An iPhone Walks Into a Bar... and Meets a Glitch

Not sure why our culture focuses the relatively minor faults of the industry giants.  We seem to watch with eager anticipation as a Goliath gets a few stones thrown at it.  

With this in mind, it's hard to miss the latest news about the new iPhone 4 and its glitches.  First it was the less than stellar performance if the phone was held a certain way.  Then it was the glitch in the bars that showed the wrong levels of signal strength.  The latest and perhaps the most serious glitch hit the news feeds on Wednesday.  

It turns out that a software glitch in the Alcatel-Lucent network is limiting the uploads speed of the iPhone 4.   While AT&T has a fix in the works and the glitch affects only two percent of the customer base (according to AT&T), this glitch speaks to a larger issue about the stability of the mobile infrastructure as we become more reliant on smartphones.

Coincidentally, on the same day the latest iPhone glitch was announced, the folks over at Pew Internet Research came out with its Mobile Access 2010 Report.  The report finds that cell phone usage is up over the past year.  Specifically, 59 percent of adults are now accessing the Internet wirelessly using a laptop or cell phone -- up from 51 percent which was reported by Pew in April of 2009.

The rise in cell phone dependence and the degradation of mobile network service is a signal (no pun intended) of the potential issues we could be facing as more people are connecting to each other and to work through their mobile devices.  

Just thinking about the flurry of concerned Twitterati regarding the potential for the Fifa World Cup to deliver a load of beached fail whales is further concern that we're not entirely confident in our mobile infrastructures.

While I don't wish these types of glitches on anyone, it certainly does call into question the role of IT governance that is in place and/or being applied to the mobile network.  

Could IT governance have spotted that potential issue before it became a headline?  Perhaps.  While certainly not a cure-all, depending on the level of IT governance applied, it may have been able to raise a flag to the fact that the infrastructure performance speed may not exactly match the way it was touted in the marketing materials.

Actually, there's more to the mobile infrastructure challenge and glitches -- it's covered in chapter five of my upcoming book, "Glitch: The Hidden Impact of Faulty Software."  

Nevertheless, I still eagerly anticipate the arrival of my iPhone 4 that's currently on order.