From slashdot:

"Fedora is going to pay Microsoft to let them distribute a PC operating system. Microsoft is about to move from effectively owning the PC hardware platform to literally owning it. Once Windows 8 is released, hardware manufacturers will be forced to ship machines that refuse to run any software that is not explicitly approved by Microsoft — and that includes competing operating systems like Linux. Technically Fedora didn't have to go down this path. But, as this article explains, they are between a rock and a hard place: if they didn't pay Microsoft to let them onto the PC platform, they would have to explain to their potential users how to mess with firmware settings just to install the OS. How long before circumventing the secure boot mechanism is considered a DMCA violation and a felony?"

I don't think this is true. Microsoft wouldn't risk that much just to dominate the market, which they essentially already do. It's just some random crap that someone came up with.

Yes, it is.
http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/secure-boo ... cted-boot/

So much for Microsoft being all for freedom of the little guy.

The question is, even though Microsoft doesn't require Secure Boot on x86 and hardware manufacturers provide an option to disable it in the BIOS, how long will it be before the hardware manufacturers remove the option to disable Secure Boot?

Its only going to be required on ARM tablets, x86/64 devices IIRC will still be able to boot other OSes. Funny thing is the iPad doesn't let you boot Linux either yet nobody has ever made a fuss. I've always noticed a double standard exists out there when it comes to things like this.

Seconded. Apple devices (meaning iPad, iPod, iPhone) are locked to iOS and nothing else, but nobody complains. As soon as there's a hint that Microsoft might do something similar, it's a threat to all that is good and free in software. Annoying. Besides, I don't care if it becomes illegal at some ill-defined point in the future. If I want to install a Windows alternative, I will do so.

EDIT: Ignore this post, just found this which seems to correspond with what you're saying:
http://www.softwarefreedom.org/blog/201 ... -down-ARM/

Just wondering, if the system won't load the OS due to a root kit how exactly are you supposed to clean it if the system won't boot?

F8 -> Safe Mode -> Et voilà!

I'm pretty sure they mentioned in a recent Building Windows 8 post that the OS comes with a separate module (replacing the old BIOS options menu) that includes the System Recovery and similar functions, that will start up automatically if the main OS is bricked for whatever reason. So it's covered.

Ummm... what about Tablets? we are talking about them....

They're not. Android successfully runs on iPod/iPhone (I've done it). Drivers for audio and camera just haven't been made yet.

They are. There's a reason they've only managed to make Android run on the iPhone 2G.

Let me be more specific. Apple devices are constructed such that they are only "allowed" to run iOS, and running anything else requires significant hacks. Therefore, you cannot say that they're NOT locked to iOS, since getting anything else to run requires circumventing the locking measures. That's like arguing that a safe was unlocked just because you were able to break the combination.

Running another system on an iDevice requires you to be able to inject your own payload code into the bootrom. We use this for bootrom-level jailbreaks, and we use this for OpeniBoot, which is a custom bootloader. From it, we can load Linux, Android etc.

So far, it is only possible on devices with CPUs up to A4 (thanks to geohot and pod2g for necessary exploits for this). That means that iPhone 4S, iPad 2, and the new iPad aren't supported.

and how do you keep that recovery area safe as well?

If it's anything like 7's, it'll be stored on a separate partition. If THAT fails, then you're probably screwed no matter what.

I would think that the "recovery module" would be stored in a PROM; write once, read many. Just a guess.