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This Is Apple's Next iPhone
An anonymous reader writes "There has been some speculation about it. Not anymore: 'This is Apple's next iPhone. It was found lost in a bar in Redwood City, camouflaged to look like an iPhone 3GS. We got it. We disassembled it. It's the real thing, and here are all the details.' Judging by Gizmodo's reaction, it looks like a winner."
And they "got" it from whom? Directly from Larry Lightfingers, or via Frankie the Fence?
J'accuse: they're dealing in stolen property, and they know it, or should know it. But ethics be damned, because ZOMG IPHOAAAN!!!!11! Right?
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Doesn't sound like apple does it?
$5 says its some wannabe iPhone killer, just waiting for everyone to say how great it is before they go "tada! we secretly switched your java with folgers" in hopes of generating hoopla...
"Waste not one watt!" - CZ
Embarrassing, how the media got played to do advertisement for them. Goodbye, journalism.
This Lunchable has real ham in it, not the processed kind offered by Microsoft.
You insensitive clod!
Not all of us are young with good eyes and good knees.
-- I have a private email server in my basement.
The best feature from the article
...it feels even nicer in your pants.
According the TFA the phone was functional before being remotely wiped by Apple. Certainly people do walk around with camouflaged, functional engineering samples during the testing cycle for new phones. I know employees at Nokia are often given pre-release hardware to try out both in the building (early testing) and outside the building (later in testing)
It really does sound like this is a real unit. It may have been leaked intentionally but that doesn't make it less relevant.
The only thing that makes me suspicious is that I cant find any report on what chip it is using. I would expect them to say something about that, even if all they said was that the processor didn't have any markings on it. I would think that would be one of the first things they would look at.
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
0) Fixed that for you; 1)Linux; 2)Car analogy; 3)Insensitive clod; 4)A Beowulf cluster 5)In Soviet Russia; 6)??? [citation needed]; 7)Profit!
The original iPod's design was clearly heavily influenced by the design of Braun products - especially radios - from the 1950's and '60s. Braun's historic designs are widely regarded as some of the best examples of industrial design from the 20th century. Many Braun designs are on display at the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan. Saying that something looks "like a Braun product" - if you're comparing it to one of Braun's traditional designs - is an enormous compliment.
That having been said, this new iPhone - if it indeed is an iPhone - reminds me more of Sony's designs from the early 1980's. Which isn't a bad thing - that's the period during which Sony reached its design peak, and influenced the rest of the consumer electronics industry.
I wonder if the seams are functional, though. If the case is all metal, perhaps the seams are there for the antenna to use.
Apple!
iPhone!
APPLE!
IPHONE!
APPLE!
IPHONE!
APPLE!
APPLE!
APPLE!
IPHONE!
IPHONE!
IPHONE!
aPple iPhone!
aPple iPhone!
aPple iPhone!
aPple iPhone!
aPple iPhone!
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aPple iPhone!
yay SLASTROTURFING!!!!
It doesn't sounds like marketing to me.
This is classic textbook Apple advertising of a new product. Next some specs will be leaked and posted online, and after sufficient time that anybody is interested can see them, Apple will start issuing takedown notices. Are all of you really not going to remember that Apple has done stuff like this in the past??
"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me dozens of times, I'm an Apple customer."
"But this one goes to 11!"
Um...no, we haven't. In fact, there's barely been any iPad news. Meanwhile, there was a story about Linux not attracting young developers, an analysis of Linux's shared kernel memory, GPL compliance checking in embedded software, how Android's Linux changes will make it back to the main source tree, how the WePad tablet will use Linux, etc.
I get that Apple competitors post here and are trying to drum up some lame anti-Apple sentiment, but lying will get you nowhere.
Apple is clearly no longer the leader. This phone is their admission of that fact. They hope packaging will save them.
Apple was never the leader in features or chipsets. However, they are the leaders in packaging, marketing, and UI (the latter being disputable by some folks, especially on Slashdot). And those things translate into mindshare and sales.
Liberal? Conservative? Compare perspectives at Left-Right
"Until someone reveals the chipset inside we still have no idea if we are stuck with those horrible infineon chips which are the root of iPhone evil."
;)
I still call fake.
This whole bar story doesn't add up either. I've been to many bars with many cellphones and I've never lost one, how the hell do you lose a prototype iPhone at a bar? That's not just your $500 phone, THAT'S YOUR JOB IN YOUR POCKET.
What are the odds that a iPhone would just happen to be found by gizmodo and engadget? Of all the people in the world? And how much would a popular blog pay for a iPhone prototype? Imagine the hits you'd get with first real photos of the next iPhone! You could even put a no-name blog on the map with real photos. This prototype is incredibly valuable.
If anyone really found a prototype iPhone it would be on eBay until they pulled it, but not before it received thousands of hits and a few dozen bids up to several thousands of dollars, but someone would contact them outside of ebay and negotiate a deal anyway.
Let's not forget that there's not one photo of this prototype iPhone running. Why not? They couldn't charge it? The brains behind engadget and gizmodo can't charge an iPhone? Let me guess, they found a "broken" iPhone prototype at a bar. Yeah, that sounds reasonable.
Some people argue "Well Apple wiped it remotely!" Seriously? Wiped it so well it doesn't turn on at all? Not even a "charge me" screen? I don't buy it. I would be happy with seeing any photo of this thing running next to a regular iPhone, just so you can somewhat compare resolutions.
WHERE'S THE INTERIOR PHOTOS!? ONE photo of the interior, and not a good one. WTF? This is my biggest skepticism. Why not a dozen photos of various processors, the new cameras, the wifi chip, etc. We could piece together every feature of the new iPhone just by interior photos, but they only posted one which shows almost nothing. FTA: "it said it was XX GB, but since we were unable to get the phone to a running state, we couldn't see exactly how large it was." Well if you would have taken photos of the chips someone could probably find the size. FAIL
Changing design doesn't make sense either. Apple has 3 generations of iPhones shaped exactly the same, and now they go in a different direction? Of course Apple did the same thing with the Nano, 5 generations of Nanos and the 3rd and 4th are shaped differently from previous generations, but this is a phone, a lot of money and research has been spent making compatible cases and docks, to change it now would cost a lot of wasted time and money by hundreds of companies.... although that means new licensing fees for Apple.... ok, perhaps new design does make sense
This is either Apple's April Fools on Gizmodo/Engadget or a clever marketing by Apple
UPDATE: while I was writing this post I found this: Apparently Gizmodo did buy this phone:
"iPhone was stolen from Apple, then purchased by Gizmodo."
my karma will be here long after I'm gone