Did Apple intentionally allow non-developers access to iOS 7?

[BroadcastDoc]

Except that it isn't money.

If you pay your $99, then test all you want - you have nothing to worry about. If you aren't paying to be in the program then Apple doesn't make a dime from you.

Sorta blows your theory out of the water.

Again, my bottom line is the whole "we're doing Apple a favor and that's why they let us do this" attitude is wrong. If they needed the favor, they'd ask, and you'd jump at the chance.

They are simply choosing to not strictly enforce the policy now. They may continue that, they may not. It's up to you whether or not you want to take the leap, but Apple certainly can block you from getting updates at any time.

 

[T0mislave]

99 $ are money too jajjajaj everything for money.they care you to buy next iphone,they don't care are you using ios 7 beta 4,3 or ios 6 .that's ************

 

[aimee.elizabeth]

Except that it isn't money.

Again, my bottom line is the whole "we're doing Apple a favor and that's why they let us do this" attitude is wrong. If they needed the favor, they'd ask, and you'd jump at the chance.

They are simply choosing to not strictly enforce the policy now. They may continue that, they may not. It's up to you whether or not you want to take the leap, but Apple certainly can block you from getting updates at any time.

Well if they asked everyone to test it, then it would be way more accessible for perhaps non-tech people and that would create more problems than do good. Like a small portion of people on this forum who caught wind of how to upgrade to iOS 7 beta but don't know anything else about the OS decides to try it out. Then we get threads asking inane questions and saying the same things, they're all pretty much either "my phone is bricked", "Apple sucks", "this app sucks because it doesn't work on a beta" etc etc. And announcing this backdoor access to iOS 7 to even more of the public would only result in more unhelpful, negative criticism.

Now, I don't know if Apple left this backdoor access open by accident or not, but either way, they are letting it be and that means the people who do a little digging and research, and probably more tech savvy than the usual crowd, can get access to this beta and can discuss it in a constructive manner like some threads on this forum. And no one is sure if Apple does want employees to look on forums like Macrumors, but I think it wouldn't hurt them to do so because forums like this can help pick up bugs that they have missed. Especially because the developers who use this beta are more focused on developing and upgrading their own apps than to test for OS bugs.

 

[BroadcastDoc]

I don't at all disagree with what you're saying aimee.elizabeth. This isn't about who is or isn't running the beta. It's the trying to justify it by saying that somehow Apple secretly wants them to do it, based on the fact that they haven't been doing strict UDID checks.

That's wishful thinking. Sometimes a rose is just a rose and sometimes skipping a UDID check is simply skipping a UDID check.

 

[T0mislave]

Wow.Pls answer me people why apple let users jailbreak their iphones?like they don't know it is happening.where's the privacy now?where is the apple security system.Apple only cares user to buy their phones,all the rest is free of charge.

 

[BroadcastDoc]

I guess you've missed the part where Apple patches the Jailbreak holes. (Apple TV v3 anyone?)

You're very misguided about Apple's intentions. Much like someone who says "while if they didn't want me to take the towels at the hotel, they would have said something! They just want people to stay a few nights anyway...:"

If they didn't care if you used a jailbreak, they'd give you a way to do it.

 

[T0mislave]

Grrr i don't really care about apple ,pff i am only sure that they won't do nothing to non devs couse they will loose,so that is my opinion so see ya bb

 

[C DM]

99 $ are money too jajjajaj everything for money.they care you to buy next iphone,they don't care are you using ios 7 beta 4,3 or ios 6 .that's ************

What? That's the point, if you paid $99 then you register your device and Apple is just fine with it--this whole discussion is about those who don't pay and still get the benefits of it (at least the betas). Apple isn't making money off of those people, at least not any more or less they would if those people couldn't install beta releases.

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Wow.Pls answer me people why apple let users jailbreak their iphones?like they don't know it is happening.where's the privacy now?where is the apple security system.Apple only cares user to buy their phones,all the rest is free of charge.

Except that they do something about it all the time by patching the exploits. That pretty much negates what you said.

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Grrr i don't really care about apple ,pff i am only sure that they won't do nothing to non devs couse they will loose,so that is my opinion so see ya bb

It's an opinion. Doesn't really seem like there's that really much specific support for it...but it's an opinion nonetheless.

 

[T0mislave]

Apple strategy:all for one >one for all!
Apple wants all users to get support and their reputation grow as well.

 

[ntrigue]

I recall several instances of people neglecting to register their UDID and I got a beta pink screen previously. I guess the distinction is upgrade vs. restore.

 

[BroadcastDoc]

Apple strategy:all for one >one for all!
Apple wants all users to get support and their reputation grow as well.

Apple really doesn't need their reputation to grow in that manner. In fact, it does more harm than good when unsupported software is out in the wild and causes problems. That's exactly why Apple has a closed-loop system. They want control over what software is on what devices.

 

[BroadcastDoc]

You can try to justify it any way you'd like, but here are the facts:

The developer previews (betas) are meant for developers enrolled in the developer program. To join, you pay $99 and you can register up to 100 UDID's (devices).

When you install the beta, you agree to only use it on a device attached to a registered account. Period. Anything else is in violation of the terms of service. Can you do it anyway? Yes. Will anything bad happen? Probably not. However, those are the rules. There's no debating that.

 

[T0mislave]

The rules are not to jailbreak your device ,but your are doing it where is the fault.And what is ambivalent with devices using ios 7 on registered udid,but are not developers?

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What is legal , and what is not in this cases? Someone pays 5-someone 99 dollars to use beta?who is doing wrong?

 

[BroadcastDoc]

Apple doesn't have the time to assure that every single person running the dev preview is actually a dev. Therefore they use the $99 fee to be a dev as sort of a "barrier". Pay the fee, get the dev goodies.

As for the fault of Jailbreaking? Apple doesn't condone it, and they actively patch the OS to prevent it. You can certainly do it, and you're not agreeing to terms like you are when loading a beta OS.

Sort of an apples to oranges comparison.

Again, facts are facts. You can read into any action or inaction however you'd like. It doesn't change the fact that you aren't supposed to install the beta OS on a device that isn't attached to a dev account. End of story.

 

[kdarling]

One possible reason why Apple doesn't mind too much, is that every time a beta comes out, they get an enormous number of new registrations, as entrepreneurs all over the world take advantage of the opportunity.

(Moreover, some of these quick buck artists buy dozens of Apple registrations under various names, so they can sell many hundreds of activations. I read an article about one guy who got two dozen registrations, and sold like 2,000 iOS6 slots for $5 to $10 each in just a few days.)

These guys get rich quick, and Apple gets to brag at their next conference about how iOS has gained thousands of new "developers".

 

[Mak47]

I think that as long as the buzz about the beta's performance doesn't get too loud in the negative/bug finding areas it's in Apple's interest to look the other way on non-devs accessing the betas. If it does get too loud, they can easily crack down and make it go away without changing any actual policies.

They benefit in two ways. First is automatic performance/diagnostic reporting back to Apple. All iOS devices have this, some users turn it off, others leave it on. If it's on, it sends info back to Apple's servers. How they use it all, I'm not sure, but it's there for a reason.

The second is that even though there is no official channel for non-devs to report bugs, there are sites like this one where dozens of users post about bugs they've found and conversations ensue. Apple employees do view the forums here (as noted when pre-release OS versions are spotted in the logs). It would be illogical to think that they don't pay any attention to the things that are said here.