I’ve spent the entire weekend away from the whole ‘Antennagate’ saga - trying to avoid much of the collective whinging from Friday’s Apple press conference - however over lunch I decided to watch the 30 minute stream from Friday. Before I go any further, I should say that I’ve experienced issues with the antenna in the iPhone 4 when in areas of weak reception. It’s not something that’s actively impacted my use of the device, and whilst I welcome Apple’s offer of a free case the whole press conference left something of a bitter after-taste.
Despite the ridiculing iPhone 4 Antenna song introduction, the presentation started off well - concise and tactful acknowledgement that some things hadn’t gone according to plan, with stats and examples. However as the show rolled on it’s as if Steve’s anger at the proverbial shit-storm that the media has built around the antenna issue started to show, particularly at the offer of aforementioned free case.
I have no problems with Apple offering “just” a free case for my iPhone 41: I’ll be claiming my Bumper to help with the weak-spot coverage. However, Steve’s retort of ‘OK, so we’ll just give out these cases’2 was thrown out there with such venomous contempt that the message quickly soured from ‘we’re just wanting to make you happy’ to ‘why the hell should we have to give you a case?’. Jobs was very obviously angry, perhaps understandably so given his firm belief that the iPhone 4 is so incredible.
Unfortunately, that single moment of contempt towards users who have experienced issues with the iPhone 4, certainly didn’t affirm my belief that Apple just wanted to make right on the (localised3) issues with the iPhone 44.
As Daniel Jalkut wrote this afternoon:
Now that Apple is on top again, Jobs seems to be losing that knack for inspiring fans. He’s turning into a sore winner. He defensively chides his own customers for holding their iPhone 4 “the wrong way.” He tersely defends questionable Apple practices in one-liner email responses. He spins the truth in that barely plausible manner that used to be celebrated as the “reality distortion field,” but now comes off as purposefully dishonest and manipulative.
At times whilst watching the stream, that’s exactly what it felt like.
I am, however, curious about the 30th September deadline for claiming a free case, especially if Apple decide to discontinue the free cases. ↩
I’ve paraphrased and boldened the text to try and convey the tone of Jobs’ delivery. ↩
Faruk has an excellent piece (particularly regarding the laughably linkbait-fueled coverage in the media). ↩
For all my negativity over the delivery of the message (and that’s my only grievance with Friday’s presentation), Apple’s media frenzy included some stunning photos of their test facility. ↩
Posted on Monday July 19th, 2010
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