Filed under: Bad Apple
Apple drops Consumer Reports/iPhone 4 threads down memory hole [updated]
Update 3pm Tuesday:Wired's Epicenter blog points to at least two threads referencing the CR story that have been left intact. Perhaps an overzealous forum manager has now reined in the urge?If you were looking for a message thread on Apple's support forums pointing to Consumer Reports' article 'not recommending' the iPhone 4, it's not there any more. Apple's support forum moderators deleted the thread. Bing cached it.
If it happened once, maybe you'd say it was a glitch. But what if it happened twice? Three times? Four times, five, six?
I'm not prone to hysterics or a subscriber to conspiracy theories, but it's fairly hard to imagine any good way to interpret this. Every post that I saw listed in a Google search of Apple's discussion boards lead to the same result: "Error: you do not have permission to view the requested forum or category."
Sadly, this isn't the first time we've heard about Apple deleting discussion board threads on topics which are unflattering to Apple's products. It's closer to the fiftieth time. In fact, we've heard so many reports about this happening that it seems safe to call this standard operating procedure for Apple's discussion boards. That's not to say that there are no negative threads on the discussion boards, but the ones that are there are the ones that Apple's moderators have decided to leave active.
It's hard to imagine what Apple hopes to gain by doing this. Instead of having one negative news story, now we have two: not only did Consumer Reports come out and say they don't recommend the iPhone 4, but now Apple seems to be trying to prevent people from talking about it on their support board.
Want some overwrought comparisons to Orwell's 1984? Apple seems to be begging for it.
Thanks to reader Paul Richards for pointing this out.
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
Michael said 7:13PM on 7-12-2010
So today I'm deleting TUAW from my RSS reader. The posts here have become more and more like something from a Gawker site, intended to inflame, rather than the informational TUAW of old. It is teh suck.
I don't want to see gossip about people's rag-on-Apple threads that Apple chooses to delete from its own website. Why don't you go try and find some NEWS or something?
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no name said 7:15PM on 7-12-2010
good riddance.
DarwinianReject said 7:27PM on 7-12-2010
Don't let the door hit your @$$ on the way out.
Brian (PC gamer extraordinaire) said 8:21PM on 7-12-2010
aren't you that douche that runs to apples defense in every single negative apple post.
STSanford said 10:13PM on 7-12-2010
So you don't think it's newsworthy that Apple are censoring dissatisfied users, and skewing the press about their newest product, thereby making a more informed decision difficult?
CaptSaltyJack said 2:39AM on 7-13-2010
FYI, TUAW is not a news site, it's a blog. Blog is short for "web log" which is an online journal of sorts. So you're essentially complaining about what someone has chosen to write in a public journal. Please get a life.
Brendan said 6:09AM on 7-13-2010
Why whine about it? Just leave then.
Ron said 10:57AM on 7-13-2010
[In the AOL log off voice]
Good Bye!
*you deserve the AOL log off voice because it is a lame as you are.
tribaltech said 6:02PM on 7-13-2010
Hey while you're at it...why don't you go onto the apple website and apply for a job for antenna engineers. Maybe you could help Steve Jobs come up with a solution to a very basic problem for a mobile device. Or hmmm maybe not, cuz with your closed mind and apple fanboy fever, your brain might not be working in the first place anyway to be of any help to anyone.....oh well! never mind..... go on...leave us alone...
Jesse B. Hannah said 7:14PM on 7-12-2010
They're Apple's forums; Apple can do whatever they like with posts on their forums. Talk about it on another site's forums; it's not like Apple not allowing discussion of it on their forums is going to keep any discussion from happening anywhere—nor is deleting threads on a specific topic even anything new, for Apple or for any online forum.
Internet is not a democracy, it's a fragmented dictatorship.
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Adam said 8:28PM on 7-12-2010
I don't think TJ was arguing that Apple shouldn't be allowed to do this. But it is certainly noteworthy, I think. Ever since this issue came to light, Apple has done everything in its power to downplay, deflect, and deny this valid criticism which is simply not going to disappear. I hope sites like TUAW continue to call them out on it for as long as they continue to deny that there is a problem.
Risto T said 2:33AM on 7-13-2010
valid criticism? as far as I can see everyone has overblown this issue and Apple is simply saying .. "chill, this is normal" which is true .. unless anyone, including consumer reports can demonstrate a more than 25 dBa loss in signal when the phone is being held, it is a non issue.
ilkyone said 8:44AM on 7-13-2010
I'm glad they deleted it. Consumer reports has been crappy for a long time and their slipshod "testing" was typical of amateurs.
Looking at other electronics recommendations they've made ithrough the years an some appliance analyses left me with no confidence in them long ago. They never really understood the megapixel game and sensor types for a long long time but would recommend cameras that had been trashed on dpreview. Likewise with some appliances.
Good for apple because if it was my website, I wouldn't want to waste any space on their brand either.
mynameisyargnad said 10:19AM on 7-13-2010
Except most sites don't censor their users. Apple is a special kind of dictatorship.
captain cthulhu said 2:45PM on 7-13-2010
>> Internet is not a democracy, it's a fragmented dictatorship.
actually, it's an actual working model of anarchy:
“The Internet is the first thing that humanity has built that humanity doesn't understand, the largest experiment in anarchy that we have ever had.”
-Eric Schmidt
Wayzom said 6:43PM on 7-13-2010
What on earth does this CR article have to do with supporting an Apple product. This story is not news at all. Apple deletes offtopic threads all the time. Discussion about a CR article is not a question or solution to a user problem. The story is just noise. There are over 80 threads related to the antenna issue on the support forums and no one has reported a thread actually relevant to reporting or solving the problem as being deleted.
VanillaSpice said 11:43PM on 7-13-2010
@mynameisyargnad - "Except most sites don't censor their users. Apple is a special kind of dictatorship."
Sorry, but that is completely wrong. Censoring of unflattering posts is the norm for official discussion boards, not the exception. And as has been noted, Apple have not removed all unflattering posts from their boards, there are many to be found.
I think it is a silly move in any case, for any company, at any time; but I also think that when any other company except Apple does it, nobody notices (or appears to care).
knewsom said 7:15PM on 7-12-2010
Apple has been headed in this direction for awhile now... and they're just going further down that rabbit hole. I don't like to see it one bit, but there it is. The tough thing is, it puts consumers, like me, in an awkward position. I don't like some of the things the company does, but I do really like many of the products - in fact, there are few others out there that can even compare. ...but they behave in such a frustratingly draconic manner sometimes that it's almost enough to make me sell my Macs and build another Linux box.
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frdmfghtr said 10:42PM on 7-12-2010
I have to agree. I'm very close to putting my 3GS on eBay and going back to a regular cellphone. Between AT&T's asshattery with cutting unlimited plans and Apple's "deny, deny, deny" tactics, I'm about done. I'll continue to use the iPad with wifi at every opportunity and avoid 3G data when possible since the hardware is already paid for, but this kind of behavior sticks in my memory a long time.
Risto T said 2:35AM on 7-13-2010
A linux box? really? I have used Linux for 13 years for work and there is no
way anyone could realistically expect to use Linux on a day to day home use
basis compared to Apple products.. It is not even remotely close in
usability.