SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs was thwarted Monday in his attempt to show off how clearly the newest iPhone displays Web pages, apparently because too many people were clogging the airwaves at the conference where he was on stage.
Jobs tried three times during his keynote to do a side-by-side comparison of the iPhone 4's screen resolution versus its predecessor's. He was trying to call up The New York Times' Web page, but it wouldn't load because too many devices in the room were operating over Wi-Fi, swamping the frequency.
Jobs switched to backup phones for the demonstration, but he was still stymied.
"Well jeez, I don't like this," Jobs groused. He abandoned the demo while staffers investigated.
Technological glitches at technology conferences are common, but less so at Apple's carefully choreographed events. Last month at a demonstration of Google Inc.'s Internet television technology, Google representatives had trouble showing how easy it was supposed to be to switch back and forth between browsing Web content and TV programming.
Google pleaded with attendees to shut off their wireless connections, as did Jobs on Monday. He asked bloggers and other people in the room to turn off their wireless connections and put their computers on the floor.
"I think bloggers have a right to blog, but if we want to see the demos we're going to have to do it," he said.
The demos immediately after that went smoothly. But a later demo of a video-calling feature that requires a wireless Internet connection was sluggish at times.
Next iPhone has clearer screen, coming out June 24
The next iPhone comes out June 24 and will have a higher-resolution screen, longer battery life and thinner design.CEO Steve Jobs opened Apple Inc.'s annual conference for software developers Monday by revealing the iPhone 4, which will cost $199 or $299 in the U.S. with a two-year AT&T contract, depending on the capacity. The iPhone 3GS, which debuted last year, will still be available, for $99.
The iPhone 4 is about three-eighths of an inch thick; the previous iPhone was nearly half an inch. It is getting a camera on the front that could be used for videoconferencing, in addition to a five-megapixel camera and a flash on the back. It can shoot high-definition video, catching up to some other smart phones.
The display on the new iPhone remains 3.5 inches diagonally, but Jobs said it can show four times as many pixels — the individual colored dots that make up an image — as the previous screen.
The new phone will run the latest version of Apple's mobile software, now called iOS4, which Apple unveiled in April to offer such new features as the ability to operate more than one program at a time. Older iPhones will be able to get iOS4 as a download June 21.
New applications for the device will include the popular game Farmville and one from Netflix that lets people watch streaming video where they left off on a PC.
-- AP writer Rachel Metz contributed to this report.
