A call for Apple to open the iPhone & iPod touch platform.

Well, we knew it was bound to happen sooner of later the iPod Touch was hacked last week through a browser exploit that created a small enough hole in the OS and the hackers forced their way in. There is now a full scale automated hack with a OSX and Windows GUI versions available in the form of iJailbreak for the Mac - see TUAW for links to the Windows app.

I will say undertaking the hack process when not sick would be a good move and having sufficient patience to ensure the hack goes smoothly helps. My best advice is to ensure that you start with a clean iPod Touch that has been restarted before beginning the process. The good news is unlike the iPhone there is a much lower risk of "brickage" on the touch since it lacks the need to connect to a cellular network.

I will admit that the touch apps are definitely worth the effort and highlight the potential that a haptics based touch screen interface has in terms of potential. Apple is in a very interesting position at the moment having surged ahead of the rest of the cell phone market with Nokia, Motorola, RIM and others in a frantic dash to catch-up with their innovation. Clearly, the competition has seen the threat and is reacting as in this great video clip showing a cleaned up version of Nokia's upcoming S60 Touch.

While Apple needs to be sensitive to its carrier relationships and the need to ensure a high degree of stability and reliability in its devices the biggest weapon it has at its disposal is a large and willing body of third party developers interested in building cool apps for its platform. Hopefully Apple, won't make the same mistake that Sony made with the PSP in sticking so rigidly to a view that it must maintain a closed system that the potential of the device as demonstrated by inventive third parties will wither on the vine.

I think Apple should be able to see the interest and desire from its customers for these enhancements to its product that it will see the light and open up the platform. It shows that customers are willing to invest their time in jumping through technical hoops to open up their device to new applications. I would even hazard to guess that if the process of installing, managing and certifying applications that Apple would even be able to make some money most easily in the form of driving significant market share gains in what now looks to be an emerging market for personal mobile devices. The rumors now circulating today are that Apple will introduce an SDK for developers in January 2008 - let's hope they're right!