After several positive early impression, things started to go wrong for Samsung when tech journos’ review units began breaking. The company said it was canceling the release meant to take place today and recalling all the review models.
The whole situation keeps refusing to normalize, and instead gets weirder nearly every day. The latest is that iFixit has decided to honor a Samsung request to pull its Galaxy Fold teardown off the internet, even though Samsung apparently didn’t ask iFixit to do so directly.
iFixit managed to get its hands on a Galaxy Fold and perform one of its famous teardowns on the phone. The site highlighted several design flaws, the main one being a 7mm gap in the bezel where the two sides meet that allows debris to enter under the display and damage it. The phone scored a poor repairability score of 2.
Samsung, apparently, wasn’t happy about its $2,000 phone’s shortcomings being exposed and requested the teardown be removed. It made the request through the iFixit partner who provided the device, and the publication has acquiesced out of respect for this partner. iFixit emphasized that it was under no obligation, legal or otherwise, to remove the teardown.
Maybe it’s just that the teardown served as excellent evidence that there were obvious and potentially avoidable mistakes in the Fold’s design, namely that it was too easy for dirt and grit to get inside it. That was our take when when we originally looked at the teardown.
Whatever Samsung’s reasoning, it’s not a great look to issue a takedown request in any situation. Why a company that’s already straining to quell the bad press around this device would invite more of it by requesting a takedown is baffling.
