
IPhone 4 - pclark
http://daringfireball.net/2010/06/4
======
rglullis
_That Apple pays so much attention to the details as to pick a different
version of Helvetica for different classes of displays is emblematic of what
makes the iPhone the iPhone — software and hardware that are designed in
tandem as parts of a single whole._

Really? On the next paragraph...

 _There is, however, one problem with Helvetica Neue in iOS 4.0: it doesn’t
include italics.(...)I can only assume this is an oversight on Apple’s part._

Yes, it is a small thing. I really don't care whether the phone comes with the
Heuvetica Neue bold, or not. But I can't stop thinking about how Apple's
marketing (or Gruber's writing) is eerily similar to hypnosis: you provide a
baseless assertion that "sort of" makes sense intertwined with contradictions,
making the target's brain take everything as valid.

~~~
elbrodeur
As a designer, Helvetica Neue (even without italics) is a huge step in the
right aesthetic direction. His original point was not so much about the font,
but about the platform. He lays the groundwork, showing that the platform was
higher resolution and therefore it made more sense for a font that displayed
better at higher resolutions to be used.

I think it's a valid point and a great critique -- how is it contradictory to
praise what is praiseworthy and point out what is wrong?

~~~
axod
Surely it's like saying "Ford pay so much detail to every part of their cars,
it's amazing the level of care put into each and every model"

and later saying "Of course Ford did forget to include wheels on this
particular model"

~~~
jws
Or maybe "Of course Ford did forget to include _tail fins_ on this particular
model".

I don't think I've seen oblique, sans serif type used in an iOS user
interface. Content, sure, and Helvetica is there for you, but this is the
system user interface font. I think the clarity demanded of the system user
interface argues against the subtle change afforded by slanting the font.

Oblique sans serif fonts are generally sort of an apologetic placeholder for:
"Here is where I would have used a nice italic font, but my type designer
couldn't pull that off in this clean, minimalist font, so please imagine that
he did."

~~~
astrange
> I don't think I've seen oblique, sans serif type used in an iOS user
> interface.

The system font in OS X (Lucida Grande) doesn't have an italic style either.

------
btmorex
>The overall build quality seems impossibly good. The iPhone 4 is beautiful to
behold and feels like a valuable artifact. It’s like a love letter to Dieter
Rams.

Do other people actually like reading stuff like this? I mean, regardless of
what you think of the iphone 4, that level of praise almost makes me feel bad
for him. It's like romantic love for an object.

~~~
cj
I skimmed through the article looking for anything negative. Acknowledging its
flaws is more productive than studying its perfection.

~~~
KirinDave
There is plenty of discussion of the signal issue, the proximity sensor issue,
and the potential fragility. It doesn't gloss over them or overplay them.

Is that sufficient? This seems at least as balanced and credible as the Ars
Technical review.

------
blehn
_Apple is so good at making buttons, it’s almost enough to make one wish they
made button-laden devices._

Oh come on...Pro mouse, Mighty Mouse, Magic Mouse, current and previous gen
macbook trackpad buttons, the previous gen desktop keyboards, iPod click-
wheels, Apple Remote...these are some of the worst buttons I've used. Apple
has made _some_ decent buttons (I think the current and previous gen MBP
keyboards are well made), but they're way too inconsistent to make a claim
like that.

~~~
brianwillis
Is is truly surprising how the company that took the mouse mainstream now
can't make one that's simultaneously aesthetically pleasing and a joy to use.

~~~
thwarted
I can't use the Magic Mouse because it doesn't fit my human-sized man-hand: it
has no palm support. And this strikes me as odd because how it looks should be
extremely secondary: the only way to effectively use a mouse is to look at the
screen not at the mouse, and even if you were to look at it, your hand is
covering it up.

