This should be interesting.

It’s official. Consumer Reports’ engineers have just completed testing the iPhone 4, and have confirmed that there is a problem with its reception. When your finger or hand touches a spot on the phone’s lower left side—an easy thing, especially for lefties—the signal can significantly degrade enough to cause you to lose your connection altogether if you’re in an area with a weak signal. Due to this problem, we can’t recommend the iPhone 4.

More here: http://cl.ly/1dZW

Reception Problems

There’s absolutely no question that the iPhone 4 has generated a lot of buzz regarding its exterior antenna and the benefits and sacrifices that come with the design.  The term “death-grip” has been coined to describe the action of placing a single finger in my case, or an entire hand, over the bottom left corner of the iPhone 4, essentially bridging the two antennas together.  Many users who do this, including myself, notice an enormous drop in signal, and for many the phone drops to No Service whatsoever.  Apple released an official statement on the issue last week.  Apple still believes this iPhone is the best iPhone it has ever shipped and is convinced the issue is software related.  Apple said in its statement:

Upon investigation, we were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong. Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength.

Apple offered this explanation as a fix:

To fix this, we are adopting AT&T’s recently recommended formula for calculating how many bars to display for a given signal strength. The real signal strength remains the same, but the iPhone’s bars will report it far more accurately, providing users a much better indication of the reception they will get in a given area. We are also making bars 1, 2 and 3 a bit taller so they will be easier to see.

Many, including myself, however, are convinced that this is a hardware issue that was glanced over in quality testing.  Could it be due to the fact that most testers were using cases to disguise their iPhone 4s as iPhone 3GSs?  Perhaps, but that’s a far stretch.  (Using a case completely alleviates the problems, by the way.)  According to Apple’s statement, at my home, maybe instead of five bars, I should have three.  That’s not going to change the fact that when I place a finger over the bottom left hand corner, the signal drops to zero; I will just have started with fewer bars in the first place.  Another official Apple statement along with a usual not-out-of-style short e-mail from Apple CEO Steve Jobs circulating the web both offer some light into the issue suggesting that Apple may know that it is in fact hardware related.  Steve told a customer, “All phones have sensitive areas. Just avoid holding [iPhone 4] in that way.”  The other official Apple statement says something similar:

Gripping any mobile phone will result in some attenuation of its antenna performance, with certain places being worse than others depending on the placement of the antennas. This is a fact of life for every wireless phone. If you ever experience this on your iPhone 4, avoid gripping it in the lower left corner in a way that covers both sides of the black strip in the metal band, or simply use one of many available cases.

I can say this much: I’ve owned several phones before iPhone, an iPhone, an iPhone 3G, and now an iPhone 4.  I’ve always had full reception at my home with every phone prior to iPhone 4 and have never had any issues regardless of how I held any of them.  Pittsburgh itself has excellent 3G coverage and I very rarely ever drop calls.  On my first iPhone 4 which was replaced already (more on that in a moment), I was dropping between 1/3-2/3 of my calls daily.  In Washington DC, I dropped somewhere around 12 calls alone.  My iPhone 4′s modem was resetting itself exactly 66% percent of the time.  All of these, incredibly unusual statistics said the Genius, were from the iPhone behavior scan they ran at the Apple store.  Those statistics, for what is supposed to be the best iPhone Apple has ever shipped, seemed incredibly depressing to me.  Anandtech, who has some more detailed research into the issues, says:

The drop in signal from holding the phone with your left hand arguably remains a problem. Changing the bars visualization may indeed help mask it, and to be fair the phone works fine all the way down to -113 dBm, but it will persist – software updates can change physics as muchas they can change hardware design. At the end of the day, Apple should add an insulative coating to the stainless steel band, or  subsidize bumper cases. It’s that simple.

My current replacement is also dropping calls and displays the same signal-dropping issue as the first.  I refuse to buy a case for my iPhone 4 as I’ve never used one before and I shouldn’t have to use one for it to function properly. (Did Apple design the iPhone 4 this way to boost its Bumper case sales?  I doubt it.)

