Hacking and quacking

Read this, if you haven't already.

I would not have bothered with this "news", had it not sparked heated arguments (like we need any more of those) in the blogosphere.

First of all, the word. "Hacked". Really? Why not "jailbroken"? Oh, I see, that is trademarked and to be used only for Divine products.

So is Symbian 9.2 or S60v3 FP1 hacked?

NO.

A FEW DIRECTORIES. A few directories were jailbroken. That means that there was no previous method of accessing them. And now there is. These are the directories that hold an important part of your device's 'kitchen', so to speak. So if you use the method described on Symbian Freak, you'll get access to those directories. That's it.

I, unlike others, understand why Symbian Freak have used the term "hacked". To create hype and drive traffic to their site. Is that bad? I don't know. Is Apple's shoving of Safari up your throat bad?
I don't even care. Would I have posted such news had I 'invented' the 'method'? Definitely. I would not have used "hacked" to describe it, though.

So back to me not caring. I don't. I do not want access to those folders. I don't care what goes on inside them. I have bricked my N95 once in a way a lot easier to accomplish. That is, I didn't do anything special. It just didn't want to boot anymore. I know how frustrating that experience was, and am not planning on taking such risks again.

Point is: I am a geek. Not an uber-geek (whatever the correct spelling for that is). Doing this is certainly not appealing to average consumers. It's not even appealing, I would say, to geeks. The only group that find this even remotely interesting are the uber-geeks. Fine. Let them see those directories. Maybe that will spark genius ideas that some day will be implemented in the OS. Who knows? As for this opening the door for viruses, grow up all! Steve Litchfield explained this better than I could.

Why am I writing this post?
Because I am sick of the Echelon-like scanning that mainstream news blogs do. See, there isn't much time to properly read (or, God forbid, understand) something, since you absolutely have to be the first (of such mainstream sites, obviously) to report something. So you scan for keywords. "Hacked" is a very strong such keyword. You read it, then write "news" posts. Based on one word. Cool!

And then it's on to the paranoia.
"Normobs will read this and feel threatened - they are going to buy useless antivirus apps or even worse, try this at home". SO WHAT?

This is being said with an assumption that when the average Joe reads "Symbian" or "S60" he knows what those words mean. Well, good morning everyone: he doesn't. He has absolutely no clue. Ok, so he does know "Nokia". Will the normobs flood Nokia Service Centers asking for, erm, protection? Very good. They should be getting the right answers there. That's what Service Centers are for.

And what is so bad in normobs trying this at home? They risk bricking their devices. Wow, that's so...unseen! Like you can't brick an S60 device in any other way. Let them try, if they're willing to. Let them brick their devices. Let them buy antivirus apps. Why not? It's their own money they're wasting. If Nokia doesn't clearly say the fact that there is no need whatsoever for an antivirus app on S60 devices, furthermore one such app is even available in the Download folder on almost every device...

This was supposed to be news of real interest to maybe a few hundred people worldwide. Because it wasn't left that way, it has turned into a case of hysteria. Bad.

And a note: The discussion on the forum at All About Symbian has again gone from rather civilised to the absurd. Keep in mind, whatever you do, that when you see someone defending paid software (as a concept, I don't mean specific examples) over free software, that person is very likely to be working for a commercial software developer. Otherwise, tell me: if you had to choose between two identical apps, one of which is free, one of which isn't, what would you pick? OR if innovation is taken into account, shouldn't all software fall into only two categories: innovative or not? Not "yes, innovative, but it's freeware, so it's not good" and "maybe it isn't that innovative, but hey, at least I can pay for it". Got it?

As for using the jailbreaking method to run unsigned apps, please, control yourself! Wait. A few days, a few weeks maybe, and all the independent freeware developers will change their apps' code so you'll be able to sign them using Open Signed Online.

Blogged with the Flock Browser