Just a friendly PSA: after facing a tidal wave of customer complaints and bad PR, Apple has opted to waive the 10% restocking fee incurred on customers returning their iPhone 4s. I doubt this is any sort of admission of faultiness from Apple — they’re addressing the reception problem partially by making the bars bigger — it seems more like a tactful placation of their angriest customers. The restocking fee also figured in one of the lawsuits Apple is facing, so there’s that as well. Sure, $20 or $30 isn’t that much money, but when all signs seem to point to your having returned a faulty product, and you still have to give them money, it can sting a bit
JiWire has been watching their 30K hotspots throughout the U.S. to see how popular iOS 4 is. The results are interesting, if not entirely predictable. As you can see from the slide above, iOS 4 accounted for just over 22% of all iOS WiFi traffic on JiWire hotspots
Typically I use this blog to write articles about Facebook, however after hosting the Social Developer Summit earlier this week, I thought I’d take this opportunity to get a single point across: developers are kings of the economy right now. While there are plenty of instances where developers don’t get credit for the work they do, developers are the ones driving innovation and its up to them to build us a new future. Here’s a quick synopsis of my thoughts on the developer kings. Everybody Wants A Developer Ninja/King/Expert/….
Last week the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs passed the Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act of 2010, a bill now better known as the “Kill Switch Bill.” The bill will now be considered by the Senate. There’s no “kill switch” provision in the bill, but the President has had that power for decades. Sponsor The bill, if passed into law, will establish new cybersecurity organizations in the White House and The Department of Homeland Security, and compel private enterprises to cooperate with said agencies during a “cyber emergency” if deemed necessary by the President. CNET reported on June 10th that the Senate was considering the bill, using the term “kill switch” to describe the proposed emergency powers, and warning of the potential for the president to gain “absolute power” over the Internet
Services like Foursquare , Gowalla and others make it easy to post your physical location to the web – but what makes people want to do that at all? Fifteen-month old Foursquare is adding 100,000 new users every week and Facebook has made it clear that location is a feature it is preparing to offer soon . What’s the motivation for users to register online where in the off-line world they are? We asked some users of these services and found that they had varied and interesting answers
There is a long list of things people will tell you that you need as a startup: You need a working product. You need a business plan . You need a lawyer .
I’ll believe this when I see it: there are reports that the death grip phenomenon is actually the result of a software error . I’d heard this going around yesterday, but the more specific issue seems to be that the device goes to no signal mode when it should just be switching frequencies. And holding the phone in the “wrong” position aggravates this tendency. However, I’ve also heard that there may be a coating missing from some of the first batch that would have prevented shorting the antenna array
There was a minor flap yesterday when it came out that Google had used their remote kill ability to delete apps from a few users’ phones. I’m not going to restate my thoughts on that here, but in the interest of getting the complete story out, I thought I’d give a link to Jon Oberheide, who created the apps they removed. He’s a security researcher and was evaluating the risk associated with malicious apps, and when Google disappeared the apps off his phone, he checked out the method they used. Turns out that in addition to the REMOVE_ASSET command, there’s an INSTALL_ASSET as well, allowing Google to remotely install apps (or, more likely, replace or modify existing apps with security holes or whatnot)
With all of the hubbub about HP buying Palm back in April , you may have thought the whole deal went down months ago. In actuality, there’s a fairly hefty, many-months-long legal process that has to be followed before all is said and done. During that time, HP’s not even allowed to hint at how Palm should be doing business.
It’s the ultimate of ironies that Apple’s externalized antenna array in the iPhone 4 — hoped (and hyped up) to finally give us a phone every bit as good the rest of the device — has become the cause of most rancor in the immediate aftermath of the handset’s release. This morning you’ll be rubbing both sleep and disbelief out of your eyes as you read that Apple’s response to some people’s reception problems with the 4 is to hold it differently . But, before we start ostracizing Apple as the singular offender here, let’s hear from a man in the know. Spencer Webb runs AntennaSys, a company that designs tailormade RF solutions, and has himself worked on making quad-band transceivers for AT&T
Whether it was intended for announcement today or not we’ll never know, but Microsoft’s VP of Marketing just mentioned during a presentation that Windows Phone 7 will be launching this October . No more details, unfortunately — it’s not clear whether it’ll be a full launch with all the handsets ready to go, or a soft launch where they formally announce prices and dates for everything. October still seems dangerously far away when you’ve got the iPhone 4 ( problems notwithstanding ) and Android 2.2 raring to go. But I’m keeping the fire.
In a TED talk earlier this year in Edmonton, serial entrepreneur Cameron Herold tackles a subject that we’ve written about here on ReadWriteStart before : how to raise the next generation of entrepreneurs and how to foster a culture that encourages startups. Herold wants to see parents and schools nurture entrepreneurial traits, traits like tenacity, leadership, introspection, networking, and sales. “We miss an opportunity to find kids that have entrepreneurial traits,” says Herold, “and to show them that being an entrepreneur is a cool thing.” Sponsor In his talk, Herold rails against the school system for grooming kids for “good jobs,” but not promoting entrepreneurship as a viable career option.
Ah, iFixit, if there’s anyone more adept at being the first to dissect the latest toys, I’ve not met them. The latest gadget on their operating table is none other than the most lusted after device in the entire world: the iPhone 4. Yes, most people are still waiting to even touch the device, and here it is splayed open for all the world to see. Matter of fact, it’s happening as I type this.
Sprint and Sierra Wireless announced their latest mobile broadband modem, the 3G/4G dongle that supports CDMA Dual-band 800/1900Mhz, GPS 1.5 Ghz L-Band as well as WiMAX2.5Ghz. The new adapter is currently only available for business customers, but should be available to all users by mid-July. Of course, it’s free after a mail in rebate (yay) with a 2 year contract. There is currently only one data plan available, $60 a month unlimited (on the 4G) and 5GB of data on Sprint’s 3G
Looking for a new iPhone near Saline, MI? Too bad. Walmart already sold the one unit they received.