Other Issues & A Replacement Replacement?

Many users are reporting other issues such as a malfunctioning or not-sensitive-enough proximity sensor, as well as iPhone 4s that are not recognizing the SIM cards installed in them.  My friend, Jack Amick, had his iPhone 4 replaced due to a “No SIM” error, which interestingly enough, tells the story of my “replacement replacement.”

While I was at the Apple store getting my iPhone 4 replaced for the dropped calls and signal issues I mentioned above, the replacement iPhone the Genius gave me, upon boot, displayed “No SIM Card is Installed.”  The Genius and myself were both confused, tried reseating the SIM, rebooting the phone, and we even went so far as to reset the phone.  None of that worked.  He ended up taking another replacement out of the drawer for me and chucked that first replacement aside.  When I asked him if he thought that one had the not-as-popular-as-the-reception-issue-but-still-popular “No SIM” issue, although it was an obvious question, he just said, “Anything is possible.”  He also told me he’s replaced a few for that very reason.

Luckily, I’ve not personally talked to anyone with the proximity sensor issue and none of my iPhone 4s have exhibited that behavior.

All of this makes me wonder how good the quality control on this device really is and how thorough the testing really was.  I imagine the testing was incredibly extensive, so to miss over the reception problems, or any problems for that matter, seems like a serious omission.  The No SIM and proximity sensor problems are probably more of a manufacturing issue than a quality issue, but regardless, all of these issues need to be resolved.

Call Me Unlucky

I’m scheduled tonight at the genius bar for yet another replacement.  This replacement iPhone has a loose camera assembly on the back that rattles, and it has a piece of dust or lint that’s clearly visible resting inside the front camera assembly.  This front piece of dust is hindering with its ability to handle different lighting situations and the rear camera assembly rattling is just plain annoying and seems to be messing with its ability to focus on certain items.  Perhaps the lint in the front came from my pocket?  Not sure.  But, regardless, it shouldn’t have made its way into the lens assembly.

Edit: I got another new iPhone.  This one doesn’t have dust under the front lens assembly nor does it make any rattle besides a slight noise from the vibration switch.

Is there anything good about this phone?

Absolutely!  The issues I’ve mentioned above aside, I truly believe this is the best mobile device Apple has ever shipped.  I do, however, believe this is the worst phone Apple has ever shipped.  The Retina display with a pixel density of 326 ppi is absolutely gorgeous and makes it impossible to distinguish individual pixels on the screen.  The display is ultra crisp, bright, and viewable at almost any angle thanks to the inclusion of in-plane-switching.  The front and back glass panels are incredibly strong aluminosilicate glass.  The camera takes absolutely excellent photos and the HD video is rather clear as well.  The front facing camera for use with FaceTime and self-portraits is also decent.  FaceTime works flawlessly and rarely cuts out or fails.  The ability to video conference on my phone is incredible and just plain amazing.  The Apple A4 chip inside the phone makes it super snappy and responsive alongside iOS 4.0.  iOS allows for multi-tasking which screams on the A4.  Apps are state frozen and switching between them works very smoothly.  The apps that tie into Apple’s background APIs like Pandora also work amazingly well and don’t excessively drain the battery (which lasts reasonably long, by the way).

Overall thoughts? What should Apple do?

Overall, I love my iPhone 4 because of all the great things I mentioned in the above section.  However, Apple needs to make these antenna issues right for its customers.  Apple sold tons of these phones.  It sold 1.7 million of them in the first three days.  That makes for a pretty damn expensive recall.  Do I see Apple doing a recall?  No.  Should it?  Perhaps.  I agree with Anandtech that Apple should either coat the phone with something to make it less conductive, or subsidize or give away free bumper cases and just admit that although innovative, the iPhone 4′s antenna design is ingeniously weak to human-generated interference.  There’s a paradox at play here – increase the reception dramatically by moving the antennas to the exterior… but, just don’t touch them!  That’s highly impractical, and for Steve to tell people “Just avoid holding it in that way.” is completely unreasonable.  Even if it’s a silent fix and replacements are offered over time for affected buyers who make their way into an Apple Store, Apple needs to make this situation right, and I fully expect them to after the software update in the coming weeks is shown to not help the situation at all.

