Ballmer Laughs at iPhone (2007)(youtube.com)
youtube.com
Ballmer Laughs at iPhone (2007)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U
85 comments
Steve Jobs said on stage at the iPhone launch that the killer app was the phone app. IMO that was wrong — the killer app was Google Maps, back when GPS navigation devices used to cost $200+. This made the economic value of the iPhone a lot more solid and subsequently destroyed the entire device category.
Google Maps didn’t have turn by turn navigation until late 2009, you probably mistaken the original iPhone with iPhone 3GS.
I didn't buy an iPhone until the 3GS, but I never used turn-by-turn navigation. I just needed a map with directions that I could refer to if I got lost. After I got it, I also discovered how useful it was for planning trips by bus. Did the original iPhone not have Maps at all? I think it would have been a killer app even without turn-by-turn.
Well, people don’t carry a Garmin when they ride buses I guess? iPhone’s navigation didn’t become reliable enough to replace a Garmin / Tomtom till 2011-2012.
The killer feature was the multitouch interface and removal of the keyboard. The same was with Macintosh, they removed the focus from the keyboard to the mouse. It is much easier to know what to do when you have several buttons on the screen instead of generic keyboard with many keys. I remember Steve Jobs emphasized this during the iPhone introduction event.
Maybe in subsequent phones but the initial iPhone didn't even have GPS, only WiFi triangulation which worked only so-so and only in cities (with well... WiFi).
It was cellular triangulation.
I disagree. I'd put Google Maps on #2. #1 was solidly the camera app, and the various apps (remember Burbn? [0]) that allowed the user to modify, post online, etc.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Instagram
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Instagram
Several smartphones already had a GPS receiver back in 2007. The original iPhone did not.
In all fairness, Ballmer seemed to be right back then - the iPhone 1 had tons of problems with very little utility, and outside of fanboy circles was considered more of a joke. Not only was it ridiculously expensive, an unproven concept at the time and married to specific cell phone companies, battery life also was abysmal (they said it was up to a day, but from memory, people had to load their phones every four to six hours if they were doing anything with it. Compare that to the average phone back in 2007, which boasted battery times measured in days (weeks in case of Nokia)).
It only really got actually general-public traction after they dropped the lock-in to specific mobile providers and proved that screen typing was feasible.
It only really got actually general-public traction after they dropped the lock-in to specific mobile providers and proved that screen typing was feasible.
It was 2G when Europe has been 3G for a while. No copy and paste anywhere, but that wasn't probably a big problem (can't remember.) It was more of a fashion / luxury statement than a useful phone. The incredibly large screen would be very useful for web browsing, but 2G... Remember, no apps on the first ìPhone.
Edit: can't remember this too but maybe its 2 Mpx camera was a great one in 2007 (for a phone.) After all the view finder was unprecedented in size and it had wifi to download (or usb through iTunes?). No video recording, no selfie camera.
Edit: can't remember this too but maybe its 2 Mpx camera was a great one in 2007 (for a phone.) After all the view finder was unprecedented in size and it had wifi to download (or usb through iTunes?). No video recording, no selfie camera.
> can't remember this too but maybe its 2 Mpx camera was a great one in 2007 (for a phone.)
It was comparable to what mid-end smartphones offered in 2007, like Nokia N75. Higher-end ones, like Nokia N95, already offered 5MP cameras with ~3" screens.
It was comparable to what mid-end smartphones offered in 2007, like Nokia N75. Higher-end ones, like Nokia N95, already offered 5MP cameras with ~3" screens.
It also had abysmal support for actual "phone" features... the showstoppers I remember were that it didn't support MMS--so no group text messages, which definitely made it feel like a "joke" given how many people I know relied on text messages (and no photos, though the phone I was using at the time didn't support that either)--and it didn't support any kind of ring tone groups, both of which being features that essentially all other competing phones (including Nokia brick phones) had supported for a long time. And that it didn't come with even a single game--even something as silly or stupid as snake--with no capability of installing a game felt somewhat ridiculously "Apple".
That’s not my memory of it at all. I remember it feeling like something from the future. The massive screen, the accelerometer, the light and proximity sensors and the overall slickness of the UI were really clearly a step change.
I didn’t quite realise at the time that it was a whole new device category that would essentially eliminate all other personal electronics but I remember it being clear that this was more than just another gadget, definitely not a joke!
