Don’t Set Your iPhone Back to 1970, No Matter What

The following image, which reportedly first surfaced on troll haven 4Chan on Thursday, encourages users to seek out an iOS “easter egg” that puts a retro Apple logo theme on your display.

Do not do this! Firstly because it makes no sense, Apple didn’t even exist until 1976. More importantly, though, don’t do it because it will turn your iPhone into a very expensive rock until you’re able to finagle a Genius Bar appointment. Restoring through iTunes won’t help. You’ll need an actual physical fix, or possibly a new phone.

The bug appears to only affect 64-bit iOS devices, meaning iPhone 5S, iPad Air, and iPad Mini 2 and newer are affected. It’s almost certainly related to the same Unix glitch that caused Facebook to wish people a happy 46 years on the service; the date 1/1/70 has an internal value of zero on a Unix system, which in this case is leading to a software freakout. The why and who are less important, though, than the what, and the what is: don’t set your phone’s calendar back. Live in the present. It’ll save you a lot of future headaches.