I still think it was a terribly bad move on Apple's part to implicate their rivals in this self created monster they have on their hands. Rather than just apologize and give out the cases/bumpers, they dragged their feet on the issue. They first stated how it was the way people were holding it. Then,
this leaked. Finally, after testing their competitions phones, they discovered it wasn't their fault their phone has a bad antenna.
By implicating their competition, they opened up the door to be made a fool of. First of all, the competition has already responded. Surely Steve didn't think they'd take it kindly to have their name thrown into this "antennagate" mess, did he?
HTC fired right back, stating how they have less than "two-hundredths of 1 percent" of antenna related complaints, much lower than Apple's touted 0.55% complaint number. They also said you can hold their phones however you want, since they take the antenna reception more seriously than any other feature of their phones, including cosmetics.
Apple really didn't do themselves too many favors with their press conference, except to their already loyal fan base. It wasn't until the very end of the conference that they informed everyone they'd offer free cases. They brushed everything under the rug and then offered people a case for their troubles. On top of that, they threw their competition under the bus. Ouch! Being an Iphone user myself, I still can't believe Steve Jobs and Apple. They really do think they can get away with whatever the hell they want, as long as they assure their loyalists that everything will be fine.