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I think there should be a law that any phone that loses official support should be able to be jailbroken and boot unlocked by an official tool. The best thing a

I think there should be a law that any phone that loses official support should be able to be jailbroken and boot unlocked by an official tool. The best thing about this is that it will disincentivize companies from dropping support early for perfectly functional devices.

bhhaskin 4y ago
Why limited it to old devices? If I buy it I should be able to run my own software if I want.
- gowld 4y ago
  Because there's an implicit binding of hardware and software in the overall proposition which includes the software (like Fire homescreen ads), until 1 party wants to stop providing their side, which should then free the other.
- JohnFen 4y ago
  I'm never shy about jailbreaking devices, new or old. They're mine, and I'll do whatever I want with them.
  - shanebellone 4y ago
    As a philosopher once said, just do it.
- gameman144 4y ago
  Doing it for old hardware makes a much more compelling case for the general public to rally behind. For lots of folks, as long as things are working, they don't care how. Limiting such a law to out-of-support hardware would give a clear value-add of "Your phone stopped working, but if this legislation got passed, it could keep working". (I personally would love the right to control all my hardware, but that's a much tougher sell.)
  - megous 4y ago
    If you just limit it to old devices, you're also limiting the pool of people who might be interested in hacking something up for the device to be usable by non-devs later on. You're certainly delaying the porting effort.
irusensei 4y ago
Not a phone but my PlayStation vita got a whole new life after jail breaking it. I actually regret not doing it earlier. I can backup and play my games from a normal sd card attached to a cheap adaptor. I can play home brew and community patches and fan translations (I have some Japanese games that never made it to the west). I can emulate anything from the 16 bit era plus perfect emulation from ps1 and psp. I can even use moonlight to play my pc. The poor vita rejected by Sony is so good I’ve decided to skip on a switch for now because it is that good.
- eldaisfish 4y ago
  the PS Vita and the community behind it are a real marvel. The hardware is fantastic and has held up really well. I have one and i upgraded the battery, jailbroke the software… and i now have a fantastic emulation device in addition to full access to the PS Vita and PSX catalogues. Both are immense and the games are enjoyable. I hope the steam deck goes down the same path and am eagerly waiting for prices to drop on the used market.
  - arglebargle123 4y ago
    Don't forget the entire PSP catalog as well. The Vita really was an underappreciated gem when it was actively selling new units.
- officeplant 4y ago
  As soon as Nintendo announced they were shutting down the E-Shop I finally homebrewed my 2DS XL. Best thing I ever did to it.
  - Gigachad 4y ago
    The 3DS series was probably the peak of console hacking. There was a surprisingly long period where you could install freeshop and it would download any game direct from Nintendo’s servers without paying. Along with easy persistent soft mods. I expect in the coming gens, console hacking will reach borderline impossible levels when things get replaced with memory safe languages. Probably all that’s left is cpu glitching with power and clock attacks.
Spooky23 4y ago
The problem there is that you would have a complete freak out on HN and other online fora.
anderspitman 4y ago
You might be right. Unfortunately the government is just as incentivized as the rest of us to uphold a consumer economy.
IntelMiner 4y ago
I was so mad when I purchased a carrier unlocked LG Velvet 5G just over a year ago. It seemed like the perfect phone - 5G radio - SD card slot - HEADPHONE JACK! Then 3 weeks later LG quietly announces "yeah we're not making phones anymore. Sorry!" Which, sure, fine. Fair enough LG. But at least let us unlock our bootloaders and put custom ROM's on the thing! What are you afraid of, we won't go out and buy a new Samsung phone instead?
- MutableLambda 4y ago
  They did release the update to 12th though, and reportedly there's going to be an update to 13th.
mindslight 4y ago
At which point the community interest in getting software working on those devices will have become quite diffuse. For example, take a look at how old devices drop off the LineageOS supported list. The main problem isn't bona fide DRM, but rather the endless churn of accidental complexity.
- zozbot234 4y ago
  Newer LineageOS releases will increasingly depend on kernel features that aren't implemented by the downstream kernel in these older devices. So at some point old devices must be supported by the mainline kernel if they are to remain viable for general use. It's pretty hard work. (And there are lots of these devices too. I don't think we even have a list of every piece of hardware that was supported by the old Cyanogenmod at some point in its history.)
  - mindslight 4y ago
    Sure, that's a large part of what I meant by "endless churn of accidental complexity". The embedded development mindset is to throw a working binary over the wall, maintainability and updates be damned. This kind of worked at the level of 16 bit micros where complexity was limited, but it doesn't scale.
implements 4y ago
Or at a minimum just be designed such that when the manufacturer stops supporting it with their infrastructure its functionality degrades ‘gracefully’. Haven’t reached the ID or update server for weeks? - probably no need to complain to the user every time they connect to a network. Even better, implement “Service Discontinued”, so the device either stops checking permanently or only checks occasionally and doesn’t report the now expected failure.