I didn’t quite realise at the time that it was a whole new device category that would essentially eliminate all other personal electronics but I remember it being clear that this was more than just another gadget, definitely not a joke!
These kinds of sensors were the norm on smartphones already. Even Openmoko phones had them (and Neo1973 was announced before the first iPhone was), those were touchscreen-only too. Nothing the first iPhone did was revolutionary, you couldn't even use those sensors yourself as you couldn't develop apps for it (and there were Symbian games that used accelerometers already).
It had some exquisite marketing which tried to place it as a somewhat accessible yet luxury item and they succeeded. Then they pushed with their app store walled garden, and the rest is sad history.
It had some exquisite marketing which tried to place it as a somewhat accessible yet luxury item and they succeeded. Then they pushed with their app store walled garden, and the rest is sad history.
I remember perceiving those phones as a new class of device, OpenMoko and the iPhone. My cousin's laptop broke, and he used his Nokia N810 instead. This last device was the most fascinating for me, doing everything in such a small size. In the same way that even now I feel that my iPhone is more of a laptop substitute than a phone. I remember for my first job interviews opening up my Macbook in Zurich to find the place, with the ubiquitous wifi at that time. Now you would use your phone.
I was doing that years before the iPhone on my PDA.
I also used GPS navigation with Google Maps on my feature phone years before the iPhone was released.
I’m not dismissing the iPhone as a bad device (I have an iPhone and other Apple hardware) but it certainly wasn’t first to market on any of this stuff. If anything, I’d describe it as a device that popularised the emerging trend rather than defining it.
I also used GPS navigation with Google Maps on my feature phone years before the iPhone was released.
I’m not dismissing the iPhone as a bad device (I have an iPhone and other Apple hardware) but it certainly wasn’t first to market on any of this stuff. If anything, I’d describe it as a device that popularised the emerging trend rather than defining it.
Sure there were lots of devices doing subsets of the features of iPhone but the feature set and execution of the iPhone was in a completely different class.
The fact that the same fundamental design still dominates 15 years later shows how remarkable a feat of product design it really was.
The fact that the same fundamental design still dominates 15 years later shows how remarkable a feat of product design it really was.
I didn’t say subset of features (because it literally wasn’t a subset of features). And the modern iPhone is very different from the originally released device.
This is exactly the kind of revisionist history I was on about.
This is exactly the kind of revisionist history I was on about.
Fun fact - Nokia N810 (announced in 2007) was initially supposed to be a smartphone already, but ended up being just a tablet because of infighting with Symbian team, effectively postponing the release of Maemo-based phone until Nokia N900.
Agree. It wasn’t really until around the iPhone 4 that the iPhone seemed to find its stride, which was released at least three years after this interview. Before that it’d be hard to argue it had greater utility than other high-end smartphones of the day.
But what Jobs and Apple had was a longterm vision… And exceptional marketing.
But what Jobs and Apple had was a longterm vision… And exceptional marketing.
I’d argue it was the iPhone 3G.
Cheaper, had an App Store and had the data speeds to combine with that burgeoning app ecosystem.
It’s arguably the phone that made GPS navigation popular for everyone, and consuming media on your phone on the go. It kickstarted an entire economy with the App Store.
Coming from Symbian UIQ (on a Sony P1), that was night and day. The first iPhone wasn’t that interesting other than the multitouch capabilities for people with high end smartphones.
The iPhone 3G made everyone sit up and take notice. You could get apps to do all the stuff you’d buy one off gadgets for , and it was way easier than downloading and installing jar files, hoping they’d support your phone.
To me the iPhone 3G was the point where it went from “okay this thing is a weird luxury statement” to “why would you buy any other competing product?”
it took quite a while before Android really found it’s footing too. To me the Galaxy S was the first real competitor to the iPhone , partly because Samsung saw what made the iPhone great and honed in on it. It’s the phone that made me switch to Android before switching back eventually to the iPhone X after a string of Android phones getting no updates in Canada, and a huge run of hardware issues with no easy way to deal with them. Come to think of it, my first Galaxy S had to be sent back because an entire SKU had bad memory.
It’s arguably the phone that made GPS navigation popular for everyone, and consuming media on your phone on the go. It kickstarted an entire economy with the App Store.
Coming from Symbian UIQ (on a Sony P1), that was night and day. The first iPhone wasn’t that interesting other than the multitouch capabilities for people with high end smartphones.
