Why did Apple have NDA for iPhone application developers?

On October 1, Venture Beat reported that Apple dropped NDA(Non-Disclosure Agreement) for iPhone application developers, which was rejoiced by application developers. Before that, iPhone application developers have to agree not to talk about Apple development kit or the work they did with it before they can download the iPhone SDK (Software Development Kit), which looks very restrictive (more restrictive than Microsoft Windows API?). I do not think it was a good decision, which hinders the healthy growth of iPhone as a platform. Making it open, iPhone should see a more healthy growth. Anyway, what is Apple afraid of? Same reason as they did for Macintosh?

Maybe the drop is related with the upcoming G1. Android, the operating system of G1, offers an open alternative to iPhone. I think an open platform will foster innovation and benefit cell phone users.

Who is manufacturer of iPhone? (Foxconn)

Apple designed iPhone and provided its operating system. But who is the manufacturer of iPhone? TEXYT has a nice article about it. There are many companies which contributed to iPhone components. For example, ARM CPU is from German Infineon, WiFi chip is from US Marvell, and touch screen is from Japan Sharp and Sanyo. But who is the final assembler of iPhone?

According to WSJ, it is Foxconn, Taiwan-based manufacturer. Foxconn has a huge factory in ShenZhen, China, which employs 270,000 workers.

It is reported that Apple has PA Semi ARM team to design a new CPU.

Is the future of smartphone industry like PC industry today?

It is rumored that HP will introduce Window Mobile, touchscreen, and QWERTY smart phone. Combined trail-blazing iPhone, Nokia touch-screen phone which debut this past Thursday, and upcoming G1, the smartphone industry competition is hot. Like high competitive PC industry, I think smartphone competition benefits consumer.

But unlikely PC, whose operating system is dominated by Windows, there is no dominant operating system for smartphone yet. There are Symbian OS, Windows Mobile, Linux Mobile, Access, and Android. Many of them are or will be open source. Hopefully it will boost application development on these open source platforms.

Also unlike PC industry, which is independent on ISP, cell phone industry is closely associated with wireless carriers.

Who is inphonic? (online seller of wireless services who never pay rebate)

Inphonic, also under the camouflage of wirefly, a1wireless, and VMCsatellite.com, is an online seller of wireless services who never pays customers' rebate claims. Thus be careful when you are online shopping for a cell phone. Do not be trapped by the enticing rebate offer by inphonic.

The stock of inphonic, which delisted from nasdaq in November 2007, is worth $0.006 per share today. You can visit Google Finance and in particular an MSNBC article about inphonic rebate scam.

I could not get $350 rebate back from inphonic in 2005. My former officemate had same experience with inphonic.