Apple joins the conversation

When I decided to to take up the offer to contribute to the Age of Conversation book, I thought long and hard about what makes a good conversationalist.

For me it was listening. So that's what I wrote my chapter on.

This week Apple showed that it knows how to listen, when Steve Jobs publicly apologised to people who bought the first release iPhone, which has had a couple of hundred dollars trimmed from its price.

In a letter on the Apple website, Jobs acknowledged that Apple had disappointed customers and that he personally had received hundreds of upset e-mails.

He then went on to say that they would be giving a $100 credit to those customers.

"We apologize for disappointing some of you," wrote Jobs, "and we are doing our best to live up to your high expectations of Apple."

Now that's what I call business in the conversation age.