Source: Associated Press

Is the iPhone 4 jinked?

The popular device has been plagued by misfortune — including the suicide of a Chinese worker, lost prototypes and a shaky debut last month, where Apple Inc. Chief Executive Steve Jobs could not get the phone to connect to the Internet.

Now, in what amounts to a rare acknowledgment of a misstep, Apple Inc. has scheduled a news conference Friday where it is expected to announce its response to widespread complaints about the phone’s antenna. 

There are no problems with basic functions such as managing PS3 downloads.  You can surf the Net and pretty much do anything from online gambling to managing spreadsheets.  But there are other issues.

Analysts say potential remedies range from giving customers a free protective case to launching a massive recall that could cost Apple $1.5 billion.

The string of woes have been so striking that some have sought alternative explanations, including the notion that the phone may simply be jinxed. One theory focuses on the number four.     

In China, where the iPhone is manufactured, four is considered to be bad luck. That’s largely because the word for four is nearly identical to the word for death. Many buildings in Hong Kong do not have a fourth floor, and people try to avoid phone numbers and license plates with “4″ in them.

Device manufacturers such as Canon Inc. and Nokia Corp., wary of the digit’s ominous significance, have been known to skip from 3 to 5 when assigning model numbers to their products. Apple, though, seemed uncowed by the superstition.

The number requires a degree of care and attention that Apple may not have heeded, according to numerologist Daniel Hardt of Indianapolis.

“If shortcuts are attempted, the whole thing falls apart,” Hardt said. “The 4 can also be karmic, having some overtones of a problem stemming from some past activity. It seems very likely to be the case that there is some karma at play in this situation that has caused the phone to not be as functional as it should be.”

Lydia Chen, associate director of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University, said she grew up “knowing that number 4 was something you avoided.”

“I would personally never say it’s the number 4 causing all of this,” she said. “Still, maybe people should avoid iPhone 13 when it gets here.”

The story begins exactly one year ago — long before the public knew anything about Apple’s fourth generation iPhone.

On July 16, 2009, a 25-year-old Chinese factory worker leaped from the window of his apartment building and fell 12 stories to his death. He had been accused by his superiors of losing an iPhone 4 prototype.

Months after the incident in China, an Apple engineer out drinking at a pub in Silicon Valley lost track of the iPhone 4 prototype he was testing — and pictures of it ended up all over the Internet.

When Steve Jobs introduced the new phone last month in front of a huge audience of reporters and Apple developers, it failed to connect to the Internet.

And since the phone’s release, it’s been plagued by reception problems blamed on everything from software to cellular network to antenna design.

Most recently, Consumer Reports won’t recommend the iPhone 4 because of what it called a “design flaw” in the antenna.

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My Take: I’m not sure what’s wrong with the iPhone because I own nothing with an apple on it.  I guess I’m a “PC.”  I’ have had my phone of course confiscated after signaling the metal detection equipment at the airport. Never try to go through a walk through metal detector without taking your phone out of your purse!  I don’t download Playstation 3 guitar games and I certainly don’t use my phone as an online casino.  Surfing is pretty limited.  But connectivity is an issue sometimes and I think once iPhone’s bugs are removed, it’s going to be just as much a part of the Apple party’s accessory line as ever. 

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Eric Sinrod writes that our nation can be threatened by more than just physical attacks.  It can also be in Cyberspace.  Various emission control systems could be threatened by cyber attacks and it is for this reason that needs to Sen. Jay Rockefeller have been working on a revision of a draft Senate bill that would give the president broad powers in the event of the Cybersecurity emergency.  This bill could possibly give the President the temporary ability to seize control over computer networks in the private sector.  This power is similar to what Pres. Bush exerted when he grounded commercial aircraft after 9/11 according to a reported Senate source.

The revised draft Senate bill calls on the President, within 180 days of enactment, to develop and implement a comprehensive national Cybersecurity strategy. This strategy is to provide a “long-term vision of the Nation’s Cybersecurity future” and a plan that “encompasses all aspects of national security,” which would include private sector involvement.

Importantly, the revised draft Senate bill sets forth that “in the event of an immediate threat to strategic national interests involving a compromised Federal Government or United States critical infrastructure information system or network,” the President may declare “a Cybersecuirty emergency” and may, if deemed necessary by the President for “the national defense and security,” direct “the national response to the Cyber threat” and the “timely restoration of the affected critical infrastructure information system or network.”

This is a mouthful, of course. But what it boils down to is that, if this becomes law, the President will be able to declare a Cybersecurity emergency and then direct the response to that threat. This would give the President very broad power.

Some might argue that this open-ended power and flexibility are exactly what the President would need to cope with the unusual circumstances that could be encountered by various types of Cyber attacks.

Others might argue that the revised draft Senate bill is too vague in terms of the scope of authority ceded to the President, and that there should be greater specificity to ensure that unbridled power is not abused potentially in the future.

It is obvious that someone in the US government needs the authority to institute plans and measures that are designed to prevent and resolve any possible cyber attacks in the future.  The revised draft Senate bill will probably see many revisions before it gets off the ground and becomes law.  However, it is something that needs to be done to protect not only government but private sector networks from cyber attack.

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My Take: This is a double-edged sword if you ask me.  On one hand, I can understand the need to control cyberspace if we are attacked from that route.  On the other hand, it would take away some freedoms of people who use the Internet for business purposes.

Businesses that utilize call center software or even data centers would be hindered by this type of situation if the bill is passed giving the president emergency cyberspace control.  This type of emergency control would interfere with business contact center solutions as well as colocation.

I think they need to put little bit more thought into how much control the president truly has in a cyberspace emergency.  Otherwise, the president could cause a lot of problems for both small and big business alike.  That is something that we do head need right now with the economy as bad as it is.

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