UPDATE 2: BGR has posted again, saying they've accessed the guys email accounts and believe the emails to be genuinely from Apple and Steve Jobs'

UPDATE: According to Fortunte Apple PR is calling this email exchange fake and Apple Insider is saying a similar exchange was previously offered to them -- for a price. BGR meanwhile has posted screenshots and headers of the emails in question, perhaps to shore up their authenticity. Real, fake, or really fake?

ORIGINAL: BGR brings a purported conversation between "Tom" and Apple CEO Steve Jobs about the ongoing iPhone 4 antenna band reception problem. You can check out the full convo via the link below; here are some highlights:

TOM: You are going to kill your brand over one product. Apple is coming off arrogant and rude. If there is no fix just tell people so they can return their phones. We have work to do. I have bought just about every apple product made in the last 20 years and this is the 1st time I am ashamed to be a MAC fan. This is just sickening,

JOBS: No, you are getting all worked up over a few days of rumors. Calm down.

TOM: I just had dinner with 3 people who had iPhone 4s we all cant make calls without dropping. There is no rumors it is reality.

JOBS: You are most likely in an area with very low signal strength.

TOM: I hope this this is not really you. Are we on a different MHz? I have yet to see an iPhone [4] work in Richmond when you hold it in your hand. It is not “isolated”. I was a big fan. But I am done.

JOBS: You may be working from bad data. Not your fault. Stay tuned. We are working on it. Sent from my iPhone

TOM: Retire, relax, enjoy your family. It is just a phone. Not worth it.

As always, we have no way of knowing if the email exchange is genuine. Jobs has confirmed some conversations in the past, and discussed that he does respond to emails on occasion but it's impossible to tell if any individual email or conversation is genuine.

Thats said, as phenomenal as Apple is at product marketing they've historically been exactly the opposite in dealing with product problems (MobileMe being the classic example). Obviously their legal department is going to be all over them to be as non-commital and non-communicative as possible, but in absence of solid, real information rumor always runs rampant.

It could very well be a software issue, Apple might be working on an iOS 4.0.1 update to fix it for those users experiencing it. Time will tell. But hopefully Apple decides to get out ahead of this one and soon.

[BGR]