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Comment by breckinloggins | Hacker News Reader

I know this is really silly, but every year I wish they would put an FM tuner in the iPhone, and every year they don't.

OK, replying to my own comment here, but you know what would REALLY be cool? Software defined radio. Think about getting to the point where not only could all the baseband stuff be done in software, but apps could program the transceiver to do whatever they wanted. Then we could get AM/FM, Shortwave, and all other kinds of apps.

Granted, the hardware is still nowhere near there right now, and there would be all kinds of complications with the FCC, but imagine how cool that would be!

Putting a self-contained piece of wireless pentesting kit into the hands of every preteen with rich parents, and then allowing any app developer to blast arbitrary RF through the airwaves doesn't exactly strike me as a good idea.

It certainly would encourage small businesses to fnially secure their wireless networks.

Guess we'll see whether WPA2's security is as strong as imagined.

I'm thinking that, as far as getting any of the apps in the app store, there would be a whole other level of certification involved.

As for one-off apps that wreak havoc, I think within the next couple of years we will be entering the age of dirt-cheap wideband tx/rx software defined radio kits, so we'll have to deal with that anyway!

that's literally the only thing stopping it from happening. the FCC is terrified that someone could write a virus which could then jam emergency radio frequencies.

I can just picture the anti-skeuomorphism crowd having a meltdown over Apple's "iRadio" app that they'd inevitably release. It would probably look like an old-timey stand-up radio.

Which is amazing seeings they have one in the iPod Touch... how hard could it be?

You mean nano.

Huh. I just re-capped the event and you're right. It's in the nano but not the touch.

I've never even thought of this - the iPhone doesn't have an FM radio? That's pretty ridiculous. Pretty much everyone, at least outside US, wants that on their phones. But I guess some learned to live without it because iPhone.

I've got it on a SGS II and never use it. The reception is pretty variable. I'd rather suffer buffering than hiss and crackle.

What's odd is that they added it to the iPod Nano, but not the iPhone or touch.

Oh my god. I must have been caught in a time vortex and transported back to 2005 when everyone was saying the iPod would be doomed if Apple doesn't include FM radio. Pronto.

Apple will add an FM tuner when the product no longer really matters. You know, like they now did with the iPod nano.

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