Tit for tat: Palm undoes Apple's "fix," re-enables iTunes syncing for Pre

Well, that didn't take long. A little over a week ago, Apple blocked the Palm Pre's ability to sync music and playlists with iTunes; now Palm is back with a new firmware update that opens iTunes up for the Pre again. Game on.

Palm announced update 1.1 for WebOS—the mobile platform that powers the Pre—on Thursday night, and among other things (including various enterprise and security enhancements), the new firmware "re-enables Palm media sync," according to the official Palm blog. "That's right—you once again can have seamless access to your music, photos and videos from the current version of iTunes."

Of course, Apple—which has been trading barbs with Palm for months, first over the Pre's iPhone-like multitouch abilities, and now this—will be none too pleased, just having released a software update to iTunes last week that (as an Apple spokesperson put it) "disables devices falsely pretending to be iPods, including the Palm Pre."

And so begins yet another cat-and-mouse game between Apple and … someone else, Palm in this case—except this particular tit-for-tat is the most ridiculous yet.

The Pre (seen by many, including me, as the iPhone's toughest competitor yet) surprised everyone early on with its ability to sync up seamlessly with iTunes; all you had to do was attach it to your system via USB, and the Pre would show up under iTunes's "Devices" menu, complete with options for easy music and (unencrypted) video syncing.

How did Palm do it? Well, it was a hack, basically—albeit, a relatively benign one.

However, Apple has never been one to tolerate hacks of any sort, be they attempts to "jailbreak" the iPhone (which Apple thwarted multiple times with firmware updates) or harmless ones like this Pre-iTunes thing.

That's why last week's iTunes 8.2.1 software update, which locked the Pre out of iTunes, was entirely predictable, and here's another shocking prediction: within a few days, Apple will release a new iTunes update that locks the Pre out again.

So, here's the big question: Is Apple merely patching a security hole in its software (as, arguably, it has every right to do), or is it poking its finger in a competitor's eye? (Or a little of both?)

Related:
Palm Releases WebOS 1.1, Restores iTunes Media Syncing [Macrumors]