iPhone's iAds Versus Common Sense (and Decency)

Last week, I posted iPhone OS 4: Why It's Time to Choose a Different Phone. In it, I described the new banner advertisement system in the iPhone 4.0 software and how I thought it posed a threat to the iPhone's clean user experience. In particular, I suggested it might lead to a flood of apps -- both free and paid -- reducing the screen space dedicated to useful content. In a nutshell, I concluded: "Apple has found a way to turn their mighty iPhone into a ghetto of banner ads and reduced usability."

What I was unprepared for was the barrage of rude and childish mail I would get in return.

First of all, don't get me wrong. I love reader comments. Blogging allows for an immediacy and direct connection with readers that was absolutely impossible when I started writing on dead trees 20 years ago. Please don't mistake this post for ungratefulness, either. Without you, the readers, there is no Business Hacks. There is no BNET. And there is no Dave Johnson, writer. We can't function in a vacuum, and I genuinely appreciate every reader who reads what I've written, no matter where I've written it.

My issue is with the overall tone of many of the letters in response to this post.

I won't bother to critique the comments -- you can read those for yourself.

But I will say that many of the comments seem to have been written without actually taking the time to internalize my post, nor did many of the readers who replied ensure their logic was internally consistent with the point I was making.

Actually disturbing, though, were the messages that readers sent directly to my personal e-mail. I got the better part of a dozen e-mails, and almost all of them were filled with obscenities. Two of them wished me actual physical harm. Really, folks? Hoping I'd get hit by a bus, and an e-mail that used the "f word" no fewer than five times... because I was somewhat critical of... a telephone?

Here's the deal, folks. We all love technology 'round these parts. That's why we write about it, that's why we read about it. But at the end of the day, it's all just tools, toys, and gadgets. It's stuff that helps us get the job done more productively. Is there any phone on the planet so important that a critical editorial should generate hate mail filled with venomous personal attacks?

It seems to me that we should be civil and respectful to each other here. We should be citizens, neighbors, and friends first and foremost. And then be technology partisans -- Mac people, Windows people, Linux people -- second. Or perhaps even third. There's enough stuff out there in the world to get our blood pressure elevated -- religion, politics, the War on Terror -- that something like what one thinks about the iPhone should not cause anyone to revert to some feral, immature beast.

I don't want to be all preachy. After all, I wrote that post the way I did to try to get a rise out of some folks. Absolutely, I admit it, and I'm not ashamed of it, since I still think my point is accurate. But did I expect people to react like I'd nailed their iPhone to a cross and submerged it in a jar of urine? No. This isn't a blog for teenagers. This is a blog for mature business professionals.

Any thoughts, folks? Am I expecting too much? Am I being too sensitive? Or is it possible set our sights on a higher level of discourse?