Hardware:

• A 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor.  That’s super fast for a phone!
• A  480×800 AMOLED screen – consumes less power than a typical OLED screen.
• A 5.0 MP camera with a LED flash.
• A trackball with a multicolored backlight, for different notifications.
• A2DP Stereo Bluetooth and Wireless-N capabilities.
• 2 microphones for “active noise suppression.”
• Compass, GPS, light and proximity sensors, and accelerometers
• A 1400mAH battery, for 5 hours of 3G browsing or 7 hours of 3G talk.
• Skinnier than a standard pencil.
• A QR code printed on the back, which, when read, takes you to an android-themed game of Memory.

Software:

• The Nexus One sports the new Android 2.1 firmware, which is gorgeous looking, and only available on the Nexus One for right now.  It’ll be on the Droid soon enough
• 5 home screens
• Live Wallpapers, or interactive backgrounds.
• A revamped photo gallery
• Background syncing to online Picasa photo galleries
• Voice enabled text fields using Google’s voice recognition
• Apps will soon be able to stored on an external SD card
• No multitouch in the default Google Apps.
• According to Gizmodo, “If you want Android phones, this is the one to get.”
• According to TechCrunch, “The Droid You’re Looking For”
• The phone has been rooted, or,  “jailbroken.”

Carriers and Pricing:

• The phone is $530 to buy it unlocked: meaning, you can use it with any carrier, including AT&T,  although it won’t work with AT&T’s 3G service.
• The phone is $179 if you want to buy it with a 2 year contract with T-Mobile. T-Mobile offers a plan for $80 including 500 minutes and unlimited internet and TXT/SMS.
• The phone is said to come to Verizon some time this spring.
• If you live in Europe, the phone will come to Vodaphone sometime in the spring as well.
• You can get the phone custom engraved.
• Buy it here.

Personally, I can’t wait to get my hands on one and give it a shot.  I liked the Droid, so I imagine I’ll enjoy the Nexus One quite a bit as well.  Apparently, Verizon and other carriers who are using the Android platform are not concerned that this will negatively impact their business.  I’m not so sure.  Google worked super close with HTC to make sure this is the shining star of the Android line.  We’ll have to see how it plays out.

Thanks to Salem from TechnoHeads.org for allowing me to use his excellent, simplified list of what the Nexus One is all about.

The lawsuit is incredibly frivolous.  AT&T tries to claim that the ads are misleading because on Verizon’s map, the white space represents no service, but on AT&T’s map, the white space, in many cases, represents EDGE coverage.  They’re claiming that consumers won’t know the difference and assume that the white space on AT&T’s map is indeed indicative of a no-service area.  Here’s an image of the ad:

"There's a map for that." Image courtesy Engadget.

At the bottom of the ad though, it clearly states “5x More 3G Coverage.”  The emphasis is mine.  Although many consumers may not know what that means, technically, Verizon is being truthful.  Verizon’s entire network is based on a network technology called EVDO.  EVDO, is by nature, entirely 3G.  This means that essentially, Verizon’s entire network is 3G, so therefore, they can use their entire coverage map.  AT&T’s network, however, is not entirely 3G.  Most of its network is in fact EDGE, which is a 2.5G technology.  The map shown to the right does properly indicate AT&T’s 3G coverage zones.  Sad, isn’t it?  The loophole for Verizon of course is that even though EVDO’s speeds in many places equal that, or are even slower than that of EDGE, because the network technology is classified as 3G, they can use the map without repercussion.  For now, anyway.  Hopefully the judge will agree, because in all honesty, I think this ad campaign is fantastic.

