IPhone 4 home button: planned obsolescence, or just poor design.

Thanks for all your comments and replies.

On the whole I like the IOS product range.

Whilst I doubt that what I suggested in my OP is true, as a developer myself, I know how easy it would be to hide a "feature" like that, and in a closed source system, any number of things can exist for the sole purpose of encouraging product sales. For example, when apple added tethering to IOS, they did not enable it for 3G equipped iPads. Why not? It has a sim, it has a data connection, why not let you share it with an iPod touch for example? Reason: to make you buy an iPhone. So somewhere in the IPad IOS code, there is a test that excludes that feature. It could equally be to allow carriers to offer iPad data plans at a discounted rate, but for whatever reason, it really is annoying at times.

I had an iphone for long while but then newer phones came out and switch to an android, now I look back at my old iphone, and in hindsight I say…it was great being one the first cool smartphone, but now it’s so overrated.
Every time a new version comes out people just line up outside the stores, no reviews, nobody knows if there was a design flaw like with the previous version’s antenna…nope they just line up at stores like mindless zombies to get a new iphone, because it’s an iphone, and it actually funny cause I can just do more with my android, but don’t tell an iphone lover this they get mad….lol

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
Listen.

Apple is the KING of making substandard product and making hipsters pay through the nose for it.

Take the Iphone 4S for example, it has a wonderful Dual Core 1GHZ processor..

But it's UNDERCLOCKED at 600MHZ!

Why?

To make the battery last longer. Nearly all the main smartphones do it - it's hardly a secret.