[Shabaz]

One of the things that most bothered me in the initial responses from Apple (the Jobs emails and the open letter) is that none of them acknowledge that there is a fundamental difference between antennas from other smartphones losing signal and the iPhone 4, where the antenna is exposed and can be shorted, even with one finger. I'm kind of disappointed they apparently still don't acknowledge that (maybe the live transcript is incomplete).

Citing dropped call numbers or return rates or showing other smartphones with signal reduction caused by something completely different just seems like willful misinformation. I suppose their usual MO is to not acknowledge complaints head-on, but that's usually with new features people would like to see. If I can short an antenna and change its RF characteristics so as to lead to an instant dropped call, that seems like a fundamental engineering flaw, and I would've liked them to acknowledge that.

[sigzero]

> caused by something completely different

Um, from what I saw it was caused by the same thing. You hold a phone a certain way you lose signal strength.

> that seems like a fundamental engineering flaw, and I would've liked them to acknowledge that.

I watched the whole thing and several times it was acknowledged as such. Maybe you wanted them to say it was only an iPhone4 issue and not a general smartphone problem?

[Shabaz]

I have only read the gdgt transcript, so if you watched it somehow I'm going to defer to you about anything not in the transcript.

But as far as the 'completely different' thing goes, as far as I know the lower signal can be caused by signal being absorbed by your hand. But what seems to happen with the iPhone 4 is that there is also this shorting issue because of an exposed antenna. But when directly asked about the shorting issue they say it's about your body being a "pretty effective signal absorber".

[sigzero]

Ok, yes I agree with that. They gave a rather bad answer to that question. I am surprised that a follow-up question was not asked to bring it back around to the shorting issue.

[ergo98]

>Um, from what I saw it was caused by the same thing. You hold a phone a certain way you lose signal strength.

Apple is playing some extraordinary deception with that. They're comparing a death grip on phones (which is entirely unnatural and I certainly don't hold a phone like that), and saying "See, it's all the same".

That isn't the issue. The issue is ruining the profile of the exposed 3G antenna by electrically distorting it (whether with your body or against the GPS antenna).

It was pretty clear when he talked about the 3GS and cases -- a death grip with or without a case will yield exactly the same outcome. But they're trying to conflate the downsides of an external, unavoidable antenna with holding the phone in a ridiculous fashion.

[dieterrams]

Hey, neat. An Apple comment by ergo98 that I agree with.