AT&T published a posting on their website saying that:

As the U.S. market leader in wireless data service, we typically don’t respond to competitors’ advertising. However, some recent ads from Verizon are so blatantly false and misleading, that we want to set the record straight about AT&T’s wireless data coverage.

They continue to give statistics that reenforce how misleading the map is, and then link to a coverage map of their own, showing their “data” coverage.  Notice the phrasing there – data coverage.  Click on these shots for an explanation (or hover over them if you’re reading from the feed):

So, to conclude, Verizon technically isn’t lying – they’re being clever.  Their network is far superior to that of any other carrier in the US.  Verizon’s response to AT&T’s lawsuit started with:

AT&T did not file this lawsuit because Verizon’s “There’s A Map For That” advertisements are untrue; AT&T sued because Verizon’s ads are true and the truth hurts.

Harsh?  Yes.  True?  Absolutely.  Maybe AT&T should be spending a little more of its time working on its network, rather than filing ridiculous lawsuits.

UPDATE 11/18/09

This isn’t looking good for AT&T.  An article on AppleInsider says:

The judge ruled Wednesday that while the ads may be “sneaky,” they are not misleading, and do not justify any action to take them off the air. The judge did state however, that most TV watchers are “semi-catatonic” and therefore can easily misinterpret information presented.

A follow-up hearing date was set for Dec. 16, giving lawyers a second chance to present their case for an injunction. Verizon has claimed that AT&T’s suit is without merit

Looks like AT&T is continuing to fight back, though.  They just aired this new ad.  The arguments, similar to their lawsuit, is weak.  Very, very, weak.

What is your name and official title at your company?

Beth Mulhern - Director of Social Media Strategy – Verizon Telecom

Cheryl Harris – Senior Staff Consultant – (manages @vzpittsburgh)

Tabitha Geary - Consultant

What is the name of the company you work for, and what does it specialize in?

Verizon – A communications and entertainment company

When did your company decide to create its online, social media presence?

2008 (There were some individual efforts before that.)  In 2009, we have a much more cohesive effort across the corporation.  We’re trying to get more cooperation between the sectors and get some brand standards set.

We did an inventory – who’s all out there?  A hundred different Twitter reps from Verizon.  We have a dozen or 15 or so FB pages – not all owned by Verizon.

About a year ago – working with [ad agency] we did a marketing campaign called MyHome 2.0 (tv show) which did tech upgrades for families, including our FiOS TV and FiOS Internet Services.  We would come in and do a technology makeover for them.  We had a website for it promoting casting, how to apply, etc.  We had the families who were winners writing blogs.  We ran the show on Fox TV in Pittsburgh, as well as in the Philadelphia market.

After hearing from a colleague who attended SXSW about Twitter, I tried to start a customer care program within my marketing team, but it didn’t go through.  However, fast forward a year later, and today we’re launching @verizonsupport on Twitter.  That team is looking at places such as BBR in addition to our Verizon forums for users with issues and complaints.  We have a tool that scrapes the content for users who look like they’re having issues so we can communicate with them quickly and effectively.  However, the @vzpittsburgh account on Twitter is all a manual process done by Cheryl – she goes out and uses Twitter search to locate users in Pittsburgh, and responds to anyone who posts directly to @vzpittsburgh.

Why did your company choose to establish that presence?

We want to have a conversation with our customers.  They require that and want that.  And there’s a huge benefit for us to do that.  We can get ideas from them.  If we’re not providing acceptable service, not being fair, billing issues, etc., we want to know about it. And if there are things they like about our products, or ideas on how to make them better, we want to know that, too.

Negative Facebook pages and such create an opportunity for us to make customers happy.  Are they pointing out an issue that we should look at closer?

Is your company using multiple services?  If so, which ones?

