Steve Jobs responded to a query about the problem from one owner by saying: “Just avoid holding it in that way.”

The official advice is to “avoid gripping it in the lower left corner in a way that covers both sides of the black strip in the metal band”.

Alternatively, said Apple, customers could buy a case to shield the antenna.

The iPhone 4 went on sale on 24 June, with hundreds of people queuing outside Apple’s flagship store in central London for the launch.

Many new owners reported that signal strength dropped when the phone was held.

In a statement, Apple said: “Gripping any mobile phone will result in some attenuation of its antenna performance, with certain places being worse than others depending on the placement of the antennas.”

Steve Jobs issued his response in a message responding to an e-mail from the Ars Technica news site. Mr Jobs wrote that “All phones have sensitive areas”.

The problem is thought to be particularly acute for left-handed owners who naturally touch the phone in the sensitive area.

The casing of Apple’s latest phone is made of stainless steel, which also serves as its antenna.

Apple sells a rubber “bumper” that shields the sensitive area as do many other firms.

Richard Warner, one of the first to buy an iPhone 4, contacted BBC News, saying that he thought the phone was “useless in its current state”.

“Apple have created a phone that has an antenna on the bottom left-hand side of the phone.”

“This means that when you hold it in your left hand, the signal bars slowly fade until there is no signal,” he wrote.

‘Complaints’

A number of videos have been posted on video sharing site YouTube complaining about the reception issue.

One video had an American user running a speed test, with hands on and hands free.

In it, the user ‘awington’ says that, while holding the phone “it won’t even run the test when I am holding the phone… once I let go, it makes a connection and runs the test.

“Hold it a second time, and the upload test will not start.”

Social networking site Twitter was full of chatter, with numerous tweets on the reception problems.

The issue might stem from the way the integrated antenna is constructed. One section provides mobile reception, while another is for wi-fi.

Some users have speculated that touching the bottom of the phone bridges this gap, affecting signal strength.

When Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone 4 at Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, he described the integrated antenna as “really cool engineering”.

By BBC News, Friday June 25 2010

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For the first three months of 2010, total Internet subscriptions stood at 1,615,032, with broadband subscriptions at 1,509,934. This represents an increase of 19% on the same period in 2009.
Speaking from the Shanghai Expo, Minister Ryan said: ‘When I entered Government, around 600,000 people in Ireland had internet access – now, we have grown to a point where well over 1.5 million people in Ireland now subscribe to a service.

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This success is down to progressive policy on the part of Government and significant investment by the private sector. In the last three years almost €1.5 billion of public and private monies has been invested in Irish broadband.
Almost every week, we hear of a new announcement of higher speeds and better services for Irish customers. The Government’s National Broadband Scheme will deliver broadband to every part of Ireland by autumn this year, 3 years ahead of the EU target. The cable operator is investing in 100Mb/s speeds, and in the last days, eircom announced that it is trialling speeds of 150Mb/s.

Broadband growth in Ireland continues apace – further schemes, and further investment will only serve to ramp up this success.’

By www.rte.ie, Friday June 25 2010

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Speaking ahead of a major conference on innovation which is to take place on Monday and Tuesday next at University College Dublin, InterTrade Ireland’s director of strategy, Aidan Gough, said an all-island innovation ecosystem would be the most effective and efficient use of resources for both regions.

“Both Northern Ireland and the Republic have identified innovation as key to future growth. Both face similar challenges and are taking similar responses. It makes sense to collaborate.”

One possible model for such a system, according to Mr Gough, is the Nordic model. This has seen the four Nordic countries integrate their national innovation policies to the mutual benefit of each of the countries. The organisation believes such a model would be particularly beneficial to Ireland due to the small size of the economies North and South.

“We are a small country and will need to pool all our intellectual, academic, business networks and funding resources if we are to maximise our potential, particularly in the field of innovation,” Mr Gough will tell next week’s conference.

According to InterTrade Ireland, collaboration to date has meant the island has successfully attracted research funding from a wide range of sources, such as the European FP7 fund – the EU’s main source of funding for research – and the US-Ireland RD Partnership. It believes open access to research infrastructure could form a key strand of such a collaborative model.

The need to develop high-tech innovation clusters as a way of building capacity and supporting innovation will also be a central theme of the conference.

By SUZANNE LYNCH, The Irish Times, Friday June 25 2010

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Windows 7, the most recent version of Microsoft’s operating system, is too unwieldy for an iPad-like device, according to David Daoud, an analyst at IDC. A lighter edition will not be ready until the fourth quarter, giving Apple almost a year’s head start in the burgeoning market for tablets.

“The Windows world needs to respond,” said Mr Daoud. “They will have to play catch-up.”
The iPad’s success caught much of the PC industry by surprise. Within two months of the April release, Apple sold two million iPads – more than IDC expected for the entire tablet industry in 2010. To catch up, Dell and Hewlett-Packard are turning to Google’s Android operating system.

The Taiwanese manufacturers that build most of the world’s PCs said they were dissatisfied with Microsoft’s current line-up. “We don’t have any choice for now,” said Joseph Hsu, chairman and president of Taipei-based manufacturer Micro-Star International, a maker of laptops and computer parts. Windows 7 was too powerful and consumes too much energy from batteries, he added. The iPad, which can display books, videos and the internet on a thin touch screen, will reach sales of 5.5 million units this year and jump to 13 million next year, according to Macquarie Group.

John Kalkman, a vice-president in the Microsoft division that works with computer makers, said the feedback from PC manufacturers was “fair”. Later this year, Microsoft will release Windows Embedded Compact 7, which will require less processing power and will reduce the drain on batteries. Microsoft has tried for more than a decade to build a market for tablet-sized personal computers. Chairman Bill Gates predicted in November 2001 that the tablet would become the most popular form of PC within five years. Demand however for the Windows tablets currently sold by Hewlett- Packard and Dell has been lacklustre, according to IDC.

