Anal Retentive Brits Force Apple to Pull TV Ad

The U.K. has given Apple's iPhone the smackdown, forcing the company to pull an advertisement that claimed the iPhone offered "all parts of the internet." The Advertising Standards Agency (ASA), an advertising oversight board in the U.K., says that because the iPhone can't show Flash or Java-based applications, the ad is misleading.

The complaints originated with two anonymous Brits (or perhaps one with access to an IP masking tool) who were upset they couldn't get Flash on the iPhone. After reviewing the complaint, the ASA upheld it, forcing Apple to pull the ad.

We considered that, because the ad had not explained the limitations, viewers were likely to expect to be able to see all the content on a website normally accessible through a PC rather than just having the ability to reach the website. We concluded that the ad gave a misleading impression of the internet capabilities of the iPhone.

Apple, for its part, argues that both Flash and Java are proprietary technologies and that iPhone does in fact deliver all of the free, standard, open web.

As much as I've come to loath Apple's ultra-closed approach to the iPhone, I have to agree with the company on this one. The absence of Flash and Java is hardly crippling, in fact I've come to see it as a feature.

And as our friends at Gadget lab point out, that's not all that's missing from the iPhone:

Besides, the picky twins left something out. What about Usenet? That's not available on the iPhone (at least, not officially), yet it is clearly part of the internet. Maybe these pedants meant the Web, not the internet. I suggest we file a complaint about the accuracy of their claims.

Photo: Jeffery Simpson via Flickr

See Also:

• Six Reasons iPhone Delivers Where Android Won't
• iPhone Coders Muzzled, Miffed by Apple's NDA
• Fruitful Developer Camp Proves iPhone's Web Prowess