We’re on Twitter, Facebook, Youtube. We recognize that different platforms provide different opportunities.  You get this opinion and fact based opportunity on Twitter.  Request for service, feedback, screaming for help, kudos, is very appealing on Twitter.  Facebook is more social – hanging out with your friends.  We’re doing some testing there to see the business opportunities and how we can interact correctly there.

We have some videos on YouTube, including some viral marketing.  This is the least of our focus so far, though.  We want to make sure we focus on the services that provide us the best place to interact with our customers.

We’ve created company forums for various products and services as well. They give our customers the chance to talk online and help each other with technical and service issues.  They also give us ideas for new services that they’d like to see.

Is your company using these services mainly as a marketing tool, customer service outlet, or just as a way to connect to its customers in general?  In other words, what’s your overall objective for social media strategy?

D.) All of above.  The marketing tool is a great opportunity – that’s part of my charge – to develop marketing tools/strategy involving social media.

Customer care is a requirement – we need to support our users.

The fact that I report to a chief marketing officer… the purpose was to make sure we got visibility for social media within the company.  We need to make it a key strategic priority as to how we move forward into 2010.  ”Is there something related to social media in this discussion?”

Tabitha adds: One of the benefits of having a small business is having the ability to talk to your customers.  For a large business like Verizon, social media is a dream come true.  It gets them back in touch with their customers.  To be able to hear one on one what their customers are saying is fantastic – they really take it to heart.  The customers are driving their direction.

Beth – Getting customer feedback from millions is hard.  We’re trying to make sense of all of it and get an individual person’s perspective.  That’s different than marketing research where everything is related to a norm (trends, perspective), and where you lose the commentary from the individual level.  That’s what’s so compelling about social media – we hear both the good and the bad from our customers on an individual level.

Do you have someone on your staff entirely dedicated to managing your online presence?  If so, what do you feel are the benefits of having a dedicated social media staff member?

With a company the size of Verizon, there are many people involved with managing our social media […] it goes into the hundreds including people from IT.

Do we have dedicated resources? Yes!

Models from Groundswell – one being key success factors – one is have someone important in charge of social media to really drive it into the organization.  You have to have a thick skin when looking at this stuff – people are brutally honest with us.  You have to have a leader who says “This is important to us.  We want to hear it.  You can’t cure what you don’t diagnose.  We need to acknowledge our faults – you can’t be better unless you fix the things that are broken.”

What sort of clients or customers do you see embracing these social media tools?  Is it just the geeky type, the brand evangelists, or are you starting to see average everyday people using them to connect to your company?

It differs by platform.  Facebook, the group with the most tenure, is younger, but currently it’s more older people (40s and up) who are fueling the growth of new users.  On Twitter it’s more the middle aged and up.

I like to think of myself as average, and I’m doing it, my friends are doing it.  My kids make fun of me.  What was I thinking for making a Facebook page?  It’s become mainstream.  Everyone is doing it.

Companies need to understand customers’ behaviors in social media, in order to craft the best way to reach them.  Forrester has a good model for describing those social media behaviors – Creators (content creators), critics (ratings & reeks), collectors (tagging/organizers), joiners (join in on the discussion), inactive (not participating), spectators (like to look at creator’s content).

I’m more of a spectator – I like to look at people’s content.  I love to see what other people put up there.

As a business, if you know who you’re going after… (creators – create digital experience that plays to their desires to create content – showcase) (spectators – as a company YOU would create the content and put it on a site like YouTube) then you can create experiences that are fit for that target.

Tabitha: Twitter & Verizon – All over the board.  Nature would say more tech oriented, but they’re actually just great communicators.  It’s become a universal tool for people who are good communicators.

How does the volume of communication from social media outlets compare to that of traditional communication sources for your company such as e-mails and telephone communication?  In other words, are more customers calling you, or are they communicating with you through social media?

The bulk is still from our call centers, and that has not changed.  But, there is a growing amount of information and feedback coming from Social Media and we’re choosing to listen and jump in and be a part of the conversation.

Do you give the customers that contact you through social media means any sort of special treatment such as priority customer service or special incentives? If so, why?

