It may surprise you to learn that unlocking and jailbreaking your cell phone has to this point been against the law. It’s especially surprising considering some of the first news when a new iOS build is released is who can jailbreak it the fastest.

The legality, at least, will no longer be in question. Feds ruled to make it a legal practice to remove the barriers between you and the awesome powers of your phone. In reality, this doesn’t do much. It’s not like jailbreaking was being enforced in any serious way in the past. This also won’t change things for the current jailbreakers. They’ll keep going, hacking as they have in the past, and the people using alternative app stores will likely continue to do the same. The only people this really affects are the few entrepreneurs out there who will try to make a legitimate buck by opening yet another app store for interested parties.

If you are such a party, start looking for your new apps soon. Otherwise, as you were, folks. Nothing to see here.

George Hotz, the young man responsible for the initial crack on the iPhone, may have put together a hack to unlock any iPhone OS device, including the iPad. Well, he thinks so anyway. There’s obviously no way to prove it until the iPad comes out and Mr. Hotz isn’t willing to give out a release date for the new crack.

The hack is a software-only exploit that allows jailbreaking of iPhone OS devices with just a simple click. Here’s the word from GeoHot himself:

The jailbreak is all software based, and is as simple to use as blackra1n. It is completely untethered, works on all current tethered models(ipt2, 3gs, ipt3), and will probably work on iPad too.

Don’t ask about a release date. You won’t make it happen any sooner.

There you have it. Wired had a phone interview with Hotz during which he said he may release the hack the day the iPad releases but that he would wait to see what the iPhone hacking community does. Here’s hoping for a launch day release.