Barnes and Noble announced the Nook Color early last year, and immediately technology gurus realized that it had the potential to be more than just an e-reader. After all, it offers the optional ability to surf the internet, to view and modify Office docs, and to use applications, similar to an iPad. Hmmm... What does that sound like? An entry level tablet PC right? And the price is set way below any other entry level tablets on the market.
In the past week, Nook Color saw an explosion in interest when the hackers at the XDA collective held a press conference to tell the world that they had successfully jailbroken the device. They proved it by showing pictures and screenshots of the Nook running the Angry Birds game as well as having modified icons on the Extras tab.
XDA offers complete instructions for jailbreaking the Nook on their nookdev wiki site. Only a handful of people online claim to have used the instructions to do the same though. Most likely, that's a result of the instructions being pretty geeky - it's not quite in the form of one-touch hack software as exists for Apple products. Many users are being careful, since making a mistake in the unlock process could result in the device being bricked.
I have no doubt, however, that the instructions will get cleaned up eventually (perhaps in short order). I also wouldn't be surprised to see a simple rooting tool created for the Nook in the future. This has been the general road that rooting options for other Android devices and jailbreaking options for Apple iOS devices have taken.
So what does this mean for the developers of the Nook (Barnes and Noble)?
If they know what's good for them, they'll ignore it, and follow Microsoft's lead rather than Apple's. They can't endorse the process for legal reasons, but if they're willing to turn a blind eye to it, it could actually increase sales of the Nook. They price the Nook as an e-reader. But this hack means that they'll have a full fledged Android tablet PC for sale at the price point of an e-reader. At $299, this blows the competition out of the water.
In the event that Barnes and Noble does decide to go against their own best interest and fight the practice of jailbreaking the Nook, they could still learn a thing or three. They could make future Nooks much better offerings by watching why people are trying to unlock them. They would pay careful attention to what features hackers were installing on jailbroken Nooks, and then implement those features on new release of the Nook. This could, in the end, give the average user less reason to crack the Nook at all, although geeks would probably still do it just for the thrill.
In the past week, Nook Color saw an explosion in interest when the hackers at the XDA collective held a press conference to tell the world that they had successfully jailbroken the device. They proved it by showing pictures and screenshots of the Nook running the Angry Birds game as well as having modified icons on the Extras tab.
XDA offers complete instructions for jailbreaking the Nook on their nookdev wiki site. Only a handful of people online claim to have used the instructions to do the same though. Most likely, that's a result of the instructions being pretty geeky - it's not quite in the form of one-touch hack software as exists for Apple products. Many users are being careful, since making a mistake in the unlock process could result in the device being bricked.
I have no doubt, however, that the instructions will get cleaned up eventually (perhaps in short order). I also wouldn't be surprised to see a simple rooting tool created for the Nook in the future. This has been the general road that rooting options for other Android devices and jailbreaking options for Apple iOS devices have taken.
So what does this mean for the developers of the Nook (Barnes and Noble)?
If they know what's good for them, they'll ignore it, and follow Microsoft's lead rather than Apple's. They can't endorse the process for legal reasons, but if they're willing to turn a blind eye to it, it could actually increase sales of the Nook. They price the Nook as an e-reader. But this hack means that they'll have a full fledged Android tablet PC for sale at the price point of an e-reader. At $299, this blows the competition out of the water.
In the event that Barnes and Noble does decide to go against their own best interest and fight the practice of jailbreaking the Nook, they could still learn a thing or three. They could make future Nooks much better offerings by watching why people are trying to unlock them. They would pay careful attention to what features hackers were installing on jailbroken Nooks, and then implement those features on new release of the Nook. This could, in the end, give the average user less reason to crack the Nook at all, although geeks would probably still do it just for the thrill.
About the Author:
Learn more about best jailbreak software. Stop by Tristan Clark's site where you can find out all about jailbreak software and what it can do for you.
0 comments:
Post a Comment