Stop iPhone from downloading iOS6 OTA

Your phone will not download or update unless you tell it to. It does not do it automatically, ever.

I'm not sure this will work, but I would try going to Settings > Store and turn off automatic download of Apps.

My phone is not jailbroken, but because of Apple's complete inability/unwillingness to let users set their own prefereces for things like this, I may have to jailbreak it.

That would be a very poor decision. Updating is a lot safer.

It doesn't download by itself or automatically. You must manually go to Settings > General > Software Update.

First I've heard of that.

The red badge shows up when the update is available. It does not mean your phone is downloading the update. I think it's possible that when you saw the badge, you tapped Settings/General/...etc and accidentally started the update yourself. I don't want to update yet either, and I'm stayin' outta there!

canucksgirl wrote:

I really don't want to jailbreak, but I also rely on the map too much to change right now.

It doesn't download on its own, someone pushed the update button. Good luck on that JB it doesn't exist for IOS 6 untethered.

canucksgirl said "According to more research on other sites about previous updates, the update will download automatically if you are connected to wifi while plugged in."

My phone is connected to wifi and plugged in all night, every night, and it has not downloaded anything by itself.

This article says you must specifically request a software update -- they will not happen unless provoked by the user:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4623?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

canucksgirl, one other comment:

The macrumors article you referenced starts by saying the author did explicitly start the OTA download ("without thinking").