Man, I love me some legalese.  No one will probably care, but this is not a great look for Apple.

Apple: Our Ads Don’t Lie, But You’re a Fool if You Believe Them

By Brian X. Chen December 02, 2008 | 3:25:46 PMCategories: Apple, iPhone

Apple doesn’t want you to believe what it says, even though the company claims it’s not lying.

That’s the gist of the Cupertino company’s legal response to a lawsuit regarding allegedly misleading advertising for the iPhone 3G.

The corporation’s nine-page legal document [.pdf] is an answer to a complaint filed by William Gillis, a 70-year-old San Diego resident who alleges that Apple falsely advertised the iPhone 3G by calling it “twice as fast for half the price” compared with the original handset.

Some parts of Apple’s 32-point rebuttal say that the company was being truthful. But one paragraph says, in effect, that anyone who believes what the company says in its ads is a fool.

“Plaintiff’s claims, and those of the purported class, are barred by the fact that the alleged deceptive statements were such that no reasonable person in Plaintiff’s position could have reasonably relied on or misunderstood Apple’s statements as claims of fact,” Apple said in its answer.

Gillis was one of several dissatisfied iPhone 3G customers who recently filed lawsuits alleging Apple falsely advertised the handset’s performance. The lawsuits stem from widespread frustration over the popular smartphone; the complaints vary from frequently dropped calls to sluggish broadband speeds and the inability to stay on 3G before it switches to the slower EDGE network.

Apple has already moved to dismiss some of the iPhone 3G lawsuits filed, but Gillis’s remains alive and kicking. Michael Ian Rott, Gillis’s attorney, said that out of the five iPhone 3G lawsuits filed, he thinks his client’s is the most likely to succeed.

“Ours has the most teeth and the most legs to it,” Rott said. “If there was any way that Apple could get out of it, they would have filed a motion to dismiss here, too. Their M.O. has been, ‘File motion to dismiss and let’s get out of here,’ but they haven’t done that with ours.”

In the past, Apple acknowledged the iPhone 3G’s network issues and promised the problems would be addressed with future software updates. Consumers are reporting that the most recent firmware version — iPhone 2.2 — appears to be mitigating the issue of frequent dropped calls. However, many still complain about reception problems.

“I keep waiting and hoping for a fix,” wrote iPhone customer “BarJohnG,” in Apple’s support forums. “So far the reception is still lousy. I can’t believe that Apple is not fixing this issue but merely trying to mask it and keep the customer confused by showing more bars than there is signal. When you look at the logs it is shocking the number of crashes and problems with the phone and OS.”

Though Apple is continuing to hold its ground in U.S. courts, the corporation hasn’t been so lucky in the U.K. The U.K. Advertising Standards Authority banned two iPhone 3G advertisements, deeming them misleading for exaggerating the speeds and internet capabilities of the handset.

You can read the full rebuttal here.  I believe it’s point 16.  My bet is either Apple will come back to clear up the statement, or no one will care.  Either way, it’s out there for good at this point.

[via Wired]

Well, over the last month or 2, I’ve finally (after 4 years) started working on my car.

i paid it off in August, and I had the 60k mile service done right before that.  Extended warranty to 65k is now gone. I had em fix everything possible I could thinkof covered under warranty while I was in there, and I also had them quote me the price a new 2/3 back seat.  Well, I passed on the seat, and fixed it myself, mostly.  They couldn’t figure how to unstick the belt.  I did it in 10 min after thinking about it for the first itme in 2 years (center seat belt was stuck, and had been since I took the seats out to do the speaker install).

Well, abotu a month ago, right before I fixed the back seat, I had a new clutch put in.  Mine was completely burnt.  I mean completely.  It was horrid.  I’ve never seen a clutch so black.  I replaced it with a R 6 clutch and pressure plate, and a 13.5 lb flywheel (yay! no more dual mass).  Right after that, I finally got ythe ECU chipped.

Next steps will probably be a 3″ downpipe (w/ cat, because I’m all tree hugging and shit), suspension, cat back (again, 3″), and also hoses, manual boot control (either a boost machine or a modshack mofo).  Last I will probably do a FMIC (unless I can find a good price on a SMIC - keeping it stealth) and an h2o/meth injection system.

