Poor thing... Deliberately chained to a sinking ship, never given a chance to flourish as a classic ereader. I read so many books on mine when it was in it's prime that it's rubber grips are worn off and the printing on it's front face is now scarcely visible, good times
Do all my reading on an iPhone 4 and iPad now, but it sure would be fun to get the ebm running again.
Thanks for your suggestions Nick, I have contacted Ectaco as well as Franklin and will let everyone know if their support is able to provide me with a solution.
The desktop manager is providing Franklin's update server with my device's serial and model numbers as well as it's current firmware version via get data embedded in the update query url, so it's easy to see how (though not why) Franklin had each os tied to a particular device.