My Take on Antennagate

I think in the hoopla over this non-issue Apple forgot two very important things. I think that they forgot it because they were never in this position before, or they forgot their lessons learned. What these 2 important things were after the break.

There are two things that Apple forgot in this flap over a non-issue. One is that Americans hate perceived arrogance. Two, Americans love to see a giant have a failure. These two things made a seemingly unimportant issue take on a life of it’s own.

It’s hard not to be a little arrogant when you are the acknowledged leader of a particular Market in this case, smartphones. The perceived arrogance has been the stony silence from Apple, and then the emails from Mr. Jobs. Having Mister Jobs respond to users is a very good marketing tool, but it is easy enough to exploit that. I have my doubts about the last few emails attributed to mister Jobs, but in the frenzy that attends a debacle more people are likely to believe it than not. Apple PR should have responded immediately in some fashion first, even to say simply “We’re looking into it.” Not the “you’re holding it wrong message.”

Then there is the bumper issue. Admittedly the bumper may have been a way for Apple to get a little more out of their iPhone customer cash-wise. It does look a bit shady when Apple stayed out of the case business until this version of the iPhone. It looks like they knew about the problem, and then tried to solve it by having everyone buy the solution. Apple Being Apple I would have thought they would provide a black bumper for each phone and then sold you the rainbow colors if they wanted to solve the problem.

The Second issue is the fact that Apple is the Giant in the smartphone industry. They move the market, and its competitors move to Apple’s beat. Americans love to see a Giant fail. They also like to see that Giant struggle back to prominence. This fact explains the immediate traction that some blog posts got on more ethical blogs and then the so-called regular media. Apple has had a string of hits that any misstep on their part would exacerbate into a media firestorm. The American Public ate up the coverage, but something unusual has happened.

Direct comparisons to Toyota’s and Apple’s problems is like comparing Apples and Oranges (sorry for the pun.) An iPhone that malfunctions is not going to cause a crash and burn like a car. Yet Apple’s sales of the iPhone has not ceased. People are reading the coverage and then buying an iPhone. Why?

I believe the reason is that most people are buying a hand-held device that is a phone. They are buying the game playing, app using device, and —oh, there’s a phone on this too. I’ve never had any problems with antenna attenuation with any phone I had that had internal antennas. The reason is that I understand about antennas, six years stint in the US Navy. I checked how I hold the iPhone, and it has always been with finger tips. I don’t cup the phone.

How could Apple of avoided this? If they knew about the antenna issue, a black bumper should have been in the phone’s container, white if this is the white iPhone. This way you can still sell the other bumpers as the rainbow pack, not individually. They should have never issued the “you’re holding it wrong” message. And Finally Mister Jobs should just shut up and do his staged events. He should stop sending out emails, period. You’ve got talented PR people let them earn their money.

Well that’s my opinion and analysis. Thank you for reading

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