iLounge

1

How would people feel about stories like this one if they showed someone wrapping their hands around something that clearly looks like an antenna (i.e. something protruding out of the top of the phone)?

We’d think it was a non-issue and the person writing the article is silly. How surprising that an antenna doesn’t work if you wrap your hands around it! But because Apple has hidden its “antennaness” with the design, you guys treat it like it’s a separate issue altogether. Although it could be considered poor interaction design to make something not look like what it does, especially if it causes a user to use it in a way that directly affects its use (i.e. covering up something that someone would normally not cover up), so it’s Apple’s fault for not making it look more like an antenna…

Posted by Bart on February 8, 2011 at 2:27 PM (PST)

2

I’m sorry to see that the “phone” part of the iPhone was, and still is, its weakest function - that “antennagate” is a real phenomenon, even on Verizon. It only strengthens my resolve to replace my iPhone 3GS with an iPad-2 and a Nokia “dumb” phone.

Posted by Farnsworth on February 8, 2011 at 2:47 PM (PST)

3

#1: I’m guessing that you didn’t bother to watch the video, and that you probably didn’t make it all the way through the two paragraphs above, either. So I’ll make this really short and sweet:

The original iPhone 4’s exposed central metal antenna can lose or entirely drop signal when it makes a certain kind of contact with the user’s hand. There were reports that the Verizon version of the phone didn’t do this any more. Those reports are inaccurate. There’s a video above that shows that the issue persists, and that using a case eliminates the problem for the Verizon phone just as it did for the AT&T version. Period.

Posted by Jeremy Horwitz in East Amherst, NY, USA on February 8, 2011 at 2:49 PM (PST)