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> it would have to run on... an open mobile OS, which would in turn require open hardware.

I'm not 100% clear on this: why can't there be an open mobile OS that runs on (bootrom-exploited) iOS devices?

I should've added *for best/cleanest experience.

Sure, you can use proprietary hardware (iPhone) and try to make it run different software, but your luck getting around their protection systems may vary (and it may or may not be illegal, depending on how much you care).

Curious: has this even been tried? I would assume Apple SoC's require binary drivers, so even though they are similar to Android phones on a hardware level it might be difficult or impossible to even get an Android port to boot.

Hell, it can be difficult to get an unsupported version of Android to work without major bugs on an Android phone.

It was tried a few years back: http://www.idroidproject.org

They had to rewrite the drivers, of course.

Important to point out: the authors of iDroid stopped, but not due to any technical obstacle; it was mainly because iDroid was a hobbyist project and their lives intervened. Someone else could pick up the effort today, if they wanted.

However even if someone picked the project up again it wouldn't run on any modern devices, since the last iPhone to have an untethered bootrom exploit was the 3GS.

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