Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

I’m guessing the EU is just holding it wrong.

While not word for word, it echoes the sentiment of the "official" response from Apple.

"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"

There is a difference between “here’s how to avoid the problem” and “the problem is caused by you”.

They sent out bumpers because it was a design flaw.

I know they did, that’s not my point. My point is that the words “you are holding it wrong” were never said.

They told people how to avoid the problem. “Here’s a workaround” doesn’t assign blame to the user. “You are holding it wrong” does. The sentiment is different.

Jobs exact words where: "All phones have sensitive areas, just avoid holding it in this way."

Which is arguably worse, since all of Apples official statements on that case contained that bit of intentional gaslighting at the beginning. The iPhone 4 did not just have "sensitive areas", it completely exposed the antenna, causing it to short circuit from normal use.

I know the history of it, I followed it closely at the time. That’s why I pointed out that the quote was wrong ( and got downvoted ). I expect the same will happen to you since you posted the correct quote.

Oh, the sentiment was there alright. You must've forgotten how Jobs was in general and his massive annoyance when he explained this "workaround" in particular.

Of course, it was users' fault. They have always been simpletons.

"You are holding it wrong" is spot on. It captures extremely accurately the very essence of Jobs' attitude towards the users.

I’m sure you understand why you were downvoted and that it has nothing to do with what facts you stated.

"All phones have sensitive areas, just avoid holding it in this way" practically means "you are holding it wrong".

Curious definition of "exact".

> 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. - Steve Jobs

The words they said did not and could not capture your perception of the former Apple CEO. They are different things.

So if I tell a user a workaround for a software issue, and they turn round and accuse me of telling them they are using the software wrong I have to agree with them?

In that statement it wasn't 1) acknowledged that this is indeed an issue and 2) the word workaround was not used.

A workaround is literally "a way to avoid triggering a bug". So if it's a workaround, then you're admitting it's a bug.

So the distinction is between "We screwed up but at least you can do x to mitigate it" and "There's nothing wrong with us. It's you."

Complaining about downvoting is bad form. If you are temporarily downvoted on a post and react by editing it to complain, that's a surefire way for that post to remain negative on its point balance.

"They" is Jobs.

"All phones have sensitive areas," Jobs wrote. "Just avoid holding it in this way."

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2010/06/jobs-on-iphone-4-ant...

You are assuming they had done all the testing and knew the full extent of the issue. When you run in to an issue like this it could be a bad batch, a certain radio variant, firmware version, only 2G vs 3G and so on.

Nothing in the statement argues either way, it’s simply two statements- one factual and one bit of advice on how to mitigate.

See my above statement. If someone reports issues with software you don’t immediately say it’s definitely a bug unto you fully understand it. Hardware is no different. We do not know if they were in a position to say either way at the time.

I’m not scared by downvotes. I called out bad form as I interpreted it, just as you are you are doing now. Posting facts in HN should not warrant downvotes. Neither should reasonable discussions.

A factual quote and some advice. There is no context as to whether they knew the full extent of the issue or not. Anyone attributing malice to this assumes they do.

“All software has bugs”, “avoid using this button” would be a perfectly reasonable thing to say if you were still analysing a problem and the user had an alternative way of using a feature.

They eventually did acknowledge a problem and issue bumpers, just as a software issue would be acknowledged and a patch issued.

The sentence I cited is from an Ars Technica article and directly attributed to Jobs. Your text is essentially an extended version of that, but I cannot find any site that attributes it directly to Jobs. It also does double down on the gaslighting by insisting that it isn't bad design but "a fact of life" and consistent with any other mobile phone.

You posted 10 comments about this. That's way too much, and the site guidelines specifically ask people not to comment about downvotes because "it never does any good and makes boring reading": https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

You're quite right, of course, that people vote with feelings and ignore facts, but you're wrong about that being specific to Apple. It's true of everything, and therefore it is not interesting (although it certainly is annoying). We want HN threads to be for interesting conversation.

They simply said it's not a bug at first, then after the backslash, went back and admitted that it is.

I have been told by a mod that I am replying too much to this conversation (?) and I therefore cannot address your point.

It’s a shame as I think it is interesting to see how people perceive things with hindsight specifically related to apple and how engineers who presumably work on similar problems cannot apply the same logic to apple but I am forced to stop the conversation. This will be my last comment on any thread related to this and I am rethinking my contributions to HN.