Well, that’s the past and the future.  Right now, thoguh, I need to pull the starter and give it a refresh.  It’s sticking on start and sounds like ass.  Found a good DIY for getting it out and clening/lubing it up, so I will probably do that over Thankgiving.  Heck, I might even start on it Weds, and just get my mom or someone to pick me up on the way to my Aunt’s place.

Edited some code.  It was working preivously, but I am trying to fix it for the current implmentaion of the myspace API.  Let’s cross our fingers.

[Well, I had the video embedded, but it's been disabled on the site.  Click the link to see it.]

You Don’t Know Me (feat Regina Spektor) dir. by Tim and Eric

So I finally picked up the real version of Ben Fold’s latest album Way to Normal this last week.  It’s an interesting ride throught he pop music genre.  I ‘ve been enjoying it thoroughly so far.  It’s a lot more light hearted in feeling (if not lyrically) that Songs for Silverman was, and is an interesting departure from Rockin’ The Suburbs, which I thought felt like another Ben Folds Five album.

Ah ha!  Here’s another video from the new album.  So far, these videos are pretty damn awesome.  Hopefully this one will stay working.

Well, at least something was really exciting this last weekend in El Paso.

[via damonhimself]

The belly bump camera wipe near the beginning had me on the floor laughing. This is too good. Someone call em up and book em for a party in Austin.

People, please do not blindly trust a tattoo artst to write something in any language.  Verify, double check, call it to commitee, do whatever you can to ensure that iit is exactly what you want.  Meaning, spelling, etc.  I have latin tattoo’d on my body, and I spent days checking and double checking that it was correct prior to having it drawn up.  I know some really smart tattoo artists, but when it comes to foreign languages that you don’t speak fluently, check your work.

Tattoo horror story…can I sue?

Los Angeles (CA). Viewed 3038 times. Posted 7 days ago in Contracts / Agreements. Flag this as objectionable

I went to a tattoo studio and asked for Chinese characters that say “courage, strength and unity”; the tattoo artist assured me he was a native speaker and would translate the sentence accurately.

I thought the tattoo looked great, but when I showed it to my Chinese friend he said it meant “he who loves men”. There’s also a character that’s not even a Chinese character at all, but resembles a dancing phallus.

I got really upset, to say the least, and several other people have confirmed the meaning…

What am I supposed to do now? Can I sue the artist? The shop? My girlfriend if she was in on it (she referred me to the artist, and I think she may be cheating on me with him)?

Go here to see the original with some of the answers.  I am still amazed that people get characters from other languages that have such dubious translations, or multiple translations, depending on region.  It blows the mind, it does.

[via woot]

From Woot’s regular Woot Weads The Wire column:

CUPERTINO, Calif. (AP)—Firefighters have put out a blaze that burned for more than three hours at the headquarters of computer maker Apple.

Apple spokespersons said that the fire was a normal event and that their groundbreaking management techniques were simply designed to run hot. Firefighters were not allowed to open the doors themselves and were instead instructed to make an appointment at the Genius Bar.

[via woot]

This is horrible if it is real.  I am skeptical as to if this happened during the actual ceremonies…maybe a rehearsal.  I didn’t see the opening, though.

Windows BSoD takes the Gold at the Beijing Olympics

August 11th | Posted by Dr. Macenstein

Faithful Macenstein reader Adam Davie sent us these shots he found on the River Cool forums showing that once again, Windows’ Blue Screen of Death has crashed another event, this time the Opening Ceremony of Beijing 2008 Olympics Games.

Above: hmm… maybe no one will notice…

Perhaps this is simply Microsoft’s idea of “product placement”, as the BSOD is one of the more recognizable features of Windows, and perhaps transcends all language barriers.

[via Macenstein]

I still think this idea has a lot of merit. I think the concept looks pretty cool, but might be a little too free flowing. Either way, the concept looks impressive, and I am down to give it a shot if it ever sees the light of day.

Aurora (Part 3) from Adaptive Path on Vimeo.

Aurora (Part 4) from Adaptive Path on Vimeo.