So, you didn’t make it to your aunt’s New Year’s Day brunch on time. Blame Apple. iPhone users who set their smartphone’s alarm for a single wake-up discovered that the alarm didn’t go off with the year’s arrival. A glitch in the device’s alarm clock feature failed to make the phones go off, causing many to oversleep.
Apple spokesperson Natalie Harrison confirmed to Macworld that Apple is aware of the problem. "We're aware of an issue related to non repeating alarms set for Jan. 1 or 2," Harrison said. "Customers can set recurring alarms for those dates and all alarms will work properly beginning Jan. 3."
That didn’t prevent iPhone enthusiasts from taking their complaints – and jokes – to Twitter. Tweeted comedian Andy Borowitz: “Steve Jobs was set to hold a press conference on iPhone alarm glitch, but he overslept.”
This isn’t the first time the iPhone’s alarm function has disappointed users. In November, hundreds of British iPhone owners were late for work after a software bug caused the alarm on the Apple device to fail to adjust when the country’s clocks changed.
Although there was no immediate response from Apple, the company promised last month that a software patch was in development when iPhone users from Australia and New Zealand encountered similar problems. Their alarms actually went off an hour early as the country switched to daylight saving time.
And in June, a small number of customers found a bug in the device that caused their phones to lose signal strength when customers held the phone in their left hands. Apple’s recommendation that users simply hold the phone a different way, or should purchase a special iPhone case that essentially places a ‘bumper’ around the edge of the phone, prompted a maelstrom of controversy.
Edited by
Tammy Wolf
