iPhone 4 glass spawns class action lawsuit

Gee Wiz, most of you are Apple Fanboys blindly sticking up for a filthy corporation that does not give a stuff about you. My Iphone 4 back glass has cracked from one drop off a couch onto a wooden floor. I'm not happy about this considering it was advertised as being incredibly strong (and phones should be to withstand everyday wear and tear).

I had a $70 plastic nokia that I threw around the place for around 4yrs and it still works just fine with no cracks, but after treating the Iphone 4 like a baby and coddling it for 6 months, one tiny accidental drop and it's cracked.

This person has a good reason to start a class action suit so perhaps Apple will properly field test their releases, and in the case of cracking offer free or COST-PRICE (ie. $10 for back glass replacement) repairs (rather than the $225 replacement fee Australian's are charged).

Shame on all of you apply fanboy sheep. You disgust me and all rational human beings, you make me feel dirty just sharing the world with you and are the reason consumers are treated like the faceless wallet machines they are.

Eww, filthy apple fanboys with no souls.

I'd be sure to buy those rubbery exterior cases but I'd be even more careful not to drop my iPhone 4 three times in a row. There is no doubt that plastic will definitely survive a fall better than most glass. Still, most high-end device manufacturers would go with a material that isn't plastic. The plastic makes them feel junky. I also think that most manufacturers would think a consumer would definitely take better care of high-end device.

Apple will most likely have to go to carbon fiber on iPhones in the future. Apple could certainly use Lexan plastic for survivability, but it scratches so easily. Apple would have to devise some sort of thin outer glass coating for hardness. No way to win 100%. There'll always have to be some compromise.
http://www.whatisguide.net/0112-gorilla-glass.html

Those of you making snide remarks about the iPhone 4 being made of glass etc etc. My iPhone 3G S survived numerous drops despite having a glass screen. My iPhone 4 has cracks and scratches from *normal use*. In fact, I treat this thing with more care than anything else I own. I have no idea how this thing is so scratched up, but it's not nearly as durable as the old iPhone. This lawsuit is completely justified in my eyes.

Someone tell this rocket scientist who is filing the lawsuit that if he'll quit dropping his damn phone trying to GET it to break, he won't have this problem. How some people make it from day to day is nothing short of astounding to me.

All phones can break when you drop them. I've replaced 3 BlackBerry's for my customers who have accidentally dropped them. The BlackBerry much like the iPhone is subsidized and the replacement cost is about $450 USD.

I also routinely replace laptops, one customer slipped on the ice and shattered the screen of a laptop as he landed on the laptop bag. I did the same thing myself when I stepped on a wet marble floor and both feet went out from under me. My hip landed on the laptop bag and destroyed the LCD screen.

Breakage happens, and no company is willing to provide you a free replacement unless you paid extra for a service plan that includes accidental damage coverage.

You bought GLASS PHONE. Be careful with it, stupid! That concerned? Get a case.

End of story.

I've dropped my iphone 4 about over one story (close to about 1.5 stories) and nothing happened. Not a crack, scuff or ding.

This douchebag should have his phone taken away from him and replaced with a plastic toy phone.

Comment thread is average.

I agree with the guy. The iphone4 is defective by design in my observation/opinion.

In fact the glass used is more likely to break due to its stiffness and hardness. Further more the stainless steel band that acts as the edge is also the trouble, or at least the antenna break is. If the phone so much as glances a hard surface on the right hand bottom corner the energy is transferred through the weakest points. A) antenna break to b) home button hole. And it's broken.

The CDMA iphone4 has already moved the weak points to more structurally sound locations as evidence supporting the claim.

And contrary to the whole "don't drop precious", I buy apple products because they are tough. Pansy tech that breaks at the first trouble is useless. Tech should be flogged and keep going. Like the iMac stories of being burnt and drenched, that is Apple. Not stories of people keeping them in cotton wool cause they are fragile and the user trying to protect it against certain death.

I actually think that the glass in the iphone 4 isn't as strong because I've received a couple scuffs on it (minor ones) that my 3GS never had. But it's random as to how I use my phone and what could happen I suppose.


That said am I really going to get anything from this? Probably not. I mean, I haven't seen widespread evidence of problems and honestly, even if I ready do think the phone scratches to easily, well there's 1 million other reasons to use my iPhone.

Apple totally deserves this for implementing such a terrible design. Anyone a fan of basic physics can tell you that hardened glass, no matter how tough, is always extremely brittle along the edges. This is why almost every other smartphone, including the old 3GS, employ the use of a tough aluminum or plastic bezel along the edges of the screen, and the same tactic is also employed in military usage of these types of glass, in forms such as the tough metal frames around the windows in helicopters.

But instead of designing on the side of durability like in previous models, Apple made the boneheaded decision to eliminate the protective bezel and leave the edges of the glass exposed, essentially negating the strength benefits of the glass. Sure, an iPhone 4 can survive a drop or two, provided that it lands in just such a way that the face of the glass takes most of the impact. But being a relatively thin device, it's just as likely that the edge of the glass will absorb the impact instead, inevitably leading to disaster.

You can't blame this on the stupidity of users. Most cell phones are designed to be dropped multiple times, because they don't exactly come with a wrist strap or a piece of velcro to prevent an accident. People drop their cell phones, and it's not a question of if, but rather a question of when they will drop it. To design a phone in such a way as to provide no protection from drops, and then tout the glass screen as being several times stronger than plastic is false advertising, plain and simple. Apple doesn't specify that the glass is only stronger versus scratches and abuse along one particular surface, and nobody has ever seen Apple themselves perform durability tests. Meanwhile HTC had a whole series of videos documenting the development of the Nexus One, one of which showed a test unit being dropped and tumbled several times as a testament to its durability.

This is probably going to pan out just like Antennagate, culminating with Steve Jobs telling iPhone users that they're holding the phone the wrong way, and that if they hold it the correct way then when they accidentally drop it the screen won't break.