iPhone unlocks are usually a tetchy experience – you have to have the right firmware on the right model iPhone at the right time. Now, however, thanks to a method that spoofs the activation server, you can unlock almost any iPhone semi-permanently.

The system, called Subscriber Artificial Module or SAM, requires a jailbroken iPhone and Cydia. To run it, you de-activate your phone, insert a new SIM, and then activate SAM. SAM spoofs the activation process, convincing the phone that it has been unlocked properly and without issues.

Built by hackers Loktar_Sun and Laforet, the process isn’t for the faint of heart and it takes twenty-eight steps. You can follow along at iClarified where they’ve outlined the entire process in meticulous detail.

Because you’re not really unlocking the phone but in fact activating it using an unsupported SIM, expect some wonky server issues. You will also have to go back and reactivate the device later if you decide to switch SIMs. It’s a small price to pay for freedom.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

As a watch fan, setting your pieces back and forth a few times a year is trivial. But what if you’re dealing with a collection of 8,000 watches? This video shows how the folks at Tourneau Time Machine, New York’s largest watch shop, deal with all of the winding, setting, and checking of their entire stock.

The entire process takes three days, from Friday until Sunday.

The last part of the video is pretty cornball – this looks like some canned video commissioned by Tourneau itself so feel free to skip it. However, I had never thought over the work necessary to set every single watch in any watch shop, let alone one holding nearly 10,000 pieces.

via hodinkee

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

As you’ve probably heard, Apple has been taking steps to make whole iPhone/iPad/iPod touch app development process a bit more orderly. They actually now have some (quirky) guidelines in place to help developers, and they’ve un-banned the use of some third-party development tools. It appears they’ve also quietly done something else: ended App Store name squatting.

This issue was talked about quite a bit last October, when a developer learned someone had secured the rights for the name he wanted to use for his app in iTunes Connect, but hadn’t actually made an app to go along with it. The situation, as described by PC World last year:

But a developer doesn’t need to actually go through the entire process of developing an application in order to register a name. The submission process can be completed only halfway and left pending pretty much forever, leaving the name stuck in limbo. Plus, you can do this multiple times for different names, without ever having to write a single line of code.

But now, Apple has begun emailing developers if they’ve failed to upload their binary for 90 days after first starting the app creation process. Apple warns the developer that they have another 30 days to do so, or the record will be deleted from iTunes Connect. And the key point: “The app name will then be available for another developer to use.”

Now, name squatting wasn’t without a barrier to entry before — you still needed to pay the $99 yearly fee to be an official developer. But that $99 ensured you could basically squat on as many names as you wanted (though Apple would take back names that were proven to be trademarked).

This is a long overdue good move to stop such behavior. Below, find the email Apple is sending out (names of people and apps have obviously been changed).

[photo: flickr/psd]

[thanks Peter]

Article courtesy of TechCrunch