The iPhone 3G made everyone sit up and take notice. You could get apps to do all the stuff you’d buy one off gadgets for , and it was way easier than downloading and installing jar files, hoping they’d support your phone.
To me the iPhone 3G was the point where it went from “okay this thing is a weird luxury statement” to “why would you buy any other competing product?”
it took quite a while before Android really found it’s footing too. To me the Galaxy S was the first real competitor to the iPhone , partly because Samsung saw what made the iPhone great and honed in on it. It’s the phone that made me switch to Android before switching back eventually to the iPhone X after a string of Android phones getting no updates in Canada, and a huge run of hardware issues with no easy way to deal with them. Come to think of it, my first Galaxy S had to be sent back because an entire SKU had bad memory.
I had an Android G2 (I think it was called) which was one of the first Android handsets and it was brilliant.
It already supported everything the iPhone didn’t (apps, copy paste, MMS, etc) plus had a slide out keyboard.
I still rate that phone as one of the best handsets I’ve ever owned.
It already supported everything the iPhone didn’t (apps, copy paste, MMS, etc) plus had a slide out keyboard.
I still rate that phone as one of the best handsets I’ve ever owned.
I think you mean the G1 if you’re talking about having a phone prior to when iOS 3 launched.
The thing is that lots of phones had a lot of the iPhone features before the iPhone came out. Heck, a Symbian S90 or UIQ device would have had more features on paper than both early iOS and Android.
That’s not what made it unique, and I didn’t really get that till I switched to the iPhone 3G. It’s never been Apple’s MO to just be features on a spec sheet.
At the time smartphones were for business people or techies. A ton of buttons and various attempts to hide them (slide out, flip out, etc…) and various attempts to become media devices (ngage).
The iPhone (the OG and the 3G) changed all that by being simple. It introduced an easy way to get apps, a giant screen with which to consume content and most importantly, it introduced multitouch+capacitive touch to the masses. It wasn’t the first at any of those but it was the first to put everything in such a streamlined package and pair it with a decent screen.
What they did was redefine who smartphones were for. It went from business people and techies to normies in the blink of an eye.
There were all screen devices before them (the LG prada) , more feature full phones like the Symbian, Blackberry, Windows CE and Android devices. iPhone killed off all of those that couldn’t get in line with the path it built.
I used to be a die hard Android guy, but they really only took off in mass appeal much later. Maybe it was because Symbian and Blackberry devices were dying , but it also coincided with Android offerings simplifying like the iPhone and focusing on streamlined experiences.
The thing is that lots of phones had a lot of the iPhone features before the iPhone came out. Heck, a Symbian S90 or UIQ device would have had more features on paper than both early iOS and Android.
That’s not what made it unique, and I didn’t really get that till I switched to the iPhone 3G. It’s never been Apple’s MO to just be features on a spec sheet.
At the time smartphones were for business people or techies. A ton of buttons and various attempts to hide them (slide out, flip out, etc…) and various attempts to become media devices (ngage).
The iPhone (the OG and the 3G) changed all that by being simple. It introduced an easy way to get apps, a giant screen with which to consume content and most importantly, it introduced multitouch+capacitive touch to the masses. It wasn’t the first at any of those but it was the first to put everything in such a streamlined package and pair it with a decent screen.
What they did was redefine who smartphones were for. It went from business people and techies to normies in the blink of an eye.
There were all screen devices before them (the LG prada) , more feature full phones like the Symbian, Blackberry, Windows CE and Android devices. iPhone killed off all of those that couldn’t get in line with the path it built.
I used to be a die hard Android guy, but they really only took off in mass appeal much later. Maybe it was because Symbian and Blackberry devices were dying , but it also coincided with Android offerings simplifying like the iPhone and focusing on streamlined experiences.
> What they did was redefine who smartphones were for.
To be honest, I'm not sure why the original iPhone is even considered a smartphone. It was a shiny feature phone disguised as one, so it sure targeted other kinds of audiences than smartphones did back in the day. I remember being excited about rumors since I expected an actual smartphone, but got incredibly disappointed once it was actually announced.
To be honest, I'm not sure why the original iPhone is even considered a smartphone. It was a shiny feature phone disguised as one, so it sure targeted other kinds of audiences than smartphones did back in the day. I remember being excited about rumors since I expected an actual smartphone, but got incredibly disappointed once it was actually announced.
