Antennagate: Can we kill ‘fail’ already?
When Apple gets a zit, the media and blogsphere rise to the occasion to declare terminal cancer. Yet the patient hasn’t died let alone sneezed and the iPhone 4 remains pristine, unchanged in the wake of record sales.
CNN has cobbled together their list of 2010′s top 10 tech fails. With apparently nothing better to go with — analysis must be in short supply at the network — than the biggest non-event of the tech year to go with, they named Antennagate their worst “fail.” Ugh.
-
- 1. iPhone 4 Antennagate — “Apple drama. Nothing brings out the diehard fans and Cupertino haters quite like this one.”
— And, the link baiters.2. 3D TV — “After being all the buzz at the trend-making Consumer Electronics Show in January, 3-D television didn’t do much of anything this year.”
— And, the real story here is that people chose not to pay for headaches while putting embarrassing spectacles. As a member of the headache class with disposable income, all I can say is, “duh.”3. Microsoft Kin — “We almost don’t have the heart to beat up on the Kins anymore.”
— Why limit Microsoft’s failure to the Kin? Seriously, Windows Mobile has all but evaporated and Phone 7 uptake has been less than stellar.4. Nexus One — “Speaking of phones that failed…”
— A pity this wasn’t better planned and executed.5. Facebook privacy — “Nothing on the Internet elicits as much squawking as a change to Facebook.”
— Forgive me my cynicism, but Facebook and Twitter glitter like fools gold, two more middlemen waiting to be disenfranchised. Thereupon, discussion of their foibles calls to mind Plato’s cave.
There are, of course, more and iTunes Ping gets a mention at number 10 — another story that’s on the list because of its Apple affiliation.
That said, if for no other reason, the person at CNN who signed off on this list should be fired for using the word “fail.” It’s an offense against nature, gawd and man akin to the deadly sin that is Comic Sans…
What’s your take?
via TUAW
Related Posts:
December 29th, 2010
My iPhone 4 has had one dropped call in 4 months, no bumper, no nothing, and it may well have been the network, or the phone at the other end, that was at fault, for all I know. Antennagate was a beat up of a rare and trivial problem. CNN might have been forgiven for falling for it at the time, but to rake it up again now the facts are established, and put it at number one – an epic technical fail for CNN.
December 29th, 2010
It’s a bit sad that every one of Microsoft’s phone platforms has crashed and burned when hitting the market.
Windows Mobile is terminal, with only about 2% market share, and still in freefall.
The word Kin is generally interchangeable with the word debacle and disaster.
Now Windows Phone 7 has gone the same way, with atrociously low sales. Microsoft still won’t reveal the exact number of phones sold to consumers.
December 29th, 2010
The real catalyst for this ‘zit’ was Consumer Reports. And that’s no zit that you can sweep under the carpet. Let’s not go into another Cupertino reality distortion field.
A few people did the math: that ‘tiny’ percentage (disputable) added up to almost 15,000 real human beings. Consumer Reports did not underestimate the problem. They tested phones. Many phones. CR has a large proportion of Apple users. They had nothing to gain, and most CR reviewers liked the iPhone.
But the iPhone was shitting something, and when CR told the truth, out came the Steve Jobs BS job.
December 29th, 2010
Yes, Consumer Reports’ then and still highest rated smartphone. No contradiction there.
And, 15,000 people out 10 million iPhone 4 owners works out to 0.15%. Or, if you assume 8 million, that’s 0.18%.
The numbers don’t lie and people have voted appropriately with their dollars.