We are coming out with special offers for our social media customers.  That’s a test for us.  We’re looking at special offers, but we’re not sure if they’ll be exclusive to social media or not.  In terms of customer service, all of our customers are important.  We’re trying to figure out what’s the right mix of service.  There is recognition that this is the age of the empowered consumer, though.  Before, if there was an unhappy customer, he might tell 5 friends, but now, with a couple of clicks, he can tell x number of people.  We don’t want to put anyone at a disadvantage – they’re all important.  It might look different from the outside looking in, though, because as we said earlier, social media is more personalized.  We do recognize the risk of not providing good service, but that service isn’t prioritized to social media.

Tabitha: By the nature of things, social media channels are so much smaller than traditional channels.  It’s much more personal.  It doesn’t make others less important, but it does make the experience more personal.  Verizon is working very hard at getting people on their team who can understand all profiles and all sorts of people.

[End of Interview]

Check out http://www22.verizon.com/socialmedia for a link to many different Verizon Social Media presences!

——————————————

Thank you so much, Beth, Tabitha, and Cheryl!  I really appreciate the insight into how a large corporation like Verizon is using social media.

(Note to my readers: This transcription was read over by Verizon’s PR department and very minor changes were made, however, no major changes were made that in any way affect the validity or quality of this interview.)

Frank Eliason – Senior Director, National Customer Operation

What is the name of the company you work for, and what does it specialize in?

Comcast.  Today, we’re the country’s largest provider of cable services – and one of the world’s leading communications companies. We’re focused on broadband cable, commerce, and content. We deliver digital services, provide faster Internet and clearer broadband phone service, and develop and deliver innovative programming.

Why did your company choose to establish that presence?

As a way to listen to our Customers and meet them where they already are

Which social media tool or service (twitter, Facebook, youtube, etc.) has proved most beneficial to your company and why?

I  think every social media tool offers unique benefits.  Forums are great for highly technical information and finding ways to supplement support for devices beyond those provided by our company.  Your internet experience may be impacted by your computer, your router, our modem, our network, or things beyond our network.  Forums, and the peer helping peer aspect, are a great way to offer support in all areas of the experience.  Blogs and You Tube are the Customer story in their own words.  I have always found stories to be so useful in learning from our Customers.  Twitter adds value due to the immediacy and searchable content.

Is your company using multiple services?  If so, which ones?

Yes.  Facebook, forums, blogs, You Tube, Twitter, Facebook and many smaller websites.

If the answer to the above question is yes, do you feel there is a benefit to having a presence on multiple social media outlets? If so, why?

It is meeting the Customer where they are, not having them meet us where we are

Is your company using these services mainly as a marketing tool, customer service outlet, or just as a way to connect to its customers in general?  In other words, what’s your overall objective for social media strategy?

Meet Customers where they already are, learn from them and assist when we can

Do you have someone on your staff entirely dedicated to managing your online presence?  If so, what do you feel are the benefits of having a dedicated social media staff member?

We have a staff of people dedicated to our Customers in this space

What sort of clients or customers do you see embracing these social media tools?  Is it just the geeky type, the brand evangelists, or are you starting to see average everyday people using them to connect to your company?

All of the above.  Based on sheer numbers there are a lot of people in social media

How does the volume of communication from social media outlets compare to that of traditional communication sources for your company such as e-mails and telephone communication?  In other words, are more customers calling you, or are they communicating with you through social media?

We have a million interactions each day with our Customers.  Social media is a smaller amount then phone, email or chat, but it does provide us the opportunity to assist where Customers are.  When necessary we can also easily broadcast a message.

Do you give the customers that contact you through social media means any sort of special treatment such as priority customer service or special incentives? If so, why?

No, we strive to treat everyone in the same manner.

Thanks, Frank!  Check out Frank’s Twitter page at @comcastcares

From Division by Zero

All I can say is, boy am I glad I have Verizon FiOS!