[LINK] the Apple iPhone rort

[Paul Bolger]

Apple is the champion of freedom of access to music without DRM,

Apple is the champion of locking customers to their own hardware more
like it. And as far as the DRM goes Apple were one of the most
enthusiastic proponents of DRM until they noticed that people hate it,
then they did a quick U-turn.

the internet was built on a free and open internet

Well... actually I seem to remember that the internet (the mass
market, public part of it, anyway) was built on people flocking away
from AOL, MSN and other proprietary networks.

 I guess the involvement of big business in the internet means this
freedom and openness of standards is sliding away.

I disagree: Freedom and openness of standards need to be fought for. I
this case the best ways are to either not buy the Iphone - and lets
face it, it's sexy, but it's just a phone - or hack it.

I'm much more concerned about Telstra's Next-G network. They are
replacing the CDMA network so that they can lock the other networks
out of roaming out of the GSM coverage zones, which means country
mobile users are stuck with Telstra's exorbitant call rates (triple
what I'm paying on prepaid Optus GSM)