“The iPhone 4 is flawed” became “Phones aren’t perfect.” It’s subtle, but it works. “All antennas have weak spots.” Count how many times Jobs said that during that press conference.
Even though all the other cell phone manufacturers (RIM, Nokia, etc.) have been crying for the last three days that Jobs was playing tricks when suggesting that “all phones are flawed,” the fact of the matter is that the public is left thinking that all phones might just be flawed. We now are asking that question, instead of anything specific about the iPhone.
After all, there are tons of YouTube videos floating around, showing the “death grip” effect on various other models of phone. Is the iPhone 4 worse than any of those?
For the vast majority of users, it isn’t.
And is suggesting that all phones are flawed any more a lie than suggesting that the iPhone 4 is seriously flawed, a major bungle, a huge mistake by Apple due to insufficient testing? I think not.
Never fight a media war with the plain and simple truth. Especially when your opponents aren’t making an honest argument, either. While what Jobs showed last Friday was no doubt a convenient, specific truth (“Other phones can be death gripped, too.”), it was no less misleading than the notion that the iPhone 4 is “seriously flawed.” He fought a half-baked, exaggerated truth with a well-crafted, cherry picked one. You can make ANY phone do this. To what degree, with how much or little effort—these things are not important. Every phone has this problem. True, if not the whole truth.
The more this looks like a general cell phone problem, and not an Apple-specific problem, the more Apple wins. Nokia can come to its own defense all it wants; that only helps Apple change the headline.
The real test will be how long it takes for these kinds of stories to be relegated to the tech nerd media, blogs, etc. Will the local news still cover this issue anymore, now that Apple has given free cases and offered full refunds? We’ll see. I imagine the quarterly earnings call tomorrow will warrant at least one mention of the “death grip issue.” But sales figures should help combat the notion that sales have been hurt. So most likely, the final word on your newscast tomorrow night will be “but the issues don’t seem to have an effect on sales or customer satisfaction.” We’ll see.
The biggest thing that will keep this story from staying alive, as Andy Ihnatko has suggested, is the conspicuous lack of victims. Toyota got maimed in the press because real people died from faulty cars. We have yet to hear a story from ANYONE about how the iPhone 4 antenna effected a real person in the real world. Not one saga of a lost call to grandma on her birthday. Nothing. Just a bunch of people sticking their fingers on the sides of their phones, and going “Oh yeah. That does happen.” And then moving on.
