The iPhone 4 iRony

No, by irony I'm not referring to the metal frame in the antenna design catastrophe that's been causing Steve Jobs to lose a large amount of sleep and hair (?) these days.

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For my friends who are blissfully unaware of the happenings in the world of mobile phones, apple has come up with a new upgrade, the iPhone 4. And while it is a great phone, it has a tiny issue: if you hold the phone normally in your left hand, you lose signal receptivity by upto 20dB on average.
This means that your signal bars will all vanish and you'll experience dropped calls if you're not standing.. well.. right next to a tower.

The problem actually arises from the new antenna design of the iPhone. Rather than use an internal antenna that has been built into practically every mobile since the old ugly extendable outer ones have been outdated, Apple chose an exterior one. One that goes round the phone. Yes, outside.

The reason they did this? To improve receptivity.
Ok, there's irony for you. But hang on, that's only part of it.

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When the iPhone 4 customers noticed this effect, they did what anyone would do: uploaded videos to youtube, wrote artices, posted on forums, and generally made a hue and cry about it.

Initially Apple had denied the whole design flaw thing, saying that it was just a problem with the way the bars were being shown. Go ahead, read the letter of how the engineers at Apple were "stunned" to discover that their formula was "totally wrong".

Later, when they realized they couldn't get away with that and that the problems were not going away, they admitted the issue in an official statement:

"Gripping any phone will result in some attenuation of its antenna performance with certain places being worse than others depending on the placement of the antennas. This is a fact of life for every wireless phone," Apple said. "If you ever experience this on your Phone 4, avoid gripping it in the lower left corner in a way that covers both sides of the black strip in the metal band, or simply use one of many available cases."

It is true that all phones could have this, but to my knowledge no manufacturer to date has put the ends of the antenna at the lower left corner of a phone where people normally hold it. It could have been placed at the top with no problems whatsoever.


Anyway, now here comes the irony (again).

Below are some frames from the official iPhone promo video (click to expand):

And here are some frames from the iPhone 4 Facetime TV Ad (click to expand):

So?

You're a bit slow? Ok, I'll spell it out for ya.
Apple says "avoid gripping it in the lower left corner in a way that covers both sides of the black strip in the metal band". 

That's how they're all holding it! All the models, in Apple's own promo and TV ad, are holding it that way!
Maybe Jobs doesn't realize: That's how all right handed people hold it!

Hell, that's how you hold it too!

:D

Now if you have time for some real humor, watch this:

Then watch this:

:D :D


Links:

Consumer Reports Lab Tests
Anandtech Lab Test: iPhone 4 Signal Problem
PCMag iPhone Deathgrip Article
CNet News Article on Apple's acknowledgement
iPhone 4 Facetime TV Ad


So what's your opinion on Apple's moronic.. er.. ironic behavior? Comment and let me know..


P.S. Thanks to everyone for the kind words, encouragement and one very inspiring verse (albeit written jokingly) for my previous post, which is the reason for this one being a whole year ahead of schedule.. ;)