

Apple doesn't want you to believe what it says, even though the company claims it's not lying.

That's the gist of the Cupertino company's legal response to a lawsuit regarding allegedly misleading advertising for the iPhone 3G.

The corporation's nine-page legal document [.pdf] is an answer to a complaint filed by William Gillis, a 70-year-old San Diego resident who alleges that Apple falsely advertised the iPhone 3G by calling it "twice as fast for half the price" compared with the original handset.

Some parts of Apple's 32-point rebuttal say that the company was being truthful. But one paragraph says, in effect, that anyone who believes what the company says in its ads is a fool.

"Plaintiff's claims, and those of the purported class, are barred by the fact that the alleged deceptive statements were such that no reasonable person in Plaintiff's position could have reasonably relied on or misunderstood Apple's statements as claims of fact," Apple said in its answer.

Gillis was one of several dissatisfied iPhone 3G customers who recently filed lawsuits alleging Apple falsely advertised the handset's performance. The lawsuits stem from widespread frustration over the popular smartphone; the complaints vary from frequently dropped calls to sluggish broadband speeds and the inability to stay on 3G before it switches to the slower EDGE network.

Apple has already moved to dismiss some of the iPhone 3G lawsuits filed, but Gillis' remains alive and kicking. Michael Ian Rott, Gillis' attorney, said that out of the five iPhone 3G lawsuits filed, he thinks his client's is the most likely to succeed.

"Ours has the most teeth and the most legs to it," Rott said. "If there was any way that Apple could get out of it, they would have filed a motion to dismiss here, too. Their M.O. has been, 'File motion to dismiss and let's get out of here,' but they haven't done that with ours."

In the past, Apple acknowledged the iPhone 3G's network issues and promised the problems would be addressed with future software updates. Consumers are reporting that the most recent firmware version – iPhone 2.2 – appears to be mitigating the issue of frequent dropped calls. However, many still complain about reception problems.

"I keep waiting and hoping for a fix," wrote iPhone customer "BarJohnG," in Apple's support forums. "So far the reception is still lousy. I can't believe that Apple is not fixing this issue but merely trying to mask it and keep the customer confused by showing more bars than there is signal. When you look at the logs it is shocking the number of crashes and problems with the phone and OS."

Though Apple is continuing to hold its ground in U.S. courts, the corporation hasn't been so lucky in the U.K. The U.K. Advertising Standards Authority banned two iPhone 3G advertisements, deeming them misleading for exaggerating the speeds and internet capabilities of the handset.

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Photo: Jeffery Simpson/Flickr*