iApple?
The iPhone 4's reception problem was for many the most important world news item of the week. Have smart phones become indispensable utilities of modern life or is the obsession unique to Apple alone?
The marketing logo on Apple's iPhone 4 website page proclaims: "This changes everything. Again." But what's basically a marketing catchphrase also reflects a reality many pundits struggle to explain. Apple has emerged as perhaps the world's leading technology company. This was demonstrated by the extraordinary coverage of Apple CEO Steve Jobs' Friday 16 July press conference held to address reception problems associated with the latest Apple product, the iPhone 4.
Jobs, 55, rejected criticism directed at his company's newest smart phone, which if gripped by the left hand might lose some of its reception. Apple's CEO said his company is offering free cases to address the problem. He went on to demonstrate that the flaw is not unique to the iPhone, but is evident in other smart phones, such as Blackberry, HTC and Samsung devices. "'We're not perfect,"' Jobs said. "This is life in the smart phone world. Phones aren't perfect. Most every smart phone we tested behaved like this."
Apple has lost more than $16 billion of its market value since 28 June, which observers associate with the iPhone 4's antenna flaw. Attacking the media, Jobs said it had blown the issue out of all proportion, accusing the media of trying to "tear down" a company that had grown so successful.
Jobs, who also promised a full refund to unsatisfied customers, appeared to have satisfied investors and analysts. According to an AFP report, shares were up slightly in after-hours electronic trading after losing 0.62 per cent in New York on Friday to close at $249.90.
But what would have otherwise been a minor antenna problem discussed within the confinements of the IT community and user forums became a top news story, extending beyond the borders of the few countries that released the iPhone 4 at the end of June (selling 1.7 million devices in three days only).
In fact, the anticipation that marked the prerelease period of the new iPhone, the hype that surrounded its actual release on 24 June, and finally the global media's obsession with its antenna issue, and Jobs' subsequent press conference, reflect an interest that goes beyond smart phones. Evidence of this Apple fixation could be illustrated in a Google search of "iPhone 4" which this week generated 570 million matching results. A search on what's probably one of the worst humanitarian disasters in history, "Haiti" where 300,000 people were killed in an earthquake six months ago, generated 649 million entries.
This is a very telling indicator of the volume of interest one electronic gadget occupies in our consciousness, and which ultimately provokes the question: When did smart phones become so important in our lives?
The topic is in no way exclusive to developed countries where purchasing power allows for this kind of debate. As mobile phone penetration in a country like Egypt reaches 70 per cent of the population, there's a huge market for smart phones. In fact, the first website to offer Arabic support for the iPhone was "iPhoneIslam" hosted by an Egyptian Cairo-based blogger named Tarek.
Ayman El-Sayyad, editor of the cultural monthly Weghat Nazar magazine and an IT expert claims the obsession "is about Apple". This is "not a smart phone issue per se," he told Al-Ahram Weekly. "The iPhone 4's reception issue is common amongst other mobile phones. There are solutions and if customers are unhappy they can always return their phones." So, he asks, "where's the problem?" "The attention has spiralled out of control."
In the heated iPhone 4 discussions on the iPhoneIslam forum, some users adopted an Islamic interpretation of the antenna issue, arguing that observing Muslims are, by default, right-handed and would thus not suffer from the design flaw that is exacerbated when the device is gripped by the left hand. This sparked a debate on whether or not the iPhone 4 is -- or isn't -- "Islamic".
The new device hasn't been released officially in the Arab region as of yet. It will be released in 18 countries at the end of July, namely: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.
The iPhone fixation offers much food for thought regarding the impact of Apple's successful marketing strategies on our lives. Many years prior to the launch of the iPod portable media player in 2001, mp3 players were widely available and at cheaper prices. But with the iPod's introduction, music gradually became a priority to tens of millions more people across the globe that purchased it.
"This is one of the rare situations when one can actually claim that a gadget has changed their lifestyle," El-Sayyad said. This extended to many -- but not all -- of Apple's products, such as the first iPhone that was released in January 2007. The iPhone 3G was launched in July 2008, followed by the 3GS in June 2009.
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