iPhone OS 3.1 rolled out this week. If you haven’t installed it or checked out reviews, let me give you the down low: install at your own risk.
Before thinking there’s something nasty in the new OS, let me assure you there’s none. In fact, a couple of good things come with upgrading. One is the new App Genius, a version of Apple’s song-recommendation engine ported for apps. Basically, it takes an inventory of all software you have installed, compares it with other users’ and builds a list of suggestions of ones you may like. While it comes with some flaws, it does offer a small reprieve to the problem of wading through over 75,000 entries in the App Store.
Another is the ability to organize your installed apps on the handset directly from iTunes 9 on your computer. Anyone who has slaved through the tedious thumbing and swiping to put some sense on the mess of icons on their phone will surely appreciate this. Other minor updates include improved media syncing, improved Exchange support and a couple of others.
Now, why the warning at the start? Well, 3.1′s major changes actually happen in the “features removal” category. More specifically, the new OS update removes the ability to tether from your iPhone (via that oh-so-easy flashing the firmware method) and removes anything and everything that has to do with Cydia (the unauthorized app store). Even worse, you can’t revert back to 3.0 once you upgrade, so you’re stuck without tethering (until AT&T actually lets you pay for it) and no cool, unauthorized apps.
Most folks will need more incentive than a recommendation engine to lose all that tethering goodness, Apple.
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