iPad not up to European standards - Israel doesn't allow 'em in country

found an interesting link. hope the edge is OK in europe

http://www.pcworld.com/article/19432...ml?tk=rss_news

Interesting, if hypocritical, stance. I'm no iPad-lover, but let me see if I have this straight: iPads were made with inferior American wifi specs; therefore, iPad owners can't use their PERSONAL devices outside the U.S. because using these devices would somehow infringe on the rights of non-Americans AND use of said devices somehow means that Americans are trying to force their standards on non-Americans. Had the Americans who made the iPad used European standards, using these PERSONAL devices would not be a problem because Europeans are not trying to force their standards on anyone.

And someone actually said that with a straight face and thought they were being both honest and sensible.

mikew, I think the problem with the article is that it was badly reported; it quoted comments clearly meant to give readers the impression that the people being quoted are biased--which may be the case. But the reason the devices are being confiscated apparently stems from the iPad being engineered to work with low-range radio (WiFi) frequencies, which are apparently illegal in Israel. But confiscating the devices seems silly. If low-range radio frequencies are illegal, then no one should being transmitting them, and no one with an iPad would then be able to receive them. I confess to being clueless about how WiFi actually works, but do WiFi devices transmit as well as receive radio frequencies?

I agree, the article was a lot of fluff and not much technical detail. Given the amount of devices that come with built-in wifi, I was taken back a bit.

One thing I had heard speculated (I read a different article, not the one linked above) is that the specific FM transmitter or whatever specs are used could be used as a trigger to detonate a bomb. Isreal takes its security pretty seriously, so if there were any danger of this, I could totally understand their perspective. (Plus, they may have more ground security that uses these frequencies that we're used to in other countries, so it could be a matter of interference.) The counter argument to that is that some are saying the iPhone apparently contains the same specs (which I admit, I know nothing about) and so why ban simply the iPad and not the iPhone.

Of course, depending on how nefarious of an interpretation you want to jump to, the crazier speculations have included allegations of censorship and espionage (ie hacking into your machine while it's confiscated).

Here's the latest on the Israel confiscating iPads controversy. Seems the iPad has exactly the same chipset as the iPod and iTouch, which are both sold in Israel. Bloggers in Israel think it's all about the money.

Hate to double post, but seems the iPad has also been banned from the campuses of Cornell, Princeton and George Washington universities. Duke apparently considering a ban. Their reasoning? The iPad is a bandwidth-guzzler and a "security risk."

Israel relents on the iPad. http://bit.ly/bqc0iN

Israel has now allowed the iPads. It seems the whole thing was a political plot, as the son of the president (Shimon Peres) is the owner of the apple franchise in Israel.
He must have stepped on someone toes in the past and this was payback time.
as a side note, does anyone know if we can get books in Hebrew for this device?

What a mess. There's a similar situation with WiFi USB flash drives. They're pretty common in Europe, especially Germany, and they make for a great mobile internet connection. In the US these flash drives can nowhere be found on the market....nor can the European ones be used there. Why? Yep, different standards. Its quite a shame because you know an internet connecting flash drive would be a huge seller in the US.