Archive for the ‘Digital Locks’ Category

The Commodification of Intellectual Property, and You!

Monday, March 3rd, 2008

I recently attended a lecture by professor Bruce Ziff, of the University of Alberta Law School, where he described what he termed as his only original academic idea. He posited that the reason we as a society are so restrictive about property rights is because it is basically impossible to ...

Tipping the Scale Too Far: User Versus Owner Rights in the iPhone Debate

Wednesday, November 14th, 2007

Like many cell phone customers, you might be irritated that your service provider locks you in.  Shortly after Apple released its iPhone, hackers developed unlocking software so the popular phone could be used on networks other than AT&T.  Since it has not been made official that the iPhone is coming to Canada, many buyers ...

Unfair Sacrifice of User Interests if Unlocking iPhone is Illegal

Tuesday, November 13th, 2007

The murkiness of the legality of unlocking the iPhone was highlighted recently by an AppleInsider article which suggested that actions of the ‘iPhone Dev Team’, hackers who are offering the solution to unlocking the iPhone for free online, may be illegal. The iPhone is locked to one service provider, AT&T, meaning ...

Break the chains and unlock your iPhone

Tuesday, November 13th, 2007

Intuitively it feels strange to ask whether consumers have a legal right to unlock iPhones, their own personal property. We don’t ask whether someone has a right to change Internet providers while keeping the same computer. Yet Apple and AT&T are trying to convince the American public that there is ...