Apple says Steve Jobs' email replies on iPhone 4 reception were faked - Page 4

I understand what you're saying, and claiming an 'on the record' reply from Apple without ID-ing the source was an odd move from Fortune. That it was confirmed as from Apple's Dowling by another media outlet entirely is also odd. Why wouldn't Fortune do so?

Your point about there being no general release, just the Fortune piece, also seems strange. You want to deny some "fake emails from SJ" but you only want it available to Fortune readers?

More to come I suspect.

Apple could but they didn't. As you point out with some glee, the Apple PR spokesperson has been named, though interestingly by a different media outlet. So Fortune's behavior here is in part why Apple's denial seems dodgy.

I'll admit my posts are full of BS when you admit yours are the mindless rants of a total Apple suck-up.

Seems like a fair trade.

And since Apple have confirmed the denial, I unreservedly offer my apologies to all on this forum.

The Fortune report is not the BS I believed it to be.

Chopper.

Emails are simple text files. There's nothing that can't be forensically faked. The only question is the quality of the faking.

All the gent who claims he had Steve's email would need to have exceptionally convincing fakes is a couple emails from a friend someplace in the South Bay Area. That would be enough to stump any forensic examination that doesn't also have access to Steve's actual phone and a GPS history of where it was at the exact times the disputed emails were sent.

If you want to expend the full effort of the FBI including subpoena powers you can get a little better than that because then ALL private enroute routing points can be examined as well making sure there was no tampering in the header. But no subpoena, no way that happens.

Without Steve's phone and without subpoena's there just isn't anything else interesting to learn about the headers unless he were so ham-fistedly badly cac'ed up that it is obvious at first glance they are forged.

Well there is at least one other question:

Just because something can be faked, does that necessarily mean it is fake?



Precisely why it remains plausible that the Apple spokesperson "mispoke". They know there's no way for BGR to prove anything.

One less rumor site on the web without even having to send a cease-and-desist....

The entire Steve Jobs email story Its real
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/...tory-its-real/

Oh, give us a break. BGR reiterates he gooned attribution on the most controversial message of the sequence -- the one that's most quoted and got the whole blogosphere in a tizzy -- and then goes on to say they are real. BGR saying they are the real deal doesn't make them real emails with Steve Jobs. They are just real emails BGR didn't create that are purportedly from Steve Jobs.

I remember in high school we used to have a saying just for this purpose: "If you don't believe me, just ask me!"

Are you referring to Dowling?

It would be interesting to hear AppleInsiders response to BGR's criticism.

BGR quote- "Someone who has now had his name revealed to the public via a tasteless article from AppleInsider, and is now being called by reporters non-stop asking about this article and whether his exchange is true or not?"
~ http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/...enna-problems/


AppleInsider, your thoughts?

Was AI really the first to report his name? How did they find his name?

Anyway, I am curious to see how AI rebuttals, if they do.

Good questions. I've no idea, but it strikes me as a news site about Apple that they have every right to say who he was. That's the risk the guy took for his $200 and besides the guy had contacted AppleInsider about publishing the e-mails, so I guess that answers one of your questions now I think about it.

Once again, Fortune asked - which is the most likely reason Fortune got a response. Apple apparently didn't think it was important enough for a full-blown press release. What part of that don't you get?

As for not listing Dowling's name, who cares? Articles get trimmed for space reasons all the time.


The funny thing is that bgr is posting some headers on their web page and pretending that this somehow proves that they're real.


Obviously not. But when an official spokesperson for Apple states on the record that they're not real, the most likely scenario is that they're fake.


Exactly. You will also note that they haven't had them examined by an outside expert.

Well it's only on about two dozen PR releases on the Apple site. With his company email and phone number. Ya know, it's his job to talk to people, that's why the official contact info for all the Apple PR reps are openly published.

I don't know how AI or anyone else got confirmation it was Dowling and not another of the PR reps, but publishing the name and official contact info is hardly irregular.

No. For Dowling to lie it would be a misstating of a material fact which could affect the stock price negatively. That would put both him and Apple at risk in court. Not likely that would be a chosen course of action.

