iPhone

Cathy Locke, Sacramento Bee:

Apple’s iPhone repair and refurbishing center has been identified as the source of apparently inadvertent 911 calls received by Elk Grove police and Sacramento County sheriff’s dispatch centers over the past five months.

Since October, the Elk Grove Police Department’s dispatch center has been receiving about 20 non-subscriber initialized 911 calls per day, said Officer Jason Jimenez, police spokesman. The calls show no service provider for the phone, but the dispatch center has traced them to a cell tower near the Apple campus and determined that they are coming from the phone repair facility, he said.

The calls are coming from inside the house.

And:

Since Jan. 1, Hampton said, the sheriff’s communication center has received 47 uninitialized 911 calls and has been able to document that 30 of those came from the Apple facility.

Testing the iPhone/Apple Watch SOS capability?

[VIDEO] Click over to the main Loop post and watch this short video. Fantastic.

That’s not units sold, but 51% of total global smartphone revenue. Both have value, but I’d argue that revenue is much more important than units sold. While total unit sales buys influence, revenue buys investment in R&D.

51% of total global smartphone revenues is astonishing.

Joe Rossignol, MacRumors:

The Financial Times today highlighted a limited number of reports from users experiencing delays with incoming phone calls on the iPhone X. Apple later confirmed to MacRumors that it is “looking into these reports.”

And:

The report, which links to a few discussions on the Apple Support Communities, notes that hundreds of customers have complained that the iPhone X’s display experiences delays in turning on for up to 10 seconds during incoming phone calls, preventing these users from tapping the Accept or Decline buttons.

Sounds like a very small pool of people have this issue, but it also sounds like this has been around a while (here’s a Reddit comment on this from two months ago) and is still not solved.

Strategy Analytics:

According to the latest research from Strategy Analytics, global smartphone shipments tumbled 9 percent annually to reach 400 million units in Q4 2017. It was the biggest annual fall in smartphone history. Apple captured first place with 19% global marketshare, nudging Samsung into second position. Xiaomi continued its relentless rise, almost doubling smartphone shipments from a year ago.

In a nutshell, smartphone shipments fell 9 percent year-over-year, Samsung fell with it, Apple held reasonably steady in shipments despite the industry as a whole shrinking, and Apple gained considerable global marketshare.

Here’s the report, see for yourself.

It’s all in the model number. Note that this has been true for many, many years and applies to Macs and, I believe, iPads too.

That said, this is one of those arcane bits of trivia that bears repeating.

Counterpoint Research:

According to the latest research from Counterpoint’s Market Pulse program, the US market sold-through 51.2m smartphones during the holiday season quarter of 2017. Apple sell-through during this period was a record 22.39 million smartphones. Apple was able to grow their sell-through market share from 37% to 44%. This is the highest ever market share for Apple in its home market.

Commenting on Apple’s growth story here, Research Director Jeff Fieldhack stated, “Apple shipped a record 22 million iPhones for the first time ever in a quarter in USA and is note-able and impressive feat because the Q4 promotional season was not nearly as aggressive as previous years. In addition, upgrade rates are slightly lower year-over-year as smartphone subscribers are holding onto phones longer. Apple was able to grow their sell through 20% in a market that only grew 2% compared to last year. This means Apple has been successful to take share away from Samsung in the premium.”

Note that this article is referencing the 4th calendar quarter and not Apple’s 4th fiscal quarter (which ended September 30th).

During Q4 2017, all the three new iPhones were strong sellers—the three were the top three selling phones in the US market. However, since its launch on November 3rd, the iPhone X outsold the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus by a 2:1 margin . What this means is the super-premium segment (above $800) has grown from almost 0% in previous years to 25% share of the total smartphones sold in USA during Q4 2017, which speaks volumes for the potential of USA market and the US consumers’ buying power.”

It’ll be really interesting to compare these results to those one quarter from now. Will the iPhone X peel even further away from the iPhone 8/Plus, sales-wise?

Start off with a quick read of this Apple Insider post: If iPhone X Demand Is Less Than Expected, Analyst Expects It to Be ‘End of Life’ When Replacements Ship.

From the post, this bit about KGI predicting a quick end-of-life for iPhone X:

KGI also expects a trio of iPhone models in the fall of 2018. He predicts the iPhone X will be “end of life” in the summer of 2018, instead of being retained as a lower-cost option in the following year. If this is the case, it would be the first time that Apple has not retained the previous year’s model to allow for a wide range of iPhones available at many price points.

John Gruber shares some insight on this:

This would not be the first time an iPhone flagship model didn’t stick around for a second year. In 2013, Apple introduced the iPhone 5S to replace the iPhone 5, and also introduced the iPhone 5C to occupy the second pricing tier.

