Amid growing criticism from 3G iPhone customers, a class action complaint was filed against Apple Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Alabama. The lawsuit alleges that despite aggressive marketing that the 3G iPhone is "twice as fast for half the price," the much-hyped smartphone is actually much slower than advertised and prone to dropping calls.... "Apple sold these devices on the promise that they were twice as fast as the pre-existing phones and that they would function suitably, or properly, on the 3G network. But, thus far, Apple and the phone have failed to deliver on this promise," Jonathan Kudulis, an attorney with Birmingham, Ala.-based Trimmier Law Firm, told ABCNEWS.com. Trimmier is the firm representing the Ala.-based plaintiff, Jessica Alena Smith.
I suppose the surprise in this is why it took anyone this long to sue Apple. Talk about overpromising and underdelivering. "Twice as fast!" "Half the price!" Yeah, right. Once you get past the dropped and missed calls and the poor signal strength...well, it's still an iPhone, eh? I've written at some length about my own frustrations with Apple's new 3G iPhone, but it really is beginning to seem as if Apple put out a product that was tested incompletely and rushed to market before all of the bugs had been identified and fixed. Combine this with the fact that AT&T's 3G network is not exactly state-of-the-art, and what you get is a phone that clearly seems not quite ready for prime time.
I'm willing to give Apple the benefit of the doubt...as long as I can see evidence that they're actually making a serious effort to address and resolve the problems. Unfortunately, I'm not exactly feeling the love at the moment, because what I'm sensing is a lot of stonewalling. This almost seems to border on the hope that if they wait long enough it will all blow over. As much as I love Apple products, not even I am going to be willing to tolerate mediocrity, ineptitude, and stonewalling indefinitely.
Apple needs to be clear and open about the problems and how they plan to make things right. They need to acknowledge what's happening, and they need to tell iPhone owners what they're going to do, when they're going to do it, and how they're going to do it. AND THEY NEED TO DO IT YESTERDAY, or this one lawsuit will be only the beginning.
