The furor over Apple’s recent September Update of the iPhone and some bricked phones has led Nokia to emphasize, in its counter attack, the open nature of its phones, according to The Guardian on Thursday. How the two approaches will work out remains to be seen as mobile phones become mobile computers, however, the Geek love affair with Apple may be waning.

"How galling to see Nokia promoting its N Series phones with lines like: ’Open to applications. Open to widgets. Open to anything. So go ahead and load it up. What it does is up to you’," Jack Schofield wrote.

It’s an emerging battle of two different approaches. One side sees mobile phones becoming UMPCs and should be treated as computers with computer OSes. The other side sees simplicity and reliability driven by the features of a computer OS, Mac OS X, but without the end user tinkering.

Moreover, Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ approach to a closed system is well documented, going all the way back to the first Macintosh. It had no expansion capability whatsover. Mr. Schofield pointed to a story about Steve Jobs’ description of the first ever Macintosh: "We’re making computers as easy to use as clothes dryers. And have you ever heard of a Maytag users group?"

"There’s nothing wrong with this idea, of course: the number of ordinary consumers is very much bigger than the number of people who want to tinker with their systems. But Jobs may just have gone a bit too far in locking down the iPhone. This could mark the beginning of the end of the geek love affair with Apple," Mr. Schofiled concluded.

In hindsight, iPO notes, this closed approach may be the price Apple has to pay to get into the consumer electronics industry, where they are a newbie, and spread its reputation for quality and product usability. It also fits in nicely with Mr. Jobs’ historical vision for the evolution of high technology products emphasized by the Maytag quote.