iPhone Jailbreakers Open their own App Store

Even though Apple released their SDK to allow developers to create applications for the iPhone, the jailbreaking community lived on. Many bloggers and articles predicted that with the iPhone SDK available, jailbreaking will also die as users will opt for the official apps in Apple’s App Store.

Unfortunately for Apple, the jailbreaking community is as strong as ever. In fact, a lot useful apps can be found within the jailbreaking community that is not found on the official store. These include apps like Cycorder, which lets you use your iPhone as a camcorder or PdaNet, which allows users to use the iPhone’s cellular data connection on their computer via a Wi-Fi connection.

All of these apps have been available through Cydia, a software installer developed by 27-year-old California graduate student Jay Freeman. Before, these apps are free to download. Now, users may have to pay up as Cydia will opening its own app store, providing a way for those jailbreak developers to easily sell their applications. Cydia intends to charge developers no more than the commission Apple does for his site’s billing services.

I’m pretty sure these app-store wannabes will be sued my Apple although their success may not be as easy as one would think. Many tech law experts say that the jailbreakers might actually have a viable defense as courts have said that courts have said you shouldn’t use the DMCA to leverage your copyright monopoly into other markets. While jailbreaking and unlocking are not the same process, the iPhone unlocking process requires jailbreaking, so it seems likely that the same legal reasoning to defend against unlocking might hold. Whatever the case, Cydia’s Freeman says he’s ready for such a challenge.

Last December, the EFF proposed an exemption to the DMCA that would legalize jailbreaking. In response, Apple filed their opposition to the proposal in February arguing that it could lead to problems with the iPhone’s security and reliability, as well as providing a potential venue for pirated iPhone applications.