Posted on July 16, 2010 - by Venik

Secret Cell

Sorry to disappoint you: this post is not about some new secret CIA jail discovered in a budding Eastern European democracy. What’s on my mind is all the ridiculous secrecy surrounding the development of the iPhone 4 and Nokia N8 and how it hurts the sales of these devices.

In case you haven’t heard, iPhone 4 comes with a newly-designed antenna that was supposed to improve reception quality. The antenna consist of a multi-segment metallic band that wraps around the cell phone. It looks cool and it actually does offer higher gain than the iPhone 3GS antenna. The problem, as it turned out,  manifests when you hold the phone in your left hand and the four sweaty fingers opposite your thumb short out two of the antenna’s segments. This causes a substantial drop in the antenna’s gain and frequently leads to complete loss of signal.

Apple’s first official response came directly from its fearless leader. Steve Jobs suggested that iPhone 4 users should not hold their new cell phone in the left hand. Brilliant. Here’s another idea – no charge – for Steve: wrap the iPhone in a napkin. Make sure its a dry napkin and not the one you used to wipe the spit off your face. After giving it a second thought, Apple came out with a new solution: a complimentary cheap case that comes in several different colors. How very innovative. Unfortunately, Apple can’t produce these cases quickly enough and so iPhone 4 owners will have to wait at least until September.

Most iPhone 4 users did not buy their latest toy because it is such a great improvement over the 3GS version or because they think it is so much better than comparable cell phones from other leading manufacturers. They bought it so that they can brag about it. And now that everyone knows that iPhone 4 sucks, these people look like saps. Not to mention that they’ve already spent a whole lot of time with AT&T’s clueless tech support trying to figure out the problem, before Apple finally acknowledged a design flaw. So you can imagine that there are quite a few pissed off Apple customers who are now hiring lawyers.

So what does the iPhone’s antenna fiasco have to do with Apple’s obsession with secrecy? Like other cell phone manufacturers, Apple sends its prototype devices to cell phone service providers for testing and iPhone 4 was not an exception. However, in its desire to obfuscate the gadget’s external design features, Apple modified the case. This modification covered the antenna and prevented the testers from discovering the problem with its design. On top of that, latest reports in the media suggest that Apple knew of the antenna issue. Apparently, Mr. Jobs liked the antenna design so much that Apple’s engineers “decided” to leave it unchanged.

Form over function is the latest trend in Apple’s product line. Apple’s thinking might have been that, for example, if Blackberry – notorious for its poor reception – can remain popular among business users, than so can iPhone 4. If this was the case, Apple simply failed to understand the nature of its core customer base: computer idiots with a soft spot for flashy gadgets. You should have seen the sheepish look on the face of one of my friends – a typical Apple fanboi – when he got a phone call and had to produce the old 3GS from his pocket instead of the iPhone 4 about which he bragged to me not three days ago.

Nokia, for its part, is engaged in a futile legal pursuit through the maze of Moscow courts of a Russian journalist who published one of the early reviews of N8. As you might have guessed, the review was not a favorable one. Nokia claims that the device he tested was obtained illegally and was an unfinished prototype. This may be true, but I have seen plenty of negative reviews of the production version of the N8, which was rushed to the market in its half-baked state to compete with the equally handicapped iPhone 4. Nokia is now demanding that Russian police force the journalist to hand over the prototype, which he says he does not have. While the N8 is not yet available in Russia – the fastest-growing cell phone market in Europe – Nokia’s PR shenanigans are inevitably drawing public attention to that review, undermining the N8′s future sales potential and giving advantage to Motorola and Ericsson.

In the highly competitive cell phone market secrecy is an important business tool, but Apple and Nokia take it to the absurd. I guess my public service announcement of the week is to stay the hell away from iPhone 4 and N8 and buy a cell phone that does things other than drain the battery and your bank account. Having said this, I have to make a painful admission: I actually own an iPhone 3GS. Despite its many flaws – a crappy camera, short battery life, poorly-placed silence switch, and slippery case, among others – the 3GS is probably the best cell phone I ever owned, primarily due to its extensibility via third-party apps. As a PDA, most current smart phones suck in comparison to my old Palm TX. But ever since I got the iPhone 3GS (not my choice – it was a present), I haven’t used the Palm. The primary reason being that Palm TX is not a cell phone and the circumference of my waistline leaves no room for two mobile devices in the pockets of my pants.

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