The Philippine Online Chronicles

And Antennagate saga continues. After Apple held a press conference specifically to tackle the issue of the iPhone 4’s signal degradation and saying that all smartphones suffer from the same problem, other smartphone manufacturers like Nokia, RIM, and HTC responded. They all said that the Apple should not drag their companies into this debacle that Apple got themselves into, while also saying that they, unlike Apple, prioritize antenna performance over other considerations such as physical design (which makes sense since they’re in the wireless industry in the first place). Apple dragging these companies (RIM specifically) into the whole mess just shows how desperate they are to deflect the attention away from them and the possibility that they released a product with a major design flaw (though it hasn’t affected sales numbers, go figure).

To me, Apple’s solution of giving away free bumpers (or cases) is a band-aid solution. It is not the long-term solution that one would expect from a company such as Apple who continuously claims that they cares for their customers and their customers’ needs. As such, Consumer Reports saying that they are still not recommending the iPhone 4 comes as no surprise.

iPhone 4 could really be the best phone in the world right now, in terms of design, usability, features, and other things, but the existence of the antenna problem means that it could be all for naught. After all, the primary purpose of a phone is to make and receive calls, so what good is a phone (even with all the apps in the world) that cannot even connect to the cellular network? Apple knows that there is a problem, they have admitted that. What they will not say is the extent of the problem, and I believe that is where Apple is shortchanging its customers. I certainly hope they find a long-term solution for this.

In other news, Google has released information regarding the current state of Android and everything looks good. Google CFO Patrick Pichette and Senior VP of product management Jonathan Rosenberg said during the company’s Q2 earnings conference call that the Android ecosystem is exploding (and it is). Mobile search on the platform grew by 300% in the first half of the year.

That is huge.

The company says it is now seeing over 160,000 device activations daily and the Android Market now has over 70,000 apps, up from the 30,000 Google announced in April. The numbers show the phenomenal growth that Google’s mobile OS has had in its two and a half-year existence. Of course, it still has a long way to go before it can really and truly compete with iOS in terms of sheer numbers, but the rate at which it is catching up is remarkable. Even more remarkable is how quickly it has overtaken other players (such as Palm and soon, Windows Mobile) in the smartphone space. It will be interesting to see if the launch of Windows Phone 7 and the release of new HP-backed Palm products will affect Android and its growth. I personally don’t think so but we’ll just have to wait.

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iPhone 4 image, Courtesy Apple