...or you could be reckless and cavalier like me and just do it because it sounds cool
i used the information found here as a guide and highly recommend it; however, if you understand what you're about to do and/or you've been reading about the experiences of others, you should realize that jailbreaking doesn't always go as planned. i you didn't realize that, you should and you do now, but you should also realize that as long as you don't freak out or at least refrain from physically stopping the process (e.g. disconnecting the pc power cord or turning off your laptop, disconnecting the phone from the pc, formatting your hard drive during the jailbreak, etc.), at worst you should have your phone back to where it was before you started toying with it in an hour or two. here is my interpretation of the information presented in the link above and how i'd walk someone through the jailbreak (draft one since work is calling):
- connect your iphone to your pc and allow it to fully synchronize. this gives you a point-in-time backup of your phone and later allows you to automatically recover all of your apps/contacts/settings/etc. and keep the jailbreak.
- download the 3.0 installation package manually. you will have one locally if you upgraded to 3.0 through iTunes, but i was unable to get through the first reboot of the jailbreak using this file.
- download and extract redsn0w (i'd do as they say and use the torrent they certify). it doesn't matter where you place or what you name the folder that will contain the extracted files.
- run redsn0w and browse to and select the .ipsw file you downloaded. i don't know if your phone has to be on and attached to your pc at this point but i would assume so since the application appears to verify that the OS version on your phone matches the one from the file.
- (edit: i seem to have issues with redsn0w completing if my phone is password protected. to be on the safe side, i would disable this feature before continuing) do as redsn0w says but don't freak out if you don't time something perfectly. your phone will visibly react to both the initial two second hold of the power button and the following ten second hold of both the power button and the home button; however, it never took more than 13 seconds on the final step of holding just the power button for redsn0w to take over (the screen will flash and display an image and a message stating that installation started). once you see this you can let go of the home button and let redsn0w do the work from there.
- occupy yourself with something else for the next twenty or thirty minutes because the install takes time. if you sit there and stare at it, you run the risk of worrying that it is taking too long and freaking out and doing something stupid and possibly dangerous to your phone.
- once you can get back to your home screen, detach and then reattach your phone to the pc. this will confuse itunes and it will ask you if it should treat the phone as new or if it should restore the phone from a backup. select the backup you created in step 1. and continue. this will likely take longer than the actual jailbreak but you are in the clear at this point.
- after itunes finishes restoring the backup and synchronizing, you will have a phone that does everything you loved before but is no longer under the all-seeing eye of the apple gestapo.
- b. if the phone never comes back from rebooting (i.e. stays powered off), just cancel the jailbreak, detach the phone from the pc (probably optional) and turn it back on - you will see it is perfectly fine and looks exactly like it did before you initiated the jailbreak.
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