Palm has successfully shut down at least one online conversation on how to tether its new Palm Pre smartphone.
At the Pre Dev Wiki, a note says that Palm "politely warned" the site, without the use of legal force, to remove any discussion of tethering during the Sprint exclusivity period and possibly longer. Tethering is the process of using a mobile phone as a computer modem, lending its mobile broadband capabilities to a connected PC.
Continued discussions on tethering "will probably cause Sprint to complain to Palm," the Wiki says, "and if that happened then Palm would be forced to react against the people running the IRC channel and this wiki. There has been no legal action of any sort."
Sprint doesn't allow tethering under its terms of service, and it's not known whether that will change. If Sprint does offer the feature, it will likely cost an extra monthly amount, as most existing tethering plans do, so I can see why Sprint wouldn't want instructions circulating on unauthorized methods.
This is, of course, the Internet we're talking about. Trying to keep people from talking about something is bound to fail, so other guides will pop up. In fact, here's one.
Beyond that, Sprint and Palm should've just included tethering all along. If AT&T ever gets around to enabling this function on the iPhone 3GS, it's just one more reason not to get a Pre.
