As more and more people find the iPhone a more and more affordable option for an everyday phone, the ammount of people jailbreaking and modifying phones has increased.
Let's face it, people want to use their phones whichever way they want to use them. They do not generally like a company like Apple or Microsoft to tell them how to use a device.
Would the PC or Mac world exist if Microsoft or Apple told companies what software could be installed on the Windows or Mac OS?

But I digress.
This is not a post about why or if people should be allowed to jailbreak their iPhone's or iPod Touch. If you secure it, they will break into it. A cat and mouse game, and the mice will always find a way to win.

I am asked over and over again by these new iPhone jailbreaker's which sources I use to get my hacks, mods, and alterations.
There are a few good sources, and I will cover a few of them here.

Anything you want to add here? Please post in the comments!

*please be advised that if you install any third party modifications to your phone, you technically violate apple's warranty. All of this is at your own risk


ModMyi:
http://apt.modmyi.com

Modmyi is the repo for the popular iphone/ipod touch site.
It is dedicated to themes galore, with many bosspaper packs as well as complete themes, lockscreens, and ringtones.

iClarified:
http://cydia.iclarified.com

iClarified offers many different mods to customize how the phone and messaging functions on your iPhone are maaged. There are call log tools, sms (text messaging) tools and other modifications.

One repo I will not post the address to:


There is one other repo.
Both of which offer great wallpapers, fonts and themes.
This repo however also offers different content that allows users to install other apps that I cannot talk about here because it may or may not violate my adsense account.

The site is www.xsellize.com
and I will leave it at that.

But those are the two you should always add to every jailbreak.
I hope this was helpful.

This is the story of three:
PDANet
iPhone 3.0.0
AT&T fail

But first:
To thether:
The ability for a laptop or desktop PC to connect to the internet via a WiFi-capable phone.
--

First, pdanet.
The original AppStore was launched in july of 2008 along with the iPhone 2.0 software. For the first time the small developers had a real marketplace for applications. A centralized hub for selling.
A month or two after the launch of the AppStore an app called pdanet was released. Pdanet had existed for palm phones and blackberry handsets and was an app that allowed for a dead simple way to tether your handset.
Within a few days, the pdanet application was pulled from the AppStore without any explanation. The app was released on the cydia store where jailbreakers were free to install and enjoy.

This is also the story of March 17th, 2009.

This was the day that apple held it's keynote and announced that the newest iphone software would be released. This new software would enable users around the world the ability to tether their phones with the ease of a simple button tap on iphone. People were elated. Everywhere around the world people were happy. Everywhere but in the united states where att would announce at some later date how much extra would be charged to their existing iphone accounts for the ability to tether.
Att was at the time running an ad campaign for their service that allows users to connect to the exact same 3g network at the exact same speed as an iphone 3g but uses a USB dongle and charging an extra fee per month.
iPhone users already pay an additional $30 a month for the unlimited internet service on the iphone, but att would not allow for the phone to tether, no no no. that would be out of the question
Within a few weeks, the friendly folks at http://help.benm.at/help.php had managed a dead simple way to enable this "missing" feature on the iPhone, and the battle was partially being won for the good guys. The next iPhone update plugged this work around, and while the rest of the world enjoyed their free iPhone modem connection, american users languished under the Att money squeeze.

But this is also the story of another Att fail.

So what conclusions do we draw?
It could be said that att knew that the ability for user to buy a $5 application and get online on a laptop anywhere would basically shatter an already extremely fragile network. They simply put pressure on Apple to remove the original PDANet application from the app store.
This undoubtedly caused people to jailbreak their devices to install the now somehow "rouge" application and use their phone as they saw fit.

It should also be pointed out that technically att is not "wrong" in this. They can dicate how much internet you use. Rumor has it that there is really a "cap" on that "unlimited internet" and this has been proven without an official statement by way of att handing out phone bills worth $28,000.00
So beware. It isn't your device. This is what att is telling you. Those that want to tether, be advised that the rumored soft cap (the one they don't HAVE to enforce but can CHOOSE to enforce) is somewhere around 5 gigabytes a month.

Keep an eye on it. I don't tether (anymore, havent for two months) but surf heavilly and listen to plenty of streaming audio all the time.
Can't wait until att calls me and tries to charge me an overage on my "unlimited" iphone data plan.

So you are an AT&T user and are sick of the dreaded three beep sound. You know, the sound your phone makes when your call fails for no good reason?

If you call AT&T directly you will likely get a rep who will admittedly be very nice in mist cases but who will simply trouble shoot your device and do little to resolve the issue.
Here are four steps you should take in order to get your account actually credited for the poor service you are getting:

**THE BELOW ASSUMES YOU HAVE AN IPHONE COVERED UNDER THE ONE YEAR WARRANTY OR APPLECARE PLAN - it requires you getting a replacement phone if you can.

1) get a new sim card from AT&T (u lose no data because none is stored on the card)

2) backup your phone in iTunes (plug it in and SYNC IT) which backs up text messages, call logs and contacts. Not music though.

4) restore the phone in iTunes (optional but xtra ammo for apple to replace your phone as they will blame software for dropped calls while AT&T will blame the sim card we replaced or the phone itself)
3) take it to apple. Be nice. Tell them AT&T replaced the sim. U restored it etc and get a new one. If there is no apple store where u are call 1-800-MY-APPLE and they will send you a replacement or u can get one from the AT&T store.

4) sync your phone at home to get your contacts etc back on it

5) call AT&T and tell them all of these steps. At this point there is no possible excuse for your issues other than the network itself.

Be sure to remind AT&T you have a 3g phone and you pay an extra $30 a month per line of iPhone service so you should be able to use that service.
At some point they SHOULD offer you a credit. If they do not then simply keep complaining and they will. Almost all of them can offer a credit to you. If you feel ok asking go ahead but that is not my style personally.

TIPS: never EVER tell anyone you jailbreak or unlock your phone if you have jailbroken it. This is against your contract and they will give you nothing ever!
If you hack and do a restore your phone looks as good as day one
Also if you have physical damage to the phone you will be out of luck. Apple does now cover physically damaged phones unless you are an amazing talker. I've had them replace a shattered screen phone but it wasn't easy.

Also: The head of the genius bar is the equivelant of a GOD at the apple store. He has final say over all replacements. Talk to him only if you must but apple is an incredible company that is great to their customers (too bad AT&T is so poor)
They want to retain you as a customer so keep that in mind.
Good luck! Post comments here...
-Steven