my old phone, I need to hope that the phone company
>> will give their blessing, and many have rules that you must have an
>> active account, it must be in good standing, etc... in order to unlock
>> it.  This is *after* you have paid off the contract and probably
>> signed onto a new one with a new device.
>>
>> The only reason is to increase the friction for you leaving for
>> another carrier, and that is anti-consumer and can only happen in an
>> oligopolistic market.
>>
>>
>> ❧ Brian Mathis
>>
>> P.S. Why does my phone bill not go down after I have supposedly paid
>> off the subsidy?  Because the prices of non-contract phones are
>> inflated on purpose as an incentive to sign a contract.
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Feb 22, 2013 at 11:44 AM, JD <jdp at algoloma.com> wrote:
>> > Or we can just purchase unlocked phones. There are lots of choices.
>> Nobody forces anyone to buy a subsidized phone, though the fact that cell
>> plans do not include a BYOD discount is a problem.
>> >
>> > Last fall, I contacted t-mobile to get a locked phone unlocked prior to
>> an overseas trip. About 5 days later an email arrived with the unlock code.
>> No real difficulty at all, except the wait.
>> >
>> > Remember when cell phones were a convenience?
>> >
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> --
> James P. Kinney III
> *
> *
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> at one end you lose at the other. It's like feeding a dog on his own tail.
> It won't fatten the dog.
> - Speech 11/23/1900 Mark Twain
> *
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