Kevin Turner, Microsoft’s Chief Operating Officer, suggested at Microsoft’s Worldwide Partner Conference that the iPhone 4 could become Apple’s Vista.
That’s a pretty cruel jibe coming from Microsoft, given that Vista was so bad even Microsoft’s own executives struggled with the product and while the iPhone may have problems, they certainly aren’t of the scale faced by Vista users.
Despite Vista’s flaws, Microsoft’s biggest blunder was pretending there was no problem. For months Microsoft maintained the fiction there was nothing wrong with Vista while customer complaints mounted.
This is the risk that Apple are now running. Every day they remain silent on the iPhone’s signal problems makes the resolution more damaging and expensive. Some analysts are claiming each week of delay by Apple could cost them $200 million in lost sales.
Apple need to show they are listening to upset customers and get a fix out now, the simplest and quickest resolution is to admit there can be problems with the antenna and give away free perimeter bumpers, according to Infoworld’s Robert X. Cringely this would cost around $45 million.
The real damage is being seen as not listening. In today’s economy, not listening to your customers and critics is probably the most damaging thing any business can do.
Last week’s 