bhhaskin 4y ago

Why limited it to old devices? If I buy it I should be able to run my own software if I want.

gowld 4y ago
Because there's an implicit binding of hardware and software in the overall proposition which includes the software (like Fire homescreen ads), until 1 party wants to stop providing their side, which should then free the other.
JohnFen 4y ago
I'm never shy about jailbreaking devices, new or old. They're mine, and I'll do whatever I want with them.
- shanebellone 4y ago
  As a philosopher once said, just do it.
gameman144 4y ago
Doing it for old hardware makes a much more compelling case for the general public to rally behind. For lots of folks, as long as things are working, they don't care how. Limiting such a law to out-of-support hardware would give a clear value-add of "Your phone stopped working, but if this legislation got passed, it could keep working". (I personally would love the right to control all my hardware, but that's a much tougher sell.)
- megous 4y ago
  If you just limit it to old devices, you're also limiting the pool of people who might be interested in hacking something up for the device to be usable by non-devs later on. You're certainly delaying the porting effort.

irusensei 4y ago

Not a phone but my PlayStation vita got a whole new life after jail breaking it. I actually regret not doing it earlier. I can backup and play my games from a normal sd card attached to a cheap adaptor. I can play home brew and community patches and fan translations (I have some Japanese games that never made it to the west). I can emulate anything from the 16 bit era plus perfect emulation from ps1 and psp. I can even use moonlight to play my pc. The poor vita rejected by Sony is so good I’ve decided to skip on a switch for now because it is that good.

eldaisfish 4y ago
the PS Vita and the community behind it are a real marvel. The hardware is fantastic and has held up really well. I have one and i upgraded the battery, jailbroke the software… and i now have a fantastic emulation device in addition to full access to the PS Vita and PSX catalogues. Both are immense and the games are enjoyable. I hope the steam deck goes down the same path and am eagerly waiting for prices to drop on the used market.
- arglebargle123 4y ago
  Don't forget the entire PSP catalog as well. The Vita really was an underappreciated gem when it was actively selling new units.
officeplant 4y ago
As soon as Nintendo announced they were shutting down the E-Shop I finally homebrewed my 2DS XL. Best thing I ever did to it.
- Gigachad 4y ago
  The 3DS series was probably the peak of console hacking. There was a surprisingly long period where you could install freeshop and it would download any game direct from Nintendo’s servers without paying. Along with easy persistent soft mods. I expect in the coming gens, console hacking will reach borderline impossible levels when things get replaced with memory safe languages. Probably all that’s left is cpu glitching with power and clock attacks.

Spooky23 4y ago

The problem there is that you would have a complete freak out on HN and other online fora.

anderspitman 4y ago

You might be right. Unfortunately the government is just as incentivized as the rest of us to uphold a consumer economy.

IntelMiner 4y ago

I was so mad when I purchased a carrier unlocked LG Velvet 5G just over a year ago. It seemed like the perfect phone - 5G radio - SD card slot - HEADPHONE JACK! Then 3 weeks later LG quietly announces "yeah we're not making phones anymore. Sorry!" Which, sure, fine. Fair enough LG. But at least let us unlock our bootloaders and put custom ROM's on the thing! What are you afraid of, we won't go out and buy a new Samsung phone instead?

MutableLambda 4y ago
They did release the update to 12th though, and reportedly there's going to be an update to 13th.

mindslight 4y ago

At which point the community interest in getting software working on those devices will have become quite diffuse. For example, take a look at how old devices drop off the LineageOS supported list. The main problem isn't bona fide DRM, but rather the endless churn of accidental complexity.

zozbot234 4y ago
Newer LineageOS releases will increasingly depend on kernel features that aren't implemented by the downstream kernel in these older devices. So at some point old devices must be supported by the mainline kernel if they are to remain viable for general use. It's pretty hard work. (And there are lots of these devices too. I don't think we even have a list of every piece of hardware that was supported by the old Cyanogenmod at some point in its history.)
- mindslight 4y ago
  Sure, that's a large part of what I meant by "endless churn of accidental complexity". The embedded development mindset is to throw a working binary over the wall, maintainability and updates be damned. This kind of worked at the level of 16 bit micros where complexity was limited, but it doesn't scale.

implements 4y ago

Or at a minimum just be designed such that when the manufacturer stops supporting it with their infrastructure its functionality degrades ‘gracefully’. Haven’t reached the ID or update server for weeks? - probably no need to complain to the user every time they connect to a network. Even better, implement “Service Discontinued”, so the device either stops checking permanently or only checks occasionally and doesn’t report the now expected failure.