Steve Jobs greatest iPhone achievement was in getting Stan Sigman, CEO of Cingular Wireless, to upgrade his network to be equal to the iPhones demands. Prior that that, the tail (carriers) wagged the dog (phone manufacturers).
At least in USA.
It's the similar thing with a lot of online business:music, videos , movies or ride sharing. First it's illegal and then someone big enough does it and it's a great business. Spotify, YouTube, Netflix, Uber etc...
Technologically certainly fairly interesting but the real roadblock was regulations and contracts and conflicts of interest.
It's the similar thing with a lot of online business:music, videos , movies or ride sharing. First it's illegal and then someone big enough does it and it's a great business. Spotify, YouTube, Netflix, Uber etc...
Technologically certainly fairly interesting but the real roadblock was regulations and contracts and conflicts of interest.
The iPhone is unironically one of the greatest products in human history. The world pre and post the arrival of the iPhone is very different.
I’m not going to deny that the iPhone was a successful product but what people often forget is that the world was already shifting that way.
Feature phones could already do what the iPhone did (and in some cases even more). Multi-touch devices were available before the iPhone. PDAs had also been about for years and did everything the iPhone could do and more. And Android wasn’t far behind the iPhone and also improved upon the original iPhone.
In fact the original iPhone wasn’t even that good compared to the competition. It was lacking a lot of features people considered “must haves”. Native applications (everything was web apps originally), copy/paste, the ability to background applications, etc. And Ballmers point about the lack of a hardware keyboard was absolutely right for that era.
Apple have successfully rewritten history here, like victors often do. And so people often credit the iPhone as being uniquely revolutionary. It certainly was industry changing but it wasn’t singularly responsible for that change.
I say this as an iPhone user with an Apple Watch and other Apple hardware. So I do buy into the Apple ecosystem. But I’m also an old fart who has lived long enough to have first hand experience, both as a user and as a software engineer, pre and post the iPhone.
Feature phones could already do what the iPhone did (and in some cases even more). Multi-touch devices were available before the iPhone. PDAs had also been about for years and did everything the iPhone could do and more. And Android wasn’t far behind the iPhone and also improved upon the original iPhone.
In fact the original iPhone wasn’t even that good compared to the competition. It was lacking a lot of features people considered “must haves”. Native applications (everything was web apps originally), copy/paste, the ability to background applications, etc. And Ballmers point about the lack of a hardware keyboard was absolutely right for that era.
Apple have successfully rewritten history here, like victors often do. And so people often credit the iPhone as being uniquely revolutionary. It certainly was industry changing but it wasn’t singularly responsible for that change.
I say this as an iPhone user with an Apple Watch and other Apple hardware. So I do buy into the Apple ecosystem. But I’m also an old fart who has lived long enough to have first hand experience, both as a user and as a software engineer, pre and post the iPhone.
>Apple have successfully rewritten history here, like victors often do
It's a long long time since I've had any interest in Apple or their products. But I wonder if the same excited anticipation still exists today [eg. with rumours of Apple producing an electric vehicle]?... or was it mainly due to Steve Jobs's cult of personality and mastery of hyperbole.
> Nope. See my previous post on this.
They absolutely did. Just look at plenty of confused people in this very thread, who attribute things like downfall of standalone GPS devices or the rise of mobile app market to the original iPhone that didn't even have these features at all, or praising it for including sensors (camera, accelerometer) that were already common in smartphones back then.
They absolutely did. Just look at plenty of confused people in this very thread, who attribute things like downfall of standalone GPS devices or the rise of mobile app market to the original iPhone that didn't even have these features at all, or praising it for including sensors (camera, accelerometer) that were already common in smartphones back then.
Now you're nit-picking. Your original comment was that Apple had rewritten history to make the iPhone seem revolutionary, when it wasn't. Which I disagree with. As another old fart, I was there at the time and remember just how revolutionary it seemed on launch --not as rewritten history, years later.
Now you're using the fact that people can't remember for sure which iPhone model introduced feature X or feature Y as evidence that history was rewritten by Apple, when all it shows is that, years later, people can't accurately remember the minutiae of which details changed between which models.
Now you're using the fact that people can't remember for sure which iPhone model introduced feature X or feature Y as evidence that history was rewritten by Apple, when all it shows is that, years later, people can't accurately remember the minutiae of which details changed between which models.
I agree with the rewriting history part, but perhaps not by apple itself, but by people falsely attributing stuff to apple.