For those reasons, I find it neither aesthetically pleasing nor a joy to use.
It's unfortunate that aesthetics have been merely associated with how
something _looks when it's just sitting there_ and doesn't take into account a
pragmatic, active angle (not saying that that's how you associate aesthetics,
brianwillis).

~~~
blasdel
It has no palm support because you're not supposed to put your palm on it --
it's meant to be held by the thumb and pinkie at the sides (like the pilloried
hockey-puck mouse).

If it was shaped to rest your palm on it, you wouldn't be able to use any of
the multitouch features without fully removing your hand first.

~~~
thwarted
And I think that may be part of the problem: I didn't find that to be a
comfortable position to use the mouse even for short periods of time, having
to hold my fingers and palm up and not having a resting, but still moving the
mouse, position. I found it extremely hard to get fine control of positioning
while clicking, I'd always end up moving the mouse slightly while clicking
(incidentally, I have similar issues with the touchpad on the MacBook Pro).

~~~
dmnd
Lots of people do use a mouse like this, however:
<http://www2.razerzone.com/MouseGuide/html/advantages.php>

------
jherdman

      "... but I’ve had fun trying out FaceTime with a few iPhone 4-enabled friends"
    

This sentence is absolutely delicious to my mind, specifically the use of the
word "enabled". It's as if to own a device was to somehow be an upgrade for
one's person.

Is this how we've really all come to think of devices now? Are they extensions
of our bodies? A whole raft of questions has drifted to the shores of my mind.

~~~
dieterrams
<http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000R3PJ74/>

<http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/clark/clark_index.html>

~~~
saint-loup
David Chalmers, in his preface of Clark's Supersizing the Mind :

"A month ago, I bought an iPhone. The iPhone has already taken over some of
the central functions of my brain. It has replaced part of my memory, storing
phone numbers and addresses that I once would have taxed my brain with. It
harbors my desires: I call up a memo with the names of my favorite dishes when
I need to order at a local restaurant. I use it to calculate, when I need to
figure out bills and tips. It is a tre- mendous resource in an argument, with
Google ever present to help settle disputes. I make plans with it, using its
calendar to help deter- mine what I can and can’t do in the coming months. I
even daydream on the iPhone, idly calling up words and images when my
concentra- tion slips. Friends joke that I should get the iPhone implanted
into my brain. But if Andy Clark is right, all this would do is speed up the
processing and free up my hands. The iPhone is part of my mind already."

------
pkulak
"This is the result of a new manufacturing process Apple has pioneered. No
other company gives a shit about things like this."

Samsung is doing this for their new displays. And they were out before the
iPhone 4 was even announced. But, to Gruber, if it's not Apple, it's
automatically crap. No sense acknowledging its existence.

~~~
danudey
I might be mistaken, but I believe he's referring specifically to bonding the
LCD display to a capacitive piece of glass, rather than just regular
protective plastic.

(Does Samsung use glass in their displays? They all look plastic to me.)

~~~
ZeroGravitas
No, it's not glass vs. plastic he's talking about (and yes Samsung Super-
AMOLED screens are glass anyway). The original poster is correct, Gruber
believes this reduction in layers above the screen was pioneered by Apple
because they made it seem like they did in their introductory videos and
thinks it unique because he neither knows nor cares about things happening
outside the sphere of Apple. He doesn't even just say that it doesn't exist
(which is of course not true), he says it _couldn't_ exist outside Apple
because no-one else cares.

------
antidaily
_The new volume buttons, silence toggle, and power button all have a better
feel than ever before._

No way. The buttons feel cheap compared to the 3GS. The silence toggle is a
piece of shit. And I preferred the volume up/down as one button.

