If Phones Were Cars

Here’s an imaginary situation to ponder:

Imagine that some car company, let’s say Ford announces a new car. It’s a newly designed low cost sports car for the general public. It has numerous innovative designs but Ford is keen to publicise the new low profile tyre and wheel design designed to improve fuel efficiency. The car receives a generally good reception from the industry and before its release, Ford sends review models to the major Car magazines and Newspapers. The car gets a glowing report and reviewers consider it one of the best cars they’ve ever driven.

When the car goes on general release however a popular car enthusiast blog, lets for the sake of argument call them Carzomo, receives a you tube video from a reader showing that if you drive over nails the tyre bursts. Upon seeing this, other readers of the blog who have also just bought the car decide to try it for themselves, and sure enough, if you drive the car over some nails the tyres burst. Carzomo declares that this is a design flaw with the new sports car’s low profile tyre design and the story is quickly picked up by other blogs and media outlets. A newspaper contacts Ford for a comment and they respond that all cars run the risk of having their tyres burst if you drive over nails, and that customers should avoid driving over nails.

Across the web blogs explode with the story that Ford has admitted that their new car has a design flaw where the car’s tyres can burst if you drive over nails. Various experts chime in to explain how the low profile tyre design with its inflated rubber tyres will in fact rupture when pierced with a sharp object. Ford customer service reportedly tells a customer who burst their tyre after driving over a nail that they should try to avoid driving over nails or else if they really need to drive over sharp objects then they should consider carrying a spare tyre. Carzomo posts this story and expresses outrage that Ford are telling people they should carry a spare tyre in case this issue happens to them.

Meanwhile several other bloggers report that if they drive over nails in their older Fords or even their Hondas their tyres also burst. Numerous blogs dismiss these reports as the rantings of Ford fanboys. At the same time the highly influential “Popular Car Magazine” reviews the new ford and finds that out on the road, despite driving for several hundred miles they didn’t once have a burst tyre. They rate the car highly. Other magazines also report that while driving out on the road they could not manage to burst their tyres, however by sprinkling their driveways with nails and driving over them they were able to replicate the issue. Ford continue to insist that all cars can suffer burst tyres if their drivers deliberately drive over nails and suggest avoiding that action.

Popular Car Magazine decides to re-test the new Ford due to the controversy surrounding the tyre bursting issue. Despite not being able to burst the tyres out on the road, they set up a controlled environment where they covered their test track in various types of nails and drove the car over it, finding out that the car does in fact loose tyre inflation when driven over sharp objects. They still give the car the highest rating for a vehicle in its class but advise customers not to buy it because the tyres can deflate when driven over sharp objects. This shock retraction leads to widespread calls for the car to be recalled.

The car continues to sell extremely well, and executives from Ford remain silent, baffled as to how to possibly respond to the situation.

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