"No software developer kit (SDK) is required for the iPhone." That statement may prove to be the death knoll for those who hoped to run cutting-edge third party applications on the iPhone.

As pointed out by Jesus Diaz in his Gizmodo post, third party software developers are now only limited to using AJAX, an internet standard that spawned applications such as Gmail, Facebook, and Google Maps. While AJAX has proven to be indispensable, it still gives developers little freedom when it comes to creating applications.

Apple's press release has this to say about the iPhone not having SDK:

Developers can create Web 2.0 applications which look and behave just like the applications built into iPhone, and which can seamlessly access iPhone's services, including making a phone call, sending an email and displaying a location in Google Maps.

However, this is hardly new, since the Safari is already included in the iPhone, which can auto-detect phone numbers and addresses embedded in webpages effortlessly.

Needless to say, a lack of SDK means lack of innovative third party programs that may improve the experience of using the iPhone. More importantly, there will be a severe lack of great games that could possibly be played on the iPhone. Apple may have ties with Electronic Arts (EA) and id software - both game geniuses in their own right - but how about other game developers who know their stuff as well?

Simply put, not giving software developers enough freedom to create applications may very well hurt possible iPhone users hoping to get cutting edge technology.

Well, there's still widgets to work with, anyway.

YahooÂ?s own Graded Browser Support may have rated Apple's Safari "an A-graded browser" for achieving the highest level of support with the Yahoo interface library. But  the company released a preview of its Ajax-enabled home page only for Internet Explorer 6.0 and Firefox 1.5. Not surprisingly, Yahoo's act was met with bristling hostility from Apple fans. One developer  in particular described it as "highly disappointing and disillusioning" and "just plain wrong."

"The only logic one can use to justify such a move is based on a totally PC-centric viewpoint, which argues that only Windows users are worth troubling with, since they comprise the vast majority of potential viewers," said Leland Scot in an article on the topic posted on Musings from Mars. "But this is precisely the viewpoint that must cease if Web 2.0 is to become the fertile melting ground for truly cross-platform interdependence that it wants to be. ItÂ?s simply not the viewpoint of any company that really cares about Berners-LeeÂ?s vision or about the millions of users on platforms other than the virus- and malware-riddled mess that is Microsoft Windows today."

By the way Sir Timothy "Tim" John Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web and director of the World Wide Web Consortium once said "Anyone who slaps a Â?this page is best viewed with Browser XÂ? label on a Web page appears to be yearning for the bad old days, before the Web, when you had very little chance of reading a document written on another computer, another word processor, or another network.Â?

Furthermore, Scot said Web 2.0 sites "should be built to open standards, and any catering to specific browser extensions should be avoided. If proprietary extensions are utilized, they should have no effect on the siteÂ?s core functionality, and should not be even noticed by users of other browsers. For example, IÂ?ve employed a harmless extension to the HTML text input field that Apple developed in order to beautify search forms in Safari. ItÂ?s nice for Safari users, but has no impact on IE users or on Firefox users on any platform."

Looks like Yahoo stirred a hornets nest and the pissed hornets are not holding back on the sting!