There are rumors going around that the totally irrelevant release of Leopard might also give way to the iPhone being opened up to third party developers for new applications. Like I said, the two are totally irrelevant, but neither one is worthy of a separate press conference, so I guess the combination of the two announcements could kind of make sense in that respect.

They aren’t going to open it up to just anyone, but well established companies, especially those well known for producing mobile apps are rumored to have been getting contacted by Apple recently. Its already fairly well known that EA is porting its entire line of iPod games to the new iPhone/iPod platforms so they can be loaded onto those devices, but there is rumored to be a lot more companies being approached.

If I had an iPhone I’d probably still Jailbreak it once that’s available again because the non-official 3rd party apps are range from decent to good from what I have seen, and they are free. But for those looking to walk the straight and narrow, you might finally start seeing some of that added functionality coming to your iPhone as well, without all the warranty-voiding goodness.

Apple may open iPhone when Leopard ships [via macnn]