Well, it worked on the S5, that's for sure. Leading to the most prolific exploit in android history with Towelroot, so I wouldn't say pointless. I'm not sure the exact % that paid their pledges, but I paid mine. The ads in apps and webpages are really starting to bug me honestly, and I miss my battery-saving apps and xposed modules. I jumped to HTC from the S5 specially to restore bootloader access and ultimately CM-based ROM's to my phone experience. I guess leaving Verizon would have been a more thoughtful choice, but oh well. If anyone starts a bounty thread (and yes I know almost everyone thinks its a bad idea), I'm in.
That being said, much respect to the people working on a root method for us currently. You guys make my little phone hacking hobby possible, so thank you.
I don't know exactly how true it was, but when I first got my M8 and found out that I had to pay $25 to get S-OFF, at first I was hesitant...But I kept reading WHY and immediately understood and paid right away. It separates guys like us who pay their pledge from people who DON'T. As I am sure you would EASILY pay the $25 to get S-OFF. I know I would. I almost prefer it this way, because im pretty much sure it comes with tech support for those who need it. If only more americans stood by their word instead of promising things they would never fulfill. I know that this community has always been about contributing and free things to make all of our experiences better. I get that, but all too often, people take the work and claim it to be theirs. I remember a few devs (that I talked to a lot) had this problem with users of the Samsung Moment and HTC Evo 4G. So between all of the devs hard work not being appreciated (especially when they do this stuff for THEIR phone and they release it to us to enjoy and some people are always complaining or demanding features, yet they don't contribute by donating to the dev so they can buy energy drinks to keep their mind going, or beer to help relax them after they finished a massive update that fixed all the bugs and added features and stuff. Then people wonder why they have to pay $25. Well I have been a member of XDA for years, contributed a lot here or on irc chat, and I will gladly pay $25 to get S-OFF, Root, and Custom Recovery. Why? Because since the DAWN of xda, everyones phone has been made far better then what ANY manufacturer gives us. I mean seriously...I would have Android Lollipop on devices that Samsung or whoever has long gone moved on from. Why? Because of XDA, and the devs. I swear if everyone paid $25 these devs would be able to buy all sorts of devices to root for us. I know I have a Samsung Galaxy Tab Pro, and an HTC. So I appreciate it, and you know what? I consider that $25 a donation to have root on devices period. Why? Because without the people who know what they're doing, I wouldn't be able to install xposed, make entire backups of my phone (so if the device fails while on warranty), I can EASILY restore my phone. I had that happen with my old HTC Evo 4G LTE. That phone broke 3 times on me and each replacement bestbuy gave me (2), all I had to do was get S-OFF flash a custom recovery, and do a "Restore" then all my texts were there, apps were there (with data), call logs were there. I can go on. That $25 is security for me. So saying all that, I will sit here as patient as I can be to get S-OFF and when the time comes to hit the pay button, there wont be a second thought. No regrets. No more stress. Any more Andybones roms to flash.
BOOM (pardon all the grammatical errors, yall get my point.............right?)