~~~
czhiddy
I've only played with them at the Apple Store, but the iPhone4 silence switch
seemed a lot better than the ones on my original 2G and current 3GS. My 2G
switch was so flimsy that it would toggle on and off in my pocket from idle
friction, while the 3GS one was stiff to the point where I needed both hands
to reliably move it.

~~~
maxjg
I do like the feel and design of the 3G model better (much easier to tell if
it's silenced in your pocket), but on multiple occasions, the switch on my 3GS
has switched from silenced to not. The new one seems a lot less prone to that.

------
teebes
To a lot of you criticizing how in love with Apple he is... well it's not like
Gruber hides being pro Apple, or that him taking sides on a personally owned
blogged makes him a bad source of information and observations.

How biased he is can certainly be borderline infuriating at times but I don't
know any other blogger right now that writes about Apple and consistently
makes observations that weren't obvious to make. He also has a compelling
talent for seeing the big picture and making pieces of the puzzle fit.

------
solutionyogi
I am sure he wouldn't have downplayed the 'signal' issue if it was an issue
with an Android phone.

~~~
ugh
Downplayed? In what respect?

~~~
Chump
He tries to emphasize that it happens in only "marginal strength areas" (see
also this other post: [http://daringfireball.net/linked/2010/06/29/gaywood-
signal-i...](http://daringfireball.net/linked/2010/06/29/gaywood-signal-issue)
) but iPhone 4s displaying 'full bars' have been shown to suffer the problem
(e.g. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNmXrVNeGzs> )

~~~
jsz0
Without knowing more concrete information either way it's irresponsible to go
too far in either direction.

~~~
naner
I think the OPs point is that if this had been an issue with an Android phone
Gruber would have jumped all over it as an example of how the phone
manufacturer doesn't pay attention to detail and gets the simple things wrong.

I tend to agree on that criticism of Gruber but it isn't really worth pointing
out. Everyone here already knows he is very biased and it is reflected in his
writing.

------
treblig
I'm a little upset that this is called "IPhone 4". It is part of the story, in
fact, a very telling part of his narrative that he merely titled it "4".

------
jasongullickson
My favorite line:

 _"No other company gives a shit about things like this."_

...pretty much sums up the major difference between Apple and every other
electronics company, perhaps with the exception of litl.

------
hop
_A love letter to Dieter Rams_

Except its less durable and the unsymmetrical breaks in the steel band take
away from its clean, minimal aesthetic. The band's function as an antenna is
compromised by conductive fingers.

I normally would not be so critical, and I do not know I have designed it
better... but when you gush like this for Ram's style of functional industrial
design, the criticism is a comin'. The 27" iMac I'm writing this on however,
may be the truest object to Ram's style that exists.

FYI Dieter Ram's 10 principles of good design:

Good design is innovative

Good design makes a product useful

Good design is aesthetic

Good design makes a product understandable

Good design is unobtrusive

Good design is honest

Good design is long-lasting

Good design is thorough down to the last detail

Good design is environmentally friendly

Good design is as little design as possible

------
awa
Is it only me who finds the flat sides and glass back "aesthetically"
unpleasing... The 3GS looks a tad better to me than the 4 (ofcourse they
aren't deal breakers, but wanted to know since Gruber seem to like them)

~~~
axod
I agree, the 4 looks like a step back. Maybe to a 70s type of design. Looks
cludgy to me.

~~~
elbrodeur
I have to disagree. Nothing about the design harkens back to the 70's, except
for maybe the earliest increases in adoption of minimalism. Maybe.

If you line this up next to their current line of products it fits right in.

------
guyzero
OMG Gruber loved the new iPhone! Who would have guessed?

~~~
gloob
While I sympathize with your feelings on the matter, there's no need to be
snarky about it.

------
jasonlbaptiste
my favorite point:

"I think Apple is going to be able to get the price on such an iPod Touch
below $200 before Cisco is going to create iMovie-like editing software for
the Flip."