Before the iPad made its debut this year, it had been forecasting that sales of tablets would decline to less than 1 per cent of the overall PC market in the US. IDC had predicted total shipments of just 523,000 tablets.
Intel, whose chips run about 80 per cent of the world’s PCs, has not helped Microsoft’s cause. The chipmaker’s most energy-efficient tablet-ready processors do not run Windows 7 – and won’t until early next year. – (Bloomberg)

The Irish Times – Friday, June 18, 2010

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2010/0618/1224272791925.html

US TELECOMS firm ATT has confirmed some users of Apple’s iPad have had personal information exposed via a network security flaw, two months after the tablet computer was launched and smashed sales expectations.

The company apologised and said it would inform any customers who had been affected by the security breach. ATT said it learned of the problem on Monday and had since corrected the flaw.

The iPad, launched in April, has already sold more than two million units worldwide. Hype surrounding the device, which alongside the iPhone will form a pivotal part of the company’s international growth strategy, helped to propel Apple past Microsoft in May to become the world’s most valuable technology stock.

Its report said more than 100,000 iPad user accounts may have been compromised. Gawker reported that it obtained a list of e-mail addresses that included celebrities, politicians and chief executives.

ATT is now the sole wireless carrier for the iPad and the iPhone in the United States. ATT said the group who discovered the flaw did not inform the company, which was alerted to the problem by an unidentified business customer.

By Reuters, The Irish Times, Fri. June 11 2010

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The Wall Street Journal previously reported that the Bebo sale would probably be at a “small fraction” of what AOL originally paid. [...] AOL in April described Bebo as a business in decline and requiring significant investment which it was not in a position to provide.

Criterion Capital Partners’ managing partner Adam Levin, who led the acquisition, said today that Bebo was an attractive media site due to its “young, highly active user base, revenue history, presence in countries throughout the world and solid technical infrastructure.”

By Reuters, The Irish Times, Thu. June 17 2010

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Office conflict
Office 2010 is being made available in a variety of formats suited to different groups of people. Microsoft said it expected the Home and Student version to sell for about £109 and the Professional edition for £429. Stand-alone versions of the programs making up Office are also available. [...] The web versions of the programs inside Office are immediately available to anyone who buys the software. Microsoft said ad-supported versions of these programs will be free to use for anyone with a Windows Live ID. [...] Despite the growth of these and other alternatives, Microsoft Office is still dominant inside businesses.

Microsoft said those that have been using the trial, or beta, version of Office 2010 can continue to use it until 31 October. At that point they can uninstall it in favour of a full version of the 2010 release, download a new trial or revert to an earlier version of Office.

By BBC News, Tue. June 15 2010

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Privacy could be enhanced if data was allowed to fade, suggests research.
Dutch researcher Dr Harold van Heerde is looking into ways to gradually “degrade” the information that sites gather about visitors. Slowly swapping details for more general information can help guard against accidental disclosure, he said.
“There are so many weak points in security that you can never be sure that your data is safe,” said Dr van Heerde.

‘Data danger’
[...] The dangers of having data about us stored more or less permanently in many different places around the web have been proved many times when that information is leaked by accident or design, said Dr van Heerde.
“People make mistakes, people can be bribed,” he said. “You cannot protect this data, you cannot be sure it’s not been disclosed, privacy policies are simply too weak.” [...] At initial use to secure a transaction or get useful information from a search all relevant details might be stored. Subsequently details would slowly be swapped for more general information.
[...] As well as limiting the impact of any disclosure, such a policy might also force companies to be more explicit about what data they gather and what they will use it for. “In most cases there’s no good reason for them storing data for so long,” he said.

By Mark Ward, Technology correspondent, BBC News, Wed. June 16 2010

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The company is the second biggest internet service provider (ISP) in the State with 21 per cent of all fixed broadband connections along with a substantial mobile broadband customer base.[...] A pilot scheme to implement what Eircom also calls the “graduated response protocol” has been under way since last month and about 800 illegal file-sharers have already received a warning.[...]

In a statement issued yesterday, Vodafone said it was aware of the Eircom actions and acknowledged that illegal file-sharing represents a “serious issue for the Irish music industry”. [...]Vodafone is in negotiation with the Irish Recorded Music Association (Irma) which represents all the major record labels.[...]

Aslan sold 11,000 copies of their latest album, but nearly three times that had been downloaded illegally, he said. [...] In a statement, Vodafone said it was now looking at providing “easy availability of legal downloads of music” to counteract illegal file-sharing. [...]

In Spain, Vodafone has implemented a successful policy of charging €6 a month for 20 tracks, but the company insists it is too early to say what kind of model it would adapt here.

By RONAN McGREEVY, The Irish Tmes, Wed. June 16 2010

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Mr Donovan declined to be drawn on how collaboration between the telcos might operate and stopped short of calling for financial support from the State. He said it made no sense for telecom operators to build competing fibre infrastructures in a market where revenues total €4 billion a year and are in decline. [...] Eircom last week briefed 50 executives from 12 telecom operators about its plans. It said six of the groups expressed an interest in participating in the fibre trials.

Vodafone, Ireland’s biggest mobile operator and a large player in the fixed-line market, said: “Eircom presented an outline of their proposed trial to industry last week and asked for a consultation period with operators to look at how it could potentially work in practice. At this point, it is too early to say how we may or may not progress.”[...] The trials will offer broadband speeds of up to 150MB/sec. Eircom said this would allow for “lightning speed” broadband.

by CIARÁN HANCOCK, Business Affairs Correspondent, The Irish Times, Wed. June 16 2010

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