The only revolutionary that apple had was a unified big promoted appstore and marketing as magic and pompous as they usually do. They did not have a single feature that they invented or was revolutionary.
At that time people were already happily surfing, navigating, filming and listening to music on other phones like the Nokia N95 (which was a beast at this time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N95), including the possibility to install Symbian apps. What was missing, were proper App stores to find those apps.
Also capacitive Touchscreens were on the market. E.g.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_Prada
The the only revolutionary thing Apple provided were Appstores and lots and lots of marketing.
The only revolutionary that apple had was a unified big promoted appstore and marketing as magic and pompous as they usually do. They did not have a single feature that they invented or was revolutionary.
At that time people were already happily surfing, navigating, filming and listening to music on other phones like the Nokia N95 (which was a beast at this time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N95), including the possibility to install Symbian apps. What was missing, were proper App stores to find those apps.
Also capacitive Touchscreens were on the market. E.g.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_Prada
The the only revolutionary thing Apple provided were Appstores and lots and lots of marketing.
A problem that I've come to notice with a lot of tech people is they either don't notice or don't value good implementation, even if that implementation is leagues ahead of everything else. It's important to develop taste and be able to look beyond feature lists.
It doesn't matter that the LG Prada had a capacitive touchscreen or that the Nokia N95 had a web browser: the iPhone had a smooth, vibrant and responsive multi-touch operating system with natural scrolling and a surprisingly good touch keyboard.
On the LG Prada you're poking at list items and dragging scrollbars while the device beeps at you and choppily redraws those lists like a terminal.
On the Nokia N95, you're navigating the web with a jumpy cursor controlled by directional buttons, and typing with a numpad.
There was nothing like the iPhone, and now everything is like the iPhone.
It doesn't matter that the LG Prada had a capacitive touchscreen or that the Nokia N95 had a web browser: the iPhone had a smooth, vibrant and responsive multi-touch operating system with natural scrolling and a surprisingly good touch keyboard.
On the LG Prada you're poking at list items and dragging scrollbars while the device beeps at you and choppily redraws those lists like a terminal.
On the Nokia N95, you're navigating the web with a jumpy cursor controlled by directional buttons, and typing with a numpad.
There was nothing like the iPhone, and now everything is like the iPhone.
> A problem that I've come to notice with a lot of tech people is they either don't notice or don't value good implementation
That may be because Apple's implementation was absolutely lacking. The first iPhone was a vibrant, shiny feature phone disguised as a smartphone. They put their bet towards marketing and fashion, not tech and revolution - which paid off for them, as it turned out that was enough. Don't be surprised that techies aren't impressed by that though. In fact, I don't think the iPhone would be so successful if it didn't come out from Apple even if it was exactly the same as it was - it would likely find its niche, but it wouldn't be a significant threat to Nokia and others.
(actually, the real iPhone wasn't that much of a threat either, it was Android that actually killed Nokia - or made it kill itself to be exact)
> There was nothing like the iPhone, and now everything is like the iPhone.
Many things were either like the iPhone already or were heading towards being like the iPhone. Apple's implementation advantage comes from the fact that it was designed from scratch as a touch-based interface, while existing platforms were only slowly iterating towards that, but they were getting there regardless. Some existing players, like Nokia, had teams that were already going there, and other teams that were actively sabotaging those efforts, which obviously left the door for Apple wide open.
Apple's implementation sure was good enough, because marketing alone would quickly dry off otherwise. It wasn't revolutionary though. I'm certain that we would have very similar trends too had Apple not gone into mobile phone market at all. Maybe we wouldn't end up in a world where restricted walled gardens are the expected state of things on computers that we carry with ourselves all the time. Or maybe it would be worse, who knows. It wouldn't, however, be much different in how we interact with those devices, because writings were on the wall and Apple just happened to enter the market with a new thing at the right time with enough preexisting clout, as evidenced by multiple companies working on implementing Apple's "revolutions" at the same time as Apple, or even beating them by years in some cases.
That may be because Apple's implementation was absolutely lacking. The first iPhone was a vibrant, shiny feature phone disguised as a smartphone. They put their bet towards marketing and fashion, not tech and revolution - which paid off for them, as it turned out that was enough. Don't be surprised that techies aren't impressed by that though. In fact, I don't think the iPhone would be so successful if it didn't come out from Apple even if it was exactly the same as it was - it would likely find its niche, but it wouldn't be a significant threat to Nokia and others.
