I wonder if it's still illegal for Android and Symbian too, since it's only talking about the Iphone...

(Well, I doubt it, of course. I know Slashdot didn't have it's daily Iphone story today, but do we need to put in a product placement for the Iphone(TM) again, when we have a perfectly good generic term, "phone"?)

What does "reasonable expectation" actually mean?

For most of the history of human civilization, the reasonable expectation was that, although people could see you in public, and in recent history, people could take photographs, there was never an expectation that it would suddenly be available for the entire world to see, forever, at a click of a button.

By all means we can debate the rights and wrongs, but let's drop this pretence of "reasonable expectation" - that's just a circular argument, as you're starting out with the assumption that it's reasonable.

Now, I think that this guy has every right to photograph in public. But that doesn't stop him being an ass.

What happened to Don't Be Evil? Just because you have a legal right to do something, doesn't mean it's always a good thing to do it. Equally, we have a right to criticise either Google, or this guy.

Heh, yes, I'm amused at the way people have been talking about "apps" as if the concept of running software applications was something new. Indeed, I wake up an check email on my Windows laptop (which I suspect is something done by far more people than those using an Ipad, but that doesn't stop the obligitary product placement in the media article) with an email client - but as I have done for years.

The source doesn't support the article anyway. The image makes it clear that the web is losing out to p2p and video. Whilst p2p is certainly a non-web app, it's just one particular case, and it's misleading for the article to conflate this with Iphone Facebook apps. Same with video - although that's just confusing, as surely much video watching will still be done through a web page? So I see no evidence that data sent through specialised apps is in genreal going to get bigger than web usage, with the sole exception of p2p ("Other" is way smaller, and it's also shrinking). There's also nothing to tell us whether any change is occurring due to usage of apps on mobile devices, compared with desktop or laptop apps - I doubt many people are doing p2p on mobile devices yet!

Certainly an interesting image though, even if the rest of the article makes no sense :)

Symbian is a waste to develop for.

Er, Symbian uses standard C++ and Qt, which I would say is one of the best application toolkits around. Apparently it used to be bad, but that's old news - I might as well criticise the Iphone for not having copy and paste.

It is in the process of being rapidly murdered

How? Not only is it still number one in current sales, the number of sales is growing twice as fast as the Iphone (Q2 2010 results), with only Android growing faster. Android is no doubt going to become a major player in future, however, in the mid-range there's still no competition for Symbian (you can get a Symbian phone for as little as £70 on PAYG, where as the latest Android release still requires a high end phone). The mid-range sells far more than the high-end.

and it has no real history of heavy app usage.

Circular argument - because they're releasing for the Iphone and not Symbian. (Do you have a source for this claim, anyway?)

I am calm - I could say the same to you; all the people who are outraged that someone might ask for other platforms, need to calm down.

I hope you are right, and we'll see a Symbian version when they roll it out worldwide. I'm not holding my breath though.

Looking down my Facebook newsfeed right now, I see 0 people using a Blackberry to post updates, 5 individuals using an iphone, 2 using Android, and 2 using Palm WebOS.

But not every person posting gets their phone listed! This is an appallingly bad way of judging how many have their own phones of a particular type. Anyone who uses an Iphone for just about everything gets an "Using An Iphone" ad tagged onto it, but this is less common with other phones. I know of loads of people with Nokias, but I rarely see it tagged on their posts.

Also the argument becomes circular - more apps produced only for Iphone, so Iphone users are more likely to use an app instead of the website, so Iphone users are more likely to have "Posted using an Iphone" advert attached, and then you conclude that there's more demand for Iphone apps...

I don't know if I'm feeding a troll but let me attempt an answer anyway - I have a Symbian touch phone, and it's easy to use all the apps, including the browser. Obviously a touch phone is going to be better than an old non-touch phone with small screen - that's hardly a fair comparison.

Even today, on current sales, Symbian outsells everything else - so it's still largest, even if we ignored the installed userbase of old phones like you unfairly compare to.

And as for whoever modded me troll - once again, anyone even asking for platforms other than the Iphone gets censored, by mods who can't bear any criticism for their beloved company.

