April 20, 2010: A day after the most high-profile iPhone leak in history, tech news site Gizmodo dissects a prototype iPhone 4, then publishes the teardown — showing the world exactly what’s inside the soon-to-be-released device.
The iPhone 4 prototype, accidentally left in a bar by 27-year-old Apple software engineer Gray Powell, quickly becomes the biggest story in the tech world. And that’s where the trouble begins.
March 29, 2012: A settlement ends the “Antennagate” controversy, as Apple gives affected iPhone 4 owners the chance to claim a whopping $15 payout. The settlement covers customers whose phones dropped calls due to its cutting-edge design, but were unable to return their handsets (or didn’t want a free bumper case from Apple to mitigate against the problem).
While it’s arguable whether a $15 payout was worth filing all the paperwork necessary to claim the cash, the Antennagate story — and the resulting class-action lawsuit — generated big headlines at the time.
February 3, 2011: The iPhone finally arrives on Verizon Wireless, the United States’ largest carrier, ending nearly four years of exclusivity with AT&T.
The move comes as Apple faces pressure to expand its customer base, with Android phones steadily growing in popularity. The deal commences with the iPhone 4, available for preorder by Verizon’s 93 million customers.
If you see someone using an iPhone 4, don’t think you’re hallucinating. Members of Gen Z have dusted off the 15-year-old handset and put it back into action.
It’s part of a trend toward retro tech, so it might be time to pull your old gadgets out of storage to see if you can turn them into cash. Or maybe starting using the devices yourself, now that they are cool again.
July 12, 2010: The iPhone 4 suffers a major blow when respected trade publication Consumer Reports says it can’t, in good faith, recommend the new Apple smartphone. The reason the magazine refuses to give its vaunted “recommended” label to the previously top-ranked device in its devastating iPhone 4 review? A little Apple scandal called “Antennagate.”
July 2, 2010: Apple opens up about “Antennagate,” issuing a letter that addresses iPhone 4 reception problems publicly for the first time.
In a letter addressed to iPhone 4 users, Apple admits to being “surprised when we read reports of reception problems, and … immediately began investigating them.” However, the company’s findings do little to dispel the growing Antennagate controversy.
June 24, 2010:. The iPhone 4 release date finally arrives, bringing a sleeker design, a new video telephony service called FaceTime and a gorgeous Retina display. Simply put, it’s a stunning smartphone.
While history may remember the device for the “Antennagate” scandal caused by that new design, it is otherwise a fantastic upgrade over the iPhone 3GS. In its first weekend, Apple will sell 1.7 million iPhone 4 handsets. That’s a major triumph for Cupertino.
June 16, 2010: Apple reports a massive surge of interest in its latest smartphone, with iPhone 4 preorders racking up 600,000 sales on their first day.
The company calls the number “far higher” than expected. At the time, it’s the most iPhone preorders Apple has ever taken in a single day. AT&T suffers server problems thanks to the demand — with 10 times the usual traffic on its website. It’s proof positive that Apple is onto a winner!
The deadline for California citizens who bought an iPhone 4, 4s or 5 with a defective sleep/wake power button to cash in is coming up.
A class action lawsuit against Apple was filed in 2013. It alleged that Apple knowingly sold iPhones with “defective” power buttons and then failed to properly remedy the issue. A settlement reached with Apple means that people who bought one of these devices can complete a form to receive “up to $24” for their troubles.
Your brand-new iPhone 11 is about to look outdated already thanks to these exciting “iPhone 12” concept images.
The renders imagine what next year’s refresh will look like based on the rumors that have surfaced so far. It takes design cues from the iconic iPhone 4 while improving on what we have today.
Apple could go back to one of its most beloved iPhone designs with next year’s iPhone refresh. According to a new report from seasoned Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, Apple’s 2020 iPhone redesign will resemble the iPhone 4.
If true, that would make an already exciting upgrade even more of a must-have!
Never sell your organs for an iPhone.
Most of us don’t need that advice, but one Chinese man, aged just 25, is now bedridden with organ failure after selling his kidney to buy the latest Apple devices eight years ago.
The new iPhone XS and XS Max are generating rave reviews. Having marked the iPhone’s 10th anniversary with last year’s awe-inducing iPhone X, Apple has now set the stage for a second decade of smartphone innovation.
But what about all the awesome iPhones that led us to this point? Which models are the classics that will occupy museum shelves long after they’ve stopped working? I decided to dive in at the deep end and rank every phone Apple ever made. Wish me luck!
WhatsApp has confirmed plans to drop support for iOS 7.
