And Apple's monopolistic attitude is reaffirmed.

You want to develop for the iPhone? You must pay $99 for the privilege. You want to write a little app for yourself? Sorry, you need to distribute to the world via Apple. You want to write an app that they (or their 'partners') disapprove? Nope, that won't be allowed.

I've put off buying both the iPhone and iPod Touch, waiting to see how open development would be. What they've given isn't openness; it forces you to bed Apple and their friends.

And how is this supposed to work with open source projects? I'm sure the certificate will be non-transferrable. How is a open source project meant to work under this model, which is obviously geared to commercial companies and their closed-source products.

Until Apple opens these devices so that I can develop what I want to develop and install what I want to install, I'll continue my boycott of them.

Though it seems monopolistic, but I am sure the QOS and style of Apple will keep the new born mobile computing infant far from hand of "bad coders", either malicious ones or "bug builders".

For years I've worked with PPC, the problem is all new bricks are placed on oldies. For example the contacts app of PPC is inherited from Win 3.1, 15 years old. And you "can't" replace system level apps because another "monopolistic" idealogy!

Next Monday I am going to purchase an iPod touch, because iPhone is not working in my zone.

Zensunni, Apple's approach seems reasonable to me. They are letting the developers keep most of the money and are keeping the start-up costs low by giving away the SDK (provided you have a Mac), and pricing the developer certificate at a more-than-reasonable $99. Apple has also found a nice way of getting all this software to consumers. They need to be concerned about security and legality. The worst thing for iPhone development would be if some rogue app got out there and either swiped a lot of people's personal information or did damage to the phones. iPhone applications will likely be very popular, so they need to take measures to protect end-users.

it shows that Apple is willing to allow instant messaging on the iPhone. I'm pretty sure that whoever writes Adium is all over the iPhone SDK by now...

I'm surprised you aren't complaining that Apple won't give you a free iPhone to test on too. Is $99 a lot of money to pay to develop for? Well, Apple isn't going to make the iPhone a free-for-all platform. I'm not sure why you thought it would be.

As for open source - what's stopping you from sending your free compiled app to iTunes and offering the source code on your web site.

But you should look for a Linux based phone instead. It seems the iPhone is not for you.

If a person does a factory restore of his iPhone, or if he uninstalls an application from the iPhone but later decides he wants to install it again, will he have to purchase applications all over again?

If it works like the iPod, the app will probably be synched to iTunes on your computer. If you do a reset, the apps you want to restore will be available from your authorised computer. At least, that is how I suspect it will work.