Once again, Apple’s iPhone 4 is dominating the news with it’s antenna woes, and the laughable PR handling of the situation.

Apple has released iOS 4.0.1 in a bid to fix the reception issue which has been plaguing iPhone 4 users since the phone’s launch last month. The update is aimed at the reception issue which is experienced when the phone is held in the left-handed death grip.
Official Apple downloads are available for iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS and iPhone 3G.

What happens when one of the most widely respected consumer watchdog organisations, Consumer Reports, gets involved in the iPhone 4 antenna analysis ink-fest? Apparently, everyone bursts out laughing, saying that they should have done the tests properly, and that the phone might well be critically flawed, but this is NOT the report that proves it. Negative response to the report was not able to stem the ensuing run on Apple stock, which dropped a dollar twenty-eight on the NASDAQ on Tuesday. (The shares have risen 19 percent this year.)
“The stock is being impacted by general concerns about the impact this is having to the brand, and the financial impact, and the uncertainty about what Apple will do about this.”, said an analyst at Pacific Crest Securities.

Filed under we-knew-this-would-come-out, in the litany of creative, experimental d̶a̶m̶a̶g̶e̶ c̶o̶n̶t̶r̶o̶l̶ PR exercises happening around the iPhone 4, is the revelation, carried on the Bloomberg site, that as far back as 12 months ago, Ruben Caballero, a senior engineer and antenna expert at Apple, informed management that the antenna design could adversely effect reception and lead to dropped calls. As expected, no-one at Apple is prepared to talk about this, least of all, Mr Caballero. Of course this “news” is being widely greeted as “News? Good grief, we knew this from minute one! Someone HAD to know this was going to be a train-smash!”

We’re guessing the iPhone 4 Antenna Press Conference that Apple is holding tomorrow at 10:00 AM Pacific Time, may not go well. Hastily arranged, against every standard operating procedure in the Cupertino manual, shrouded in vague-itudes about the content, and apparently to be headed up by Mr Jobs himself, You’d be forgiven for thinking this is something BIG. Like, “We’re recalling iPhone 4.” or, “Free bumpers for everyone!”, or something similar. This writer believes it may be a lot less satisfying than all that. This might simply be Steve-O, angered by the way it’s all getting crazy and out-of-control, wanting to assemble the big names in the industry, and set all this nonsense straight. Just don’t hold it like that!
We’ll see…