The hugely popular messaging service, owned by Facebook, will continue to work for a little while yet. However, WhatsApp warns that it is no longer actively developing for iOS 7, and certain features could stop working at any time.
Late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel featured the iPhone X on Tuesday night’s edition of Lie Witness News, asking people on the streets of Hollywood to hold the handset and give their impressions of Apple’s $1,000 smartphone.
Few realized they in fact held an iPhone 4 from 2010.
A judge has ruled that a lawsuit against Apple for breaking FaceTime in iOS 6 can continue.
It is alleged that the iPhone-maker purposely allowed the feature to be disabled on older devices in an effort to force users to update to iOS 7.
It’s no secret that Apple loves to keep products secret, but thanks to a new leak we can now see the crazy lengths the company goes to just to keep prototype iPhones under wraps.
Notorious Apple leaker Sonny Dickson has put out some new images of an ugly iPhone case allegedly used by Apple to keep the iPhone 6s secret. From the outside it doesn’t look like much, but there are a bunch of tiny details that help Apple keep features from leaking.
Apple’s iPhone empire has been made possible thanks to the magic of aluminum. But under certain circumstances, Jony Ive’s favorite metal can be the iPhone’s worst enemy.
The folks behind the YouTube channel Backyard Scientists decided to see what happens when you dunk the iPhone in molten aluminum. Seeing the iPhone get a Terminator 2 type of death is oddly beautiful.
Check it out:
The design of the iPhone 7 is awfully disappointing to Apple fans who were hoping for a major change this year, but there’s still a way to get all of the new device’s features into a totally different form factor.
All it takes is a giant saw and an industrial sanding belt and you’ll be on your way to getting the sleek straight edge frame of the iPhone 4. YouTuber PeripateticPandas created a new video showing the full process that will give you the most unique looking iPhone 7 in the world.
Check it out:
June 7, 2010: Steve Jobs introduces the iPhone 4 at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco.
“For 2010, we’re going to take the biggest leap since the original iPhone,” Jobs says, addressing a crowd inside Moscone Center. “So today, we’re introducing iPhone 4. Fourth-generation iPhone. Now, this is really hot.”
He then touted the device’s all-new design — and cracked a joke about the sensational leak that revealed the iPhone 4’s look in the preceding months.
“Now, stop me if you’ve already seen this,” Jobs said, to raucous applause, before cannily reclaiming the narrative. “Well, believe me, you ain’t seen it. You’ve gotta see this thing in person. It is one of the most beautiful designs you’ve ever seen.”
You can’t think about Apple without thinking about great design. The two go hand-in-hand, thanks to the company’s incredible ability to churn out hit products that make billions of dollars one after the other, year after year.
But Apple’s design team isn’t perfect. There have been some missteps over the years, and it seems like they’ve become more common under Tim Cook. Its design has also become predictable; even before we get a new product, we have a good idea what it will look like.
Are we worrying about nothing, or is it time Apple invited some fresh blood into Jony Ive’s lair? Join us in this week’s Friday Night Fight between Cult of Android and Cult of Mac as we fight it out over this and more!
Michael Fassbender is a lot of things: actor, producer, Magneto … but one thing he isn’t is on the cutting edge of technology.
The man playing Steve Jobs in the upcoming biopic from director Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire) confessed in a recent interview that he is a little behind the times, phone-wise.
Although BlackBerry hasn’t been a serious competitor to the iPhone in years, the UK phone trade-in website “Cash for phones comparison” has published some pretty damning statistics, showing just how massive the gulf is between the two “competitors.”
Only 8 percent of customers who traded in an old BlackBerry phone claimed any kind of loyalty to the brand, while an overwhelming majority of 66 percent decided to switch to an iPhone. However, it seems that these people weren’t looking so much to get a new iPhone as they were to get any iPhone — since 42.1 percent of respondees decided to ditch their trustworthy BlackBerry for an iPhone 4: a phone which was introduced all the way back in 2010.
Apple is planning to rollout a new 8GB iPhone 5c in India starting this June in hopes to turn the country into it’s next booming market.
India was one of the few places you could still buy an iPhone 4 until last week when Apple pulled phone from the country. A cheaper iPhone 5c will aim to boost Apple’s marketshare in a smartphone market dominated by Sony and Samsung.
Less than four months after relaunching the iPhone 4 in India, Apple has decided to ditch the strategy and take the phone off the market again.
The January move had made the iPhone 4 one of the cheapest unsubsidized iPhones in the world, with the aim of growing market share by appealing to a percentage of the population who would not usually be able to afford iPhones.