The iPhone X was a relatively giant leap in hardware design. The notch took a lot of heat and it seems a logical speculation that Apple is working hard to shrink the hardware footprint and the notch. And that means a new rev of the iPhone X. Once that happens, it’d seem logical to end-of-life the previous version. If the KGI speculation is true. If.

But my favorite part of Gruber’s post is his takedown of a Newsweek article, with the headline:

Is Apple About to Cancel the iPhone X? Poor Sales Mean Device Faces ‘End of Life’”

This article got a fair amount of traction, but it was based on the Apple Insider article quoted above. Headlines. A sharp, cutting tool, dangerous when used poorly.

Follow the link above to Gruber’s post. A worthy read.

Did you know you can specify medical info to appear on your iPhone lock screen? This could be lifesaving for many people.

Important features to be aware of, well laid out by Michael Potuck, writing for 9to5Mac.

Farhad Manjoo, New York Times:

Tech “addiction” is a topic of rising national concern. I put the A-word in quotes because the precise pull that our phones exert over us isn’t the same as that of drugs or alcohol. The issue isn’t really new, either; researchers who study how we use digital technology have for years been warning of its potential negative effects on our cognition, psyche and well-being.

What is new is who has joined the ranks of the worried. Recently, a parade of tech luminaries, including several former Facebook employees, have argued that we’re no match for the sophisticated machinery of engagement and persuasion being built into smartphone apps. Their fears are manifold: They’re worried about distraction, productivity, how social networks alter our emotional lives and relationships, and what they’re doing to children.

And:

I got to thinking about Apple’s responsibility last week when two large investors wrote an open letter asking the company to do more about its products’ effects on children. I was initially inclined to dismiss the letter as a publicity stunt; if you’re worried about children and tech, why not go after Facebook?

But when I called several experts, I found they agreed with the investors. Sure, they said, Apple isn’t responsible for the excesses of the digital ad business, but it does have a moral responsibility to — and a business interest in — the well-being of its customers.

I am not sure I agree with Farhad’s allegation of Apple’s moral responsibility, but I think this article is worth reading. More and more, the world is stumbling around, staring at their phones and losing their connections with each other, losing touch with their humanity.

Is this Apple’s fault? I don’t think so. I think blame, in general, is not helpful, and I also think we were heading down this road as technology evolved, whether Apple was there to steer us or not.

One more quote from the article:

There’s another, more important reason for Apple to take on tech addiction: because it would probably do an elegant job of addressing the problem.

“I do think this is their time to step up,” said Tristan Harris, a former design ethicist at Google who now runs Time Well Spent, an organization working to improve technology’s impact on society.

“In fact,” Mr. Harris added, “they may be our only hope.”

Just me, or did this immediately spring to mind for you, too?

Jeremy Burge:

Why am I now always taking screenshots by accident? Two things:

The volume buttons are directly opposite the Lock button (aka “Sleep/Wake” button), and The combination for screenshot has changed. On phones with a home button, the iOS combination has always been Lock and Home buttons but is now Lock and Volume Up on iPhone X (due to lack of home button)

Trying to hold the phone with a stable grip while pushing the lock button means my thumb is resting on the lock button, and my index finger is on the volume up button.

Design is hard.

The position/function of the external iPhone buttons has evolved over time, and with each new generation, it seems there’s some design compromise that emerges.

In this case, putting buttons on opposite sides of the device mean that pressing one will require an equal and opposite press on the opposing button. And for the iPhone X, this results in a screenshot.

Luke Kawa, Bloomberg:

In a letter to the smartphone maker dated Jan. 6, activist investor Jana Partners LLC and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System urged Apple to create ways for parents to restrict children’s access to their mobile phones. They also want the company to study the effects of heavy usage on mental health.

“There is a growing body of evidence that, for at least some of the most frequent young users, this may be having unintentional negative consequences,” according to the letter from the investors, who combined own about $2 billion in Apple shares. The “growing societal unease” is “at some point is likely to impact even Apple.”

“Addressing this issue now will enhance long-term value for all shareholders,” the letter said.

Instinctively, it seems clear to me that heavy smartphone usage does have an impact on your mental health. It changes the social equation, moving communication from one-on-one direct contact to abbreviated, interrupting bursts. It also brings in a steady stream of sensationalized news snippets, exposing you to some information that is false.

This is an issue for children and an issue for everyone.

Is this Apple’s issue to fix?

.

Chris Smith, BGR:

If the same image is shown on an OLED screen for a long period of time, burn-in effects may set in. This goes for TVs, monitors, and smartphones. It took the iPhone X 510 hours of continuously displaying the exact same image on the iPhone X for burn-in effects to become permanent. That’s Cetizen’s conclusion, and that’s great news for all iPhone X users.

And:

Cetizen stopped at various intervals to check for burn-in traces, but the iPhone X did not show visible effects until hitting the 510-hour mark. The screens on the Galaxy Note 8 and Galaxy S7 Edge, meanwhile, were impacted sooner.

