> after putting it in my back pocket and sitting down on it
> the bending issue is very real
I'd suggest that the issue is that you're a guy who thinks sitting on $1,000 of glass and aluminium is a normal thing to do.
> the bending issue is very real
I'd suggest that the issue is that you're a guy who thinks sitting on $1,000 of glass and aluminium is a normal thing to do.
The phone is the outlier, not the use case.
[0] This also depends on the seat. My couch at home is very cushy, it'd be hard to break it there. But my kitchen table chair is little more than a slat of wood cut to a comfortable shape.
My ex-wife always sat with her 3 in her back jeans pocket because fashion designers refuse to put sensible front pockets on women's jeans. The 3's case began to crack at the top around the power button after a while. And this is a girl sitting on her phone - not some 200lbs guy.
And I certainly wouldn't sit on my nexus 5 or the SGS4 that it replaced.
It has a glass screen, that alone should make it obvious that you shouldn't sit on it.
So once people may have fixed certain expectations about the durability of an iPhone. But those will have to be revised with the new models.
Granted, I don't this should be as big of an issue as some people are making it out to be, but I think the discussion should go beyond chastising owners for putting their phones in the wrong pocket. That's not much better than saying "you're holding it wrong."
If the back pocket is "not supported", that's fine, but when support is pulled on anything that people use, (however obscure or unwise its use may be), there's going to be friction.
When consumers expressed a clear preference for big, thin phones that offer a lot of mechanical advantage to their round butts when sitting on them.
it's something I care about
But not enough to buy a smaller, more durable phone? One with a thick, rubber or plastic exterior case? No? I didn't think so.
That's not much better than saying "you're holding it wrong."
Maybe people should take personal responsibility for breaking their belongings?
I only just recently upgraded from an old feature phone to a Moto G. One of the major reasons I selected it was its relative cost versus other phones, and thus less worrying on my part about it (also, it was the cheapest phone Republic Wireless was offering). While that's not specifically buying based on durability, it's the same idea of being concerned about how much money you've sunk versus how easily it will break.
Even still, I don't go sitting on it (or, if I discover I'm sitting on it, I immediately cease the sitting action). I'm not arguing Apple should refund these people for their bent phones or anything, and I agree that people should take personal responsibility for their actions. I'm just fine with the potential lack of durability being discussed, which is the issue stevewepay originally mentioned.
EDIT: Upon further thinking, I agree that my comparison to "you're holding it wrong" is somewhat mistaken. While the grip one uses on a phone doesn't have any common-sense effects, putting a phone in your back pocket and sitting on it should have clear potential consequences, even if phones of the past typically had the durability to withstand it.
I think it's reasonable to ask for phones that are water proof and shock proof. That is, a phone should be able to handle a dunk in the swimming pool, and should certainly be able to handle being dropped on a sidewalk. Both of those are every day events that happen to everyone. Until phones get to the point at which they can routinely handle both (neither of which any iPhone has ever been able to do), they come up lacking.
In addition, a phone should certainly not deform that much if it sits in a reasonable pocket.
On the flip side - I'm not expecting my phone to handle 200 pounds of force by me sitting on it on a hard surface repeatedly, particularly if there is hard edge/corner involved (which greatly increases the PSI the device has to handle). I also absolutely do not expect a phone to not deform if someone tries to bend it. People can bend freaking rebar, and I'm not expecting a phone to be structurally stronger than rebar.
That isn't to say you shouldn't be proud of your device if it can handle that amount of stress - I think it's definitely an advantage, it just isn't what I would consider the "minimum bar of performance for a smartphone."
The rear pocket in women's jeans might be able to accept an iPhone 6, but only if the woman's rear isn't present at the same time.
It's interesting that "cargo" pockets, located on the side of the pants at mid-hip height, are popular right now, because that's a much better and safer place for a phone than the back pockets.
This is where the marketing concept of "life-proof" comes from. Shit happens. Day-to-day consumer devices are going to get bumped, dropped, damp, sat on, etc. If the iPhone can't handle those things, the answer isn't "Be more careful you idiots", the answer is people will (presumably) stop buying them.
In FantasyLand, engineers could create phones with 8 inch displays that were still somehow useable with one hand, and you could run over them with your car ("life-proof" - oopsies!) and they'd be ok. In the meantime, put your money where your mouth is and buy a smaller, more durable phone like an iPhone 5.
"life-proof" is kind of a silly term, I agree. But as much as you might want to mock people who do not baby their smartphone like a delicate glass flower, they are most of the market.
I've never sat on my smartphones before, whether they were large or small. And I've always kept my smartphones in my pocket.