Nothing says they have to make it easy. In fact, manufacturers are required by federal law to make some things a bit difficult (changing your cell phone radio into a jammer, for instance. The feds have arrested people with modified radios jamming or impersonating aviation or public safety communications, for instance.)
Well thats different. With a radio jammer you're actually affecting other people.
Hundreds of years of contract law would beg to differ.
You could sign a contract restricting you from doing anything but look at your iphone if it was supported by valid consideration and a court didn't decide the provision was unconscionable or contrary to public policy.
Those hundreds of years of contract laws were built around services. Not products that were only possible within the last few decades.
Like I said, when I go into a store and I buy a blu-ray disc, a game, a DVD, a piece of software, or an iPhone, and I pay for it, that product is MINE. I can do whatever I want to it as long as I don't copy it and sell it as something I created, make copies of it and distribute it to everyone and their brother, or use it in a manner that would negatively affect another human being.
If I want to customize my iPhone to my hearts content, install another OS on it, use it on another carrier, or take a hammer to it, that is my business and Apple is in no place to tell me I can't.
EULAs are invalid contracts anyway. Why? Because I have no way to accept or reject the contract until after the purchase has been made. If I make the purchase, read the EULA and decide I don't like it, I can't return the software for a refund. There isn't a store I can think of that will accept opened software for return, not even Apple.
Better yet, wheres the EULA agreement with the iPhone? I just went through all the boxes for all five of my iPods, my iPhone, and my MacBook. Guess how many printed EULAs there were? One. In the MacBook box. The rest made no mention of EULAs.
Even if the iPhone and iPods did ship with EULAs, you can't get to them until after the seals have been broken and the box completely open and torn apart. So if you get to it and read it and disagree with it, you have to return it and pay a hefty restocking fee at most stores, including Apple (which tends to have the highest restocking fee of all).
If Apple wants their EULA to actually be an enforceable contract, then it needs to be presented prior to purchase and it needs to be in plain English as well as negotiable. On top of that, for those who have already purchased a product, Apple needs to have completely negotiable contracts for updates or to abide by the original terms. None of this "by using this you agree.." nonsense.
Also, if Apple wants said contract to be signed and enforceable, they need to include clauses that hold themselves accountable. For example, some sort of guarantee their product won't cause any sort of harm, like data loss.
If people actually felt EULAs meant something, theres no way they would agree to something that basically says "you can't do this this or this, you can't hold us accountable for anything, even if it causes you to lose all of your data, and if you agree to that then you can use this product".
With this type of post, you just proved who you are? That's why Apple is doing this.
And who did he prove he was? I have a "clean" iPhone and I experience massive amounts of dropped calls, signal loss, voicemails not showing up for days, texts not showing up for days.. AT&T is just simply the worst service provider in the US.