BGR has nothing in the fight except the longer he can keep it going, the more hits and ad revenue he gets. And when the emails are finally accepted as fakes he has full deniability as long as he didn't create them or cause them to be created. He has nothing to lose and quite a bit to gain by pushing the controversy out as long as possible.

Given those two outlines above, I am more than willing to lay odds on the emails actually being fake.

The guy who provided the emails was identified in the headers of the emails. Old news, and was part of the original story.

The gent folks are getting riled up about is the Apple PR rep. But it's his job and his official contact info is publicly available on Apple's site so... Big whoop!

From BGR:

Lets go over it one more time someone who wanted to remain 100% anonymous and only asked to be paid a nominal fee of a couple hundred dollars lied and completely made up this entire thing? Someone who showed me in his AT&T call records more than two calls from Apple representatives (Texas phone numbers, confirmed to be Apple Customer Relations) on the exact dates he said they called trying to resolve the situation after he had emailed Steve Jobs? Someone who repeatedly emailed me and the BGR staff to correct the last line in my story since it wasnt accurate? Someone who has now had his name revealed to the public via a tasteless article from AppleInsider, and is now being called by reporters non-stop asking about this article and whether his exchange is true or not? They still wouldnt admit this was fake? No, you know why? Because it wasnt fake. I'd think BGR is referring to AI outing Jason Burford at jj@burfordadvertising.com

OK, could be. But in the original story BGR offered to show the world the email headers as proof, then he posted them within 24 hours. Despite what BGR said, BGR offered Burford up from the get-go, because there was no way to offer the headers without offering the whole header, including both the addressees. And Burford was the generator of the story that shopped it in the first place. Literally, Burford sold his anonymity when he sold the story, and access to the emails, to BGR.

So yes, I reject the entire wanting to remain anonymous aspect. Especially so as Burford shopped the story around before he found BGR who would pay for it. Once Burford made the offer in the open market, he irrevocably made himself part of the story, quite explicitly. Nothing slimy about reporting that once BGR published the sold story.

And I really am having a hard time believing that last email's reattribution as being from Burford rather than (fake) Jobs.

It completely reads wrong, the (fake) Jobs was never worked up and Burford was awfully agro in most of them. The ONLY way it makes sense and is at all believable is if the original story where (fake) Jobs wrote that was to be the true one. I really think Burford/BGR lost their nerve when Forbes carried the "not from Apple" report, and that really hot-button email was going to get them fried. Now they are just trying to stay above water in the blogosphere by claiming "truth" until people lose interest, and hope that Apple lawyers leave them alone because they removed the worst attribution themselves.

I agree.


I don't recall any of the reported emailed reading that way. Even if Jobs did write, "Retire, relax, enjoy your family." I can't imagine him writing "It is just a phone. Not worth it."

The quoted email I posted is straight off BGR's site. It's still there. Originally the quote was attributed to (fake) Jobs. Then after the Apple denial BGR claimed he misunderstood and re-attributed it to Burford (Tom in his pre-header posting terminology). But that reading just doesn't make sense.

Go have a lookhttp://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/...enna-problems/ as much as I loathe giving a blogger like BGR more hits. Look at his "update notes", when you really think about it starts looking like an unravelling hoax.

Nope, it looks like you're in serious denial, though. I'm half expecting there to be some weasel words emanating from Apple soon claiming that "we didn't say all of it was faked" or some such if all the records get looked at more closely and they're found to be real. That would cast quite a bit of doubt on any denial from Apple if it happened.

More likely though will be the news that although the emails came from SJ's email account, there would be a denial that SJ actually sent them, giving Dowling some wriggle room with his attributed "fake" claim.

As I said earlier, there's more to come I think. But it's just a sideshow. I'll wait for AI's next news page posting about this topic rather than repeating myself ad infinitum in this thread.

No. See, there's no evidence a crime took place here. Maybe fraud, by someone? Who knows.

From AI on July 1:

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles..._for_sale.html

Okay, so the guy contacted them with his info. He forfeits any anonymity the moment he does that.

Duly noted by those who might otherwise email tips and stories to Apple Insider.

That's quite brilliant, actually. Much better than his articles for AppleInsider.