Review: August 2008 Archives

Author: Judy Mottle

A second plaintiff has joined the lawsuit against Apple regarding problems with its iPhone 3G, giving the company until Sept. 10 to respond to charges that it sold a defective device under false marketing promises.

Wilton Lee Triggs II is now the second complainant on the lawsuit initially filed Aug. 19 by Jessica Alena Smith, regarding the purchase of 3G iPhones from a Birmingham, Ala. Apple store this summer.

The suit, filed by the Birmingham-based Trimmier Law Firm, states the plaintiffs have suffered "significant monetary and non-monetary damages" due to the "defective" devices. According to the suit, their iPhones allegedly do not provide the data speeds and voice call connectivity promised in Apple advertising. The lawsuit also aims for class-action status, claiming it's also being filed on behalf of the "millions" potentially affected by defective iPhones.

The latest development comes two months after Apple's second phone took the mobile device industry by storm, selling one million devices during the weekend of its launch.

It's also the latest snag for the new device, which for weeks since launch has suffered persistent problems with its MobileMe online service, while a firmware update to existing models may have posed additional activation difficulties in the wake of the debut.

Click here for full story at internetnews.com.

Author: Philip L. Graitcer

There are almost 2,000 third-party applications available for the iPhone on the iTunes "App Store." I haven't been able to wade through all of them but I've found six applications that I really enjoy. For the most part, they work well with few crashes.

Author: Troy Dreier

If you've been waiting for a time when it was safe to try Apple's MobileMe, the waters seem to be calm now.

MobileMe, the successor to Apple's .Mac suite of online tools, experienced perhaps the rockiest launch of any Apple product ever. Approximately one percent of existing customers couldn't access their mail and lost old mail for weeks, while many more couldn't use the online services. A host of smaller bugs caused syncing problems.

The worst is over and MobileMe is behaving as it should at this point. While we'd love to share what the transition problems were like, we had a perfectly smooth time moving from .Mac to MobileMe. Most users didn't have any trouble.

The old .Mac (which is still in use for people using OS X 10.4 and older) allowed people to sync and store important information with their online accounts. MobileMe is a refinement of the service that brings the iPhone and iPod touch into the equation. The key benefit is that users can wirelessly sync information between their computers, handhelds, and online account. While Apple has surprised us by dropping colorful but less-used parts of .Mac, it's successfully focused on providing a simple user experience for the most important features.

Click here for the full story at Wi-Fi Planet.