------
phreeza
He talks about how awesome audio and video quality on Facetime is. Yet, these
are supposedly just SIP and H.264/AAC, or am I missing something there? Does
Apple add some magic juice to these open protocols/codecs?

~~~
tcdent
He's speaking of the call quality compared to a standard voice call.

------
samaparicio
I for one am getting tired of all this undeserved attention to things that
don't make a difference in anybody's lives. This iphone doesn't make anybody
more productive, more empowered, more effective, less frustrated. It doesn't
free up time for anybody and doesn't do anything new.

In fact, I just wrote the complete opposite of Gruber article: a comparison of
the GREAT things that are unique to iPhone and to Android for startups trying
to get something done.

[http://www.ringio.com/2010/06/29/iphone-vs-android-
getting-o...](http://www.ringio.com/2010/06/29/iphone-vs-android-getting-over-
the-hype/)

~~~
pohl
Blogging about the hype only constitutes more hype. Your actions are at odds
with your intent.

~~~
samaparicio
Pohl... I didn't blog about the hype. I wrote about real differences that make
a user's life better.

For example: I said that Android's turn-by-turn navigation will lower the
chances of you getting lost on the way to the airport.

Or that the pictures and videos you take on an iPhone will look better.

What I'm trying to get at is that a lot of these reviews (like Gruber's) focus
on irrelevant or marginally relevant issues for real users.

It's great that the iPhone 4 has a hi-res display, but what is the impact?

~~~
pohl
Odd choice for a headline, then.

As it happens, nobody that I know personally cares about turn-by-turn
navigation at all. I probably use that capability twice a year just for shits
and giggles. A marginally better turn-by-turn implementation would have no
impact for me or anyone I know, but that's because there's nothing terribly
complex about navigating around my region.

It also happens that the display resolution on the latest iPhone was a major
selling point for me, as I end up doing a lot of reading on my phone for the
simple fact that I read a lot and it's always with me when I have those
random, spare minutes throughout the day where I have nothing else to do but
kill time. I just want the internet in my pocket, and not to strain my eyes.

I suspect I'm not alone in my priorities. Did you really not suspect that
there are people out there who are dissimilar from you?

~~~
samaparicio
I guess you're saying that the article suffers from selection bias? Maybe.

But then you go on to state that "nobodody that I know" ... which is just the
same kind of selection filter.

There are well over 50 million Garmin style GPS units in the market offering
turn-by-turn navigation. While you may not have a need for them, they are
providing widely adopted functionality, and since Android is the first mobile
platform doing this, it is potentially disruptive.

Is the higher resolution display of the iPhone 4 disruptive, or an
enhancement?

------
sabj
I find the hardware to be very delightful, in most respects, and I appreciate
the thought and efforts that Apple puts into creating a unified
software/hardware 'product solution' even if I disagree violently with some of
the philosophical assumptions baked into that in both physical form (hold it
differently, buy a case!) and software (you'll like the software we offer you,
and we know best what you might want!).

All that aside... I can't say I really enjoy reading daring fireball, for many
of the same reasons eloquently described in this thread. Substance (of a
sort), but without soul.

------
tfh
_> No other company gives a shit about things like this._

There was a time where I really liked John's articles. Now he's sounding like
just another fanboy...

~~~
Hari_Seldon
But he's right, can you name another tech firm that cares as much about these
things?