The original site quoted by BGR is in Korean but is pretty understandable if you use Google Translate to translate the page to English. It’d be interesting to see what the burn-in number is for the Pixel 2 XL.

Kirk McElhearn:

While I currently use an iPhone 8+, a still have the iPhone SE that I bought in March, 2016. With all of the attention to batteries on the iPhone, I decided to check this device’s battery. It hadn’t seemed particularly slow to me, but the battery hadn’t been lasting a full day for some months before I got the iPhone 8+ and stopped using the SE.

Kirk uses iMazing, a Mac app, to check the iPhone SE battery health (current max charge vs max charge when it was new). If you are thinking about checking and, possibly, replacing your iPhone battery, this is an excellent case study.

Side note: You might also check the Coconut Battery app, which will tell you about your Mac battery, as well as the battery in any USB connected iOS device.

Brian Heater, TechCrunch:

Those $29 battery out-of-warranty replacements Apple promised are now available for impacted users with an iPhone 6 or later. The company was initially aiming for a late-January timeframe in the States when it first offered up the discount, following blowback against its admission that it had slowed down older model phones to maximize performance.

“We expected to need more time to be ready,” the company said in a statement offered up to TechCrunch this weekend, “but we are happy to offer our customers the lower pricing right away. Initial supplies of some replacement batteries may be limited.”

No word yet on the timing of the battery health iOS software update.

From Apple’s public statement on the iPhone battery throttling issue:

We’ve been hearing feedback from our customers about the way we handle performance for iPhones with older batteries and how we have communicated that process. We know that some of you feel Apple has let you down. We apologize. There’s been a lot of misunderstanding about this issue, so we would like to clarify and let you know about some changes we’re making.

First and foremost, we have never — and would never — do anything to intentionally shorten the life of any Apple product, or degrade the user experience to drive customer upgrades. Our goal has always been to create products that our customers love, and making iPhones last as long as possible is an important part of that.

Apple then goes into detail on battery aging and some battery shutdown history, all pretty readable. But at the very bottom is this:

Apple is reducing the price of an out-of-warranty iPhone battery replacement by $50 — from $79 to $29 — for anyone with an iPhone 6 or later whose battery needs to be replaced, starting in late January and available worldwide through December 2018. Details will be provided soon on apple.com.

And:

Early in 2018, we will issue an iOS software update with new features that give users more visibility into the health of their iPhone’s battery, so they can see for themselves if its condition is affecting performance.

Stay tuned for the details. Personally, I wish Apple had wrapped their PR arms around this issue a lot sooner. They certainly had all the pieces in place to have avoided this issue entirely.

Some people assign ill will to Apple, feel Apple was trying to do something shady with their battery tech. Some feel Apple was trying to manipulate people into buying new phones. I just don’t see any of that. No way.

Me? I think this was a fumble. This letter makes me feel a bit better about the whole thing, gives me a sense that Apple is both taking this seriously and is learning from this experience.

One final note: iFixit has dropped the price of their DIY battery replacement kits to $29 or less in case you want to do this yourself.

Robert Kientz, Seeking Alpha (free reg-wall):

Li-ION is the most advanced, commonly available batteries that are used in portable electronics like laptops and phones. That is because unlike Nickel Cadmium [NiCad], they do not develop ‘charge memories’. And they are better for small electronics than Nickel Metal Hydride [NiMH] because of shorter charge time and higher energy density, both critical for the uses of portable phones.

And:

Li-ION batteries typically fail faster than NiCad because they wear out in less charge cycles, which mean consumers get fewer charges before their batteries will need replacement.

And:

Apple has not designed flaws into its iPhone product with regard to battery management.

What Apple has done is provide software that allows its iPhone users who want to keep their phones to manage their batteries by slowing down the processor during times of lower power and to keep the phones from turning off spontaneously. Contrary to what many have said about this story, what Apple is doing is not abnormal at all.

There are two computer chip manufacturers that you may have heard of, Intel and Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD), that have built advanced power management technology into their chipset designs.

Provocative read. To me, Apple has done an amazing job optimizing its battery technology. Where they’ve slipped up here, in my opinion, is in communications. This would not be an issue of Apple gave users an easy way to tell where their device sits on the battery efficiency curve, made it easier for a user to have a sense of how much better their device would perform if they bought a new battery.

That said, I’m not sure Apple wants to be in the battery swap-out business. If Apple educated their users about the current state of their batteries, I suspect many consumers would develop a habit of updating their batteries, rather than live with a 75% solution.

Last week, we ran a post titled iPhone 6s running slow? Consider replacing your battery.

In response to the referenced reddit thread, Geekbench founder John Poole did some testing. If the battery/performance issue is of interest, this is a fascinating read.