Orb updated their OrbLive client for the iPhone and the iPod touch today, an update that enables the ability of a user to watch Live TV on the iPhone over 3G and EDGE connections. Even if Apple previously blocked such uses of the 3G network and the first release of OrbLive also had such restrictions, therefore forcing people to use Wi-Fi for this type of connections, it seems that the company will allow this update. Nevertheless, Apple maintains monopoly control over what applications are published and distributed to the iPhone, which is barely legal. If Apple approves the update of OrbLive and blocks Slingbox, another app, this would be an illegal, anti-competitive business practice.

Some people say that the update was approved for now by mistake. The example of NetShare, an internet sharing app, which permitted iPhone to sling its internet connections to notebooks and other Wi-Fi connected devices, seems to create this idea of mistake. Apple removed NetShare hours after it had been posted on the App Store and thousands of purchases. Later on, Steve Jobs’ company told NetShare developers that the application would not be permitted on the App Store. AT&T markets would be the first to suffer if thousands of iPhone users begin streaming Live TV 24/7. Even now, AT&T continues to suffer capacity and local-loop bandwidth issues in some areas of their 3G network, mostly because of the expanded bandwidth usage of the iPhone and the iPhone 3G.

At a conference in San Francisco on November the 6th, AT&T and Apple announced that they plan to deliver an official tethering app for the iPhone as soon as possible, even if such tethering apps already exist, with no costs.