When a Mac or Linux user asks where's a version for them, because they only released for Windows, it's not considered trolling (even though Windows only at least makes some sense, being the largest platform).

I like how Iphone support is seen as important when it lacks this feature that many other phones have; yet companies (and even public funded organisations like the BBC and Government) are happy to write proprietary apps only for those with Iphones...

There's an uproar when the BBC or Government requires the use of things like Windows or Flash (and rightly so), even though 90%+ of the population can use them. But requiring the use of an Iphone, that only ~3% of the mobile phone population have? Oh, perfectly fine. The correct response is that we should always be supporting open cross-platform solutions, of course.

Not exactly - Open Source is still a term popularised by the Open Source Initiative, as you say in your title. Whilst it isn't exactly synonymous with Free Software (I forget the difference), Open Source means more than simply "making the source available for viewing". If I say the source is available, but only if you pay money to see it, and you're not allowed to redistribute either the source, or anything derived from that source, I don't believe that that would be an Open Source licence.

Not that this has anything to do with postgresql, which AFAICT is Open Source anyway.

It's funny how a phone which didn't sell well seems to keep showing up in press releases

The Iphone?

(Apple have about 3% of the market, yet get a mention several times a day in any random Slashdot story; to put things in perspective, Nokia ship twice as many phones per quarter than Apple have ever sold, and even just one of their many products, the 5800, has sold equal to or more than the original "iPhone". Android has now already overtaken Apple btw, and is the fastest growing platform, whilst Apple are actually now increasing sales slower than Symbian, Android and RIM, according to Q2 2010 results.)

Don't worry, that's queued for tomorrow's story: "Watching Toy Story On The iPhone(TM)".

(Certainly as newsworthy as many stories we get, such as yesterday's "Choose your own adventure On The iPhone(TM)" or some time ago was "You can access this website On The iPhone(TM)".)

Iphone first, followed by Android and then Windows. Yet Another Company writing catering first only for 3% of the mobile phone owning population, followed up with two of the other smaller platforms, whilst ignoring the market leaders of Symbian (worldwide) and RIM (in the US).

Android is certainly a platform that should be written for, as it's the fastest growing right now, and second most popular in the US. But I fail to understanding putting the Iphone first, or supporting Iphone and Windows, whilst forgetting the two major platforms. All I can think of is that the Iphone and Windows have problem using the touch.facebook.com site with a web browser, so need to have a special "app" written for them.

(Not to mention that a J2ME application would be an obvious thing to do too, since this is really the biggest platform overall, catering for the vast majority of phones.)

Oh, and if you're going to reply telling me that the Iphone is more popular, have the decency to look up actual market data, rather than redefining market sales to mean something completely different, like "mindshare" or "what me and my mates brag about owning".

Then again, since this seems such a bad privacy feature, I guess I shouldn't worry. Iphone users already have to have their posts tagged with an Apple advert "I'm posting with an iPhone!", so why not give away more info too?

Well I and the 97% of the population who own phones that isn't an Iphone will be okay.

*RTFA*

Oh wait, it's all mobile phone applications, not just the Iphone. Yet another obligitary Iphone Product Placement, when the story has nothing specifically to do with the Iphone.

Given that this does affect any mobile phone, including those that aren't locked down feature phones like Apple's, this is a significant issue.

I agree. And here in the UK, even the public funded BBC will be happy to give national coverage for your Iphone App, even if it's as trivial as just displaying an image. Next time I write an application, I'll be sure to submit a press release to them.

So much for the lie that the BBC don't advertise.

Sure, and then there are all the people astroturfing Apple, and unable to stand any criticism of their loved company. It's a must read :)

Posted from my iPad.

Please no, we'll end up like Facebook. Every page is a wall of Apple advertising, because everytime the few who use Apple products do something, we have to have the obligtary advertisement telling everyone how they used an Apple product to do it.

Do we get "Posted using Windows" or "Posted using Linux"? No, because no one cases, and turning posts into ads is generally annoying. Netbooks don't do it, most other phones don't do it either (although annoyingly, Android phones have started to pick up the trend).