MacBlogz - One Stop Apple News - Bridging the Apple Community and Keeping Tabs on the Rumor Mill.

[Feature] SMS Popup Messages Lead to Ruined Birthday Party; Angry Boss and Pissed Off Girlfriend

This past weekend, we had the privilege of hearing one of the most hilariously unfortunate iPhone stories we’ve ever heard. I know what you’re thinking, some sort of hardware issue, bad reception or an iPhone 3G problem, but no. Far worse, this story revolves around the tiny little SMS bubble that pops up when you get a new message.

When you receive an SMS message from somebody on your iPhone, in most cases, a preview of that message will pop up to the front of the screen.

If you go into Settings > General > Passcode Lock, you have the option to turn those SMS previews off. But then they’re always off. What if you want to use them sometimes, but you don’t want them to show up when you’re using certain applications? As an iPhone owner, I’d like the ability to do this.

The following happened to our friend (we’ll just call him) “Derek” this past weekend, nearly ruining his life.


1. Ruined Surprise: Thursday, August 7, 2008

Derek was driving with a couple of friends to a surprise get-together. The person who’s surprise birthday party it was, was sitting in the front seat of his car. Derek was the person in charge of keeping this a secret, and his friend, who’s in the car, knows nothing about this surprise birthday party.

On the way to the event, Derek and the rest of the people in his car, somehow lost the directions and wound up in an unfamiliar area. Naturally, everyone in the car turned to Derek and said “Doesn’t your iPhone have GPS?” so he pulled it out of his pocket and handed it to the person in the front seat.

Now this person opened up the Maps application and started plugging away to get directions to the “Address” that she’d been given, (She doesn’t know what’s going on there, because she is the one who’s birthday it is), but she finds their current location and pinpoints the destination, and starts properly navigating. Now I know what you may be thinking as you’re reading this…”Why would Derek give this person the phone? You’ve got other people in the car, let them do it!” Well, in moments of chaos, such as this, people don’t always think clearly. Handing the iPhone to the person in the front seat (who you trust with using the Maps application), is a natural reaction. Trying to remember that the oh-so annoying SMS screen may popup while he’s staring at the Maps application is another.

Of course, I can assume you know where this is going. Derek’s iPhone got an SMS message saying precisely the following, “What Time is Kat’s Surprise Birthday Party Stuff Going on Tonight?” while the device was in Kat’s hands because she was navigating with the iPhone GPS and Google Maps.

Surprise Party Ruined. Kat finds out. Only 10 minutes before the party.


2. Laura Gets Derek on His Boss’ Shit-List: Friday, August 8, 2008

A little disappointed from the night before, but hey, it’s Friday! Derek gets up and goes to work.

As he plugs away at his computer, checking things off one-by-one, he feels great. Lunch time rolls around and he cleans out his desk and steps out to get some Subway, (What, it’s the healthy option! $5 footlongs people!). When he gets back from work there’s a more relaxed atmosphere in the office, as so happens on Friday afternoons. As 6pm rolls around, he finishes up his work and shuts down his computer.

As his boss walks over to Derek’s desk, he asks him one final question before he leaves for the weekend “Hey Derek, can you show me the email that Jerry sent over about an hour ago? I haven’t gotten a chance to look at the numbers before I head out. You got it up?” Knowing that the email is the third one down from the top of his inbox, Derek whipped out his shiny iPhone and hit the Mail Application, navigated to the email and handed his boss the iPhone.

At the moment Derek was telling us this story, we knew exactly what was going to happen…again. Derek explained to us that “the second he handed his boss the iPhone, a sickening feeling entered his stomach and he thought to himself ‘No Way Can Anything Like This Happen Again.”

Precisely 10 seconds after his boss took the iPhone from his hands, Derek’s girlfriend sends him what she thought was a really sweet message, “Thank God today is over. Can’t wait to see you at home. I’m so glad you don’t have to see your piece of shit boss for Two Whole Days!!!”

Uh Oh.

Derek heard the iPhone SMS beep right as he handed his boss the phone. He looked at his boss’ eyes, and could sense the anger. His boss handed him the iPhone and walked away.

Weekend Ruined. Possible Job Lost.


3. Laura Sees Amanda’s Text From The Night Before: Friday Evening, August 8, 2008

At this point, allow us to clarify… Derek has officially turned ON the passcode and turned OFF SMS previews. He is now living with this annoying passcode screen interfering with his text messages.

When Derek got home, he was still rather shocked from what has just happened. He walked in and met Laura (his girlfriend) and didn’t know how to explain. After trying to wind down for a few minutes, Derek showed Laura his iPhone’s SMS screen, of the text that she sent him about his boss, that could’ve potentially gotten him fired, (we still don’t know). While she was looking at his screen, she noticed the text from Derek’s ex-girlfriend Amanda, who texted Derek “It was fun seeing you at Kat’s Birthday Party Last Night! Will I see you again soon?”

At this point, like most of you would, we were so shocked, we kinda stopped believing Derek, so we asked him to show us his iPhone. We took screenshots of his iPhone (and told Derek we just HAD to post this on MacBlogz), he said he didn’t care.

I know some of you may be saying, “Are you serious? You can turn on an SMS passcode so the iPhone will ask you for a passcode before showing you a preview of the message. Why didn’t he just do that?”

Well, these three experiences are all from Derek. All of them involve that little bubble that pops up with a preview of the message on their screen. And Derek hates having to type a passcode every single time he gets a text message.

Apple has given us, and Derek no other options here.

To prevent stories like this ever happening again, we propose that Apple should implement an App Specific SMS Passcode, where you can turn on and off this SMS preview bubble, based on what Application you are currently using. For example, when the Maps application is being used, the SMS preview won’t show up. Or the same for the Email application. Perhaps you could assign the people you want that bubble to show up for, or not show up for.

We need more options with our SMS passcode options. Derek is living proof of why.