(actually, the real iPhone wasn't that much of a threat either, it was Android that actually killed Nokia - or made it kill itself to be exact)
> There was nothing like the iPhone, and now everything is like the iPhone.
Many things were either like the iPhone already or were heading towards being like the iPhone. Apple's implementation advantage comes from the fact that it was designed from scratch as a touch-based interface, while existing platforms were only slowly iterating towards that, but they were getting there regardless. Some existing players, like Nokia, had teams that were already going there, and other teams that were actively sabotaging those efforts, which obviously left the door for Apple wide open.
Apple's implementation sure was good enough, because marketing alone would quickly dry off otherwise. It wasn't revolutionary though. I'm certain that we would have very similar trends too had Apple not gone into mobile phone market at all. Maybe we wouldn't end up in a world where restricted walled gardens are the expected state of things on computers that we carry with ourselves all the time. Or maybe it would be worse, who knows. It wouldn't, however, be much different in how we interact with those devices, because writings were on the wall and Apple just happened to enter the market with a new thing at the right time with enough preexisting clout, as evidenced by multiple companies working on implementing Apple's "revolutions" at the same time as Apple, or even beating them by years in some cases.
> That may be because Apple's implementation was absolutely lacking. The first iPhone was a vibrant, shiny feature phone disguised as a smartphone. They put their bet towards marketing and fashion, not tech and revolution - which paid off for them, as it turned out that was enough. Don't be surprised that techies aren't impressed by that though.
They bet on coupling capacitive multi-touch technology with a novel and responsive user experience that takes advantage of that technology to the fullest extent.
> I'm certain that we would have similar devices soon afterwards had Apple not go into mobile phone market at all.
It took competitors a considerable amount of time to even approach the iPhone in terms of quality of implementation, and that's in a timeline where they had the iPhone to use as a benchmark. How long do you think it would have taken them without the iPhone? Would they have ever? Would we have to use scrollbars, like on the LG Prada? Would we still be using miniature keyboards? How much baggage from the old days of cell phones would we still be carrying with us?
I remember telling people in 2007 and 2008 that every phone was going to become like the iPhone, and still encountering plenty of doubters and naysayers. Some people simply don't get it.
I'm not the biggest fan of Apple these days, and I think touchscreens are overused, and I think some of the things the iPhone did have resulted in a decline in user experience, but it's absurd to confidently proclaim that the iPhone didn't cause a dramatic shift in the cell phone industry and beyond.
They bet on coupling capacitive multi-touch technology with a novel and responsive user experience that takes advantage of that technology to the fullest extent.
> I'm certain that we would have similar devices soon afterwards had Apple not go into mobile phone market at all.
It took competitors a considerable amount of time to even approach the iPhone in terms of quality of implementation, and that's in a timeline where they had the iPhone to use as a benchmark. How long do you think it would have taken them without the iPhone? Would they have ever? Would we have to use scrollbars, like on the LG Prada? Would we still be using miniature keyboards? How much baggage from the old days of cell phones would we still be carrying with us?
I remember telling people in 2007 and 2008 that every phone was going to become like the iPhone, and still encountering plenty of doubters and naysayers. Some people simply don't get it.
I'm not the biggest fan of Apple these days, and I think touchscreens are overused, and I think some of the things the iPhone did have resulted in a decline in user experience, but it's absurd to confidently proclaim that the iPhone didn't cause a dramatic shift in the cell phone industry and beyond.
I'm under an impression that people who are talking about iPhone's "quality of implementation" have either never used iPhones or never used their competitors.
Maybe you're not sensitive to choppy UI rendering and high input lag, or you simply don't value responsiveness. In which case, perhaps the devices that came in the iPhone's wake were adequate to you.
I was there as well. I witnessed the announcement of OpenMoko, iPhone, Android, drooled over Nokia Internet Tablets that were way outside my price range, browsed discussions about them on Slashdot like crazy. Got excited over rumors about a smartphone from Apple just to be extremely disappointed once it actually arrived. There really wasn't anything revolutionary in actual devices, the whole "revolution" was cultural and marketing-induced. The craze over iPhones wouldn't have happened at all without iPods being as popular as they were, and other smartphones were already heading towards everything Apple did anyway. There was a period of time where Apple was actually bringing some innovations to the table a few years later, but that didn't last long anyway.
Exactly.
