OpenMoko phone schedule announced [LWN.net]

OpenMoko phone schedule announced

Posted Jan 22, 2007 19:53 UTC (Mon) by bradfitz (subscriber, #4378)
In reply to: OpenMoko phone schedule announced by JoeBuck
Parent article: OpenMoko phone schedule announced

As far as I've heard, the carrier can only detect that the phone's using an approved radio chip (which the OpenMoko is), but can't tell beyond that what phone you're using.

But I know very little about this, and I welcome anybody to school me with more accurate information. :-)

(Log in to post comments)

OpenMoko phone schedule announced

Posted Jan 26, 2007 16:33 UTC (Fri) by smurf (subscriber, #17840) [Link]

Phones (are supposed to) have a unique identifier (the IMEI -- your phone is supposed to display it when you dial *#06#), part of which is a manufacturer code.

So yes, carriers could decide to block the OpenMoko phones.

Why they would want to do that is another matter. Presumably, people buy that phone in order to, well, phone, and blocking that would lose them money -- as well as opening them up to breach-of-contract lawsuits (the phone will have regulatory approval, after all).

I'm looking forward to getting one of these. Even though it doesn't do UMTS. Yet. :-/