The gloves come off for iPhone users at inauguration

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WASHINGTON -- Here’s a blow to gadget geeks in town for Barack Obama’s presidential inauguration, particularly ones from balmy California: Gloved fingers can’t control the iPhone.

It’s cold in D.C., and as women who have long fingernails understand, the iPhone’s innovative touch screen needs the electrical charge emitted by fingertips to function properly. So if you want to tell your friends all about the parties you’re crashing or send photos of the presidential motorcade that just raced by, you have to either hold that thought or take your gloves off.

There are a few solutions. If you don’t mind a couple of chilly digits, snip a few fingers off your cheapest pair of gloves. Or buy a pair of touch-screen-friendly gloves made by a company called Dots. The Dots gloves, which come in knit for $15 or wool for $20, include metal dots on the fingertips that let you swipe and type to your iPhone-loving heart’s content.

But if you don’t have them, it may be best to text selectively. An added bonus of that strategy: It decrease the chances of the dreaded cellphone crash at the moment that Obama becomes president...

-- Carla Hall