And iPods wouldn’t have existed without MP3 players, which themselves were just a natural evolution from Walkmans and other portable music players. The cassette is an evolution of reel to reel tape and the industry was already primed with vinyl. And vinyl wasn’t even the first format for music playback.
As I posted elsewhere, we all stand on the shoulders of giants.
The only people who call things “revolutionary” are marketing firms and fanboys.
And iPods wouldn’t have existed without MP3 players, which themselves were just a natural evolution from Walkmans and other portable music players. The cassette is an evolution of reel to reel tape and the industry was already primed with vinyl. And vinyl wasn’t even the first format for music playback.
As I posted elsewhere, we all stand on the shoulders of giants.
The only people who call things “revolutionary” are marketing firms and fanboys.
> There really was genuine excitement at the prospect of an Apple phone.
“Excitement” isn’t what we are talking about here though. I get excited about buying a new car, but it doesn’t mean that new car is industry defining.
> But it did seem at the time like Apple had the magic touch and anything they came up with would be revolutionary.
Only for a subset of people though. Lots of people didn’t like Apple products much and used other products with similar features (sometimes more, sometimes less).
What we are talking about here is technology (something tactile) and not peoples emotional state about said technology (subjective and personal).
Also I was both a consumer and a software engineer both pre and post the iPhone too.
“Excitement” isn’t what we are talking about here though. I get excited about buying a new car, but it doesn’t mean that new car is industry defining.
> But it did seem at the time like Apple had the magic touch and anything they came up with would be revolutionary.
Only for a subset of people though. Lots of people didn’t like Apple products much and used other products with similar features (sometimes more, sometimes less).
What we are talking about here is technology (something tactile) and not peoples emotional state about said technology (subjective and personal).
Also I was both a consumer and a software engineer both pre and post the iPhone too.
No one had the sheer power of Apple though. In Australia, when the first iPhone hit, Apple was able to dictate certain things with carriers if they wanted to carry the iPhone. Plans suddenly got better and cheaper. You could just walk into an Apple store and get an unlocked phone (although the 3GS was first available only through carriers). iPhone launches had people camping out for days so Apple managed to exert their influence for years.
Before this, data was really expensive, phones were all locked. None of the other device makers exerted their power like this. Or even had that sort of power. The iPad also had a similar effect with data only plans for iPads.
Before this, data was really expensive, phones were all locked. None of the other device makers exerted their power like this. Or even had that sort of power. The iPad also had a similar effect with data only plans for iPads.
I can’t speak for the Australian market but in the U.K. it was a very different story. The iPhone arrived locked into one specific carrier (O2 IIRC) when most handsets were available on multiple carriers. As a result, a contract for the original iPhone was more expensive than most other handsets.
There certainly where handsets that were locked to specific providers but even in those cases it was much easier to unlock them than it was to unlock the original iPhone.
In fact the iPhone has actively worked against interoperability. Take charging, everything has standardised in USB-C except for the iPhone. Their app ecosystem is another walled garden (other handsets ran a third party OS but Apple rolled their own). Lack of a support for SD cards, etc.
If anything, one of the biggest achievements of the iPhone is successfully programming people to be OK with being locked out of their own hardware. A trend we’ve seen Google, Microsoft, Tesla and others follow suit in.
If it weren’t for the fact that they are (presently) strong advocates for privacy, it would be hard to say something positive about Apple. But given the current technological climate, they’re definitely the lesser of two evils.
There certainly where handsets that were locked to specific providers but even in those cases it was much easier to unlock them than it was to unlock the original iPhone.
In fact the iPhone has actively worked against interoperability. Take charging, everything has standardised in USB-C except for the iPhone. Their app ecosystem is another walled garden (other handsets ran a third party OS but Apple rolled their own). Lack of a support for SD cards, etc.
If anything, one of the biggest achievements of the iPhone is successfully programming people to be OK with being locked out of their own hardware. A trend we’ve seen Google, Microsoft, Tesla and others follow suit in.
If it weren’t for the fact that they are (presently) strong advocates for privacy, it would be hard to say something positive about Apple. But given the current technological climate, they’re definitely the lesser of two evils.
The iPhone was/is a good product, but I think mass indoor plumbing and the washing machine along with many other inventions ranks higher than the iPhone.
Decimal, the printing press, light bulbs, the power grid, telegrams, landlines, wireless data transmission (radio, TV, cell phones), computing machines, transistors, ARPNET, WWW, etc… to name a few.
All of