iPhone 4 solution
The soap surrounding “the best iPhone ever”, is nearing it’s climax. Apple is holding a press conference later today to address the problems with the iPhone 4.
Rumour has it that Apple might appease customers by offering the “bumper case” (a flimsy plastic cover) to disgruntled buyers for free. Analysts do not expect Apple to announce a recall as that would probably be more damaging to the company even though a poll at the Wall Street Journal Online shows that about 60% of the readers think Apple should issue a recall. Analysts estimate that such a recall would cost Apple around 1,5 billion Dollars (approx. Euro 1.8 billion).
Ever since the antenna problem got confirmed – just a few days after the June 24th release – Apple has received much criticism for the reception problem caused by what many see as a critical design flaw. First Apple denied the problem and downplayed it (“you’re holding it wrong”), then the company said it was a software problem and the phone was just displaying the signal strength in the wrong way.
Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal (not just another newspaper), published a story in which the paper claims that Apple knew of the iPhone antenna risk, but nevertheless released it, “because Steve Jobs liked the design so much”. The iPhone 4 is not the first iPhone that has been troubled with reception problems. Previous generations suffered from poor reception – although in many cases it has been also proved to be problem of the provider (in the US AT&T) and not the hardware.
The Wall Street Journal also reports in the same article that, according to their sources, the field testing process of the iPhone 4 was very limited as well, because of “Apple’s emphasis on secrecy”.
Earlier this month American Consumer Reports.org (a large US consumer interest organisation) officially announced that people looking for the new iPhone, should not buy it until Apple comes up with a good solution to the antenna problem, although the fix is shown in a video as well: a simple piece of duct-tape eliminates any problems.
The whole controversy heated up after the publication with reports of overactive moderators deleting any links to the article from posts by users in the official Apple support forums.
Personally, I am reconsidering my previously decision the get an iPhone 4 myself. I still have a couple of months to decide what my new phone will be (either iOS of Android based), and it will be crucial to me to see how Apple handles this situation.
We will probably know the latter later today.
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Common dude you’ve a journalistic background, do some research first before you start quoting other sources. First of all it was Bloomberg who had the scoop and Wall Street Journal took it over, just like New York Times (also not an other newspaper). Here’s Bloomberg’s news post:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-07-15/apple-engineer-said-to-have-told-jobs-last-year-about-iphone-antenna-flaw.html.
The messages about Steve Jobs knowing in advance is already denied by other sources by the way.
There are some rumors flying around that it CAN be fixed by software!?
Apple does what every company does: “deny and wait and see”. Remember the Microsoft XBox? Dell and Sony’s batteries?
I also take a wait and see approach, let’s see what they have to say tonight (19:00u).
I deliberately choose this article – which is my prerogative as this is my blog anyhow – because it was a nice roundup of the news surrounding “Antennagate” and not because they where the first one to bring it. The WSJ also links directly to this – and other Bloomberg stories – regarding the iPhone 4.