I remember reading something a while back about how much time Apple spent on
getting the angle (directon) of the mouse pointer right on the original Mac.

~~~
tfh
It's not about _what_ he says but more about _how_ he says it. I'd rather read
something like _"Other companies don't take these things seriously"_ than _"No
other company gives a shit about things like this."_.

------
doron
The screen is stunning. I found it annoying that Apple released the Ipad but a
month before without it. It seems they could have pulled that one easy, but i
guess we will see this in Ipad2, its fair business, but still kind of a dick
move in my mind, I am glad i didn't get the ipad yet. I can wait for the
retina enabled one.

I am not an Iphone user, but I held friends 3gs and the 4 to compare, and
found the smooth block disconcerting, it was harder to cup the phone, and
introduced a mild strain on the fingers, it felt slippery, prone to fall out
of my hands if i am not too careful, which is often the case when i pick my
cell. I suspect that I would have got used to it had I handled one for a
longer period of time , but I have to ask, why should I?

The design strikes me as beautiful (the most elegant mobile phone design i
have seen to date) But I also think that the design choices Apple imposes,
exclude a good number of people physically,(minor discomfort for me, due to a
hand injury) some people prefer physical keyboards because of the physical
capabilities of their hands,why not make a version for them? Not to mention
the great benefit IOS4 and apps can give people working in more physically
hazardous environments that are missed by not having a little more variance in
industrial design choices.

Its pretty much agreed by both people who dislike and people who love apple,
that Apple is not looking to fulfill every niche of the market, it is a source
of contention or pride, depending on where your sentiments are.

I am too much of a tinkerer to use an Iphone, i feel it restricts me. Indeed,
Apple products, restrictions and other idiosyncrasies drive me mad, and so i
don't use them.

I do recognize that these are issues of personal preference, and by most
measures i am not the hypothetical "normal person" that always appears in most
Apple reviews.

So I fully recognize the genius behind the design, it is elegant and
beautiful, without peer in the industry (for shame) and it is also true that
the "just works" cannot be overstated. It is simply of no personal concern to
me, because i take pride in making things work on my own, and rather enjoy it,
as i mentioned... tinkerer

But I would have bought my mom one without thinking twice about it, ware it
not for the limited physical options, she cant handle it in her age with her
hands, this exclusivity by Apple is a pity, and in that sense it is a bad
design choice, I suspect elderly people, factory workers, or people that need
to work with gloves would love to have a phone that indeed "just works". this
exclusion is something I always found to be the chink in apples design ethos,
imagine an apple designed product specifically tailored to the elderly, or an
Apple designed tough industrial strength laptop or Ipad.

~~~
Lazlo_Nibble
There is a world of difference between getting acceptable manufacturing yields
on a 300ppi+ iPhone-sized screen and a similarly-dense iPad-sized screen.

~~~
doron
I am sure there is,but can it be done? If it is possible, then its inevitable
future design iteration, and worth the wait, because i suspect it will come
soon, or am I wrong?

~~~
allwein
I don't think he's questioning the "inevitable future design iteration", but
rather the characterization of withholding such a screen from iPad 1.0 as a
"dick move".

------
martythemaniak
One has to read Gruber's review and Ars Technica's review of the iPhone 4 to
see the difference between a fan boy and a level-headed writer.

Before I clicked the link I bet myself I would not see a single criticism and
Gruber was predictable in his praise. The iPhone 4 is perfect, like every
other piece of anything Apple puts out. _yawn_

~~~
ubernostrum
_Before I clicked the link I bet myself I would not see a single criticism and
Gruber was predictable in his praise._

So you just skipped the parts where he brought up criticisms and pointed out
things he thinks are missing and speculated on ways Apple could resolve them?

------
10ren
Re: the speed test video <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGu4h1vP3qM>

I count it as 7, 14, 28 seconds for 4, 3GS, 3G - seems like x2 per generation
to me.

------
Arron
Not sure why ppl continue reading his completely biased crap.

~~~
elbrodeur
It's a positive, thorough review by someone who develops on the Apple
platform. Do you comment on Silverlight developers glowing posts as well? Or
do you just dislike it when Apple developers do it?

~~~
rglullis
What has Gruber developed for Apple, exactly? His "projects" page shows
_nothing_ Apple-related: <http://daringfireball.net/projects/>

~~~
blasdel
What? Every single one of those is Apple-related -- one is a low-level review
of differences in 10.4, and all the rest were originally written as itch-
scratching extensions for BBEdit, which is an ancient Mac-only commercial text
editor, and his last day job was for the company that produced it as some sort
of tech-support / help-writer.

~~~
rglullis
I would say that they are _BBEdit_ -specific, except for the review of
differences on Tiger. That's only tangentially related to Apple. It's not like
he wrote something _for_ the iPhone and/or Mac.

------
MichaelApproved
Enough

------
ergo98
Even though this is the Haus of Gruber (why, exactly, does everything he post
get FPd here? Confirmation bias, perhaps?), I'll take my downvote suffering-

>In fact, Apple seems very confident regarding everything it decided for the
original 2007 iPhone

Except multitasking in apps. Actually, scratch that, except apps altogether.
Two major shifts in direction.

Of course Gruber led into that talking about hardware. There you can look at
the fact that the iPhone pre-4 had a worst-in-class DPI, but now with the 4
it's all about the Retina display. DPI is suddenly where everything is.

The original iPhones were about feminine curves. The new iPhone is about kick-
you-in-the-face masculine squares.

And then the front-facing camera (a common complaint on the original iPhone).
The volume buttons. And on and on. Original perfection indeed.

The iPhone 4 is a brilliant phone. I'm morally against Apple's dominance of
mobile, yet it's hard to gather the strength to argue when a friend talks
about possibly getting an iPhone 4: It's a hard choice to argue with.

Yet Gruber's salacious, disturbing love of all things Apple; his automatic
justification of everything Apple does; is very tough to stomach.

As a somewhat unrelated aside, one thing that really strikes me about the
iPhone is the large amount of wasted space. It's interesting seeing it near
>=4" phones and they barely eclipse the iPhone in size, the huge bezel (esp.
on the bottom) of the iPhone making a small screen in a large phone.

~~~
jsz0
His quote makes a lot more sense in context:

* In fact, Apple seems very confident regarding everything it decided for the original 2007 iPhone. There are no new buttons, or even moved buttons. The Retina Display is emblematic of the iPhone 4 as a whole, both hardware and software: the same fundamental idea as the original iPhone, but clarified. It hasn’t really changed so much as improved — like the same picture in increasingly sharper focus.*

Insofar as the automatic justification how does that explain his questions on
the durability of the glass back? Missing italics which he urges people to
bring to Apple's attention? His statement that the antenna issue is, worse
case, a fatal design flaw? Seems like you're kind of spinning the article a
bit to me by omission.

~~~
chc
The only part of his comments that really amounts to negative criticism is
about the glass back.

He isn't hard on Apple about the missing italic face in the same way he is
about e.g. Microsoft's errors (he basically treats it as a regression for
Apple to fix), and it's a gross distortion to characterize his verdict on the
antenna as "This could be a fatal design flaw." Almost every mention of the
antenna issue is cushioned with soothing positivity. He repeatedly states his
belief that reception only drops when your reception is lousy to begin with,
and overall he seems to think it's likely that the issue will be helped by a
software patch, or maybe a small hardware fix. The "fatal design flaw" angle
is brought up very briefly, immediately said to be unlikely, and then further
softened by reiterating his belief that the issue doesn't affect your
reception that much anyway.

I mean, I like Gruber. He's a good writer and has a lot of interesting
insights and I actually value his opinion, but you'd have to be stark raving
mad to read his blog and think, "Wow, this guy is kind of hard on Apple."

~~~
stilldavid
To put my two cents in on the antenna issue, I believe that Gruber is just
saying it how it is in this case. I have an iPhone 4, and nearly everyone that
sees it asks me about reception issues. I've talked on it for a total of
probably 4 hours now, in various locations with various signal strength and
have had no issues with dropped calls or reduced reception of any sort. During
many of the longer calls, I've tried holding the phone upside down, bridging
all the metal gaps, left handed, right handed, etc... and it made no
difference.

So call him "optimistic" in his analysis, but if his experience is anything
like mine, he is right to be wary of all the reports of the "death grip" as
much as I am.

------
kenjackson
I haven't read the story yet... but I'm going to guess: he likes it!

~~~
Garbage
No prize for guessing that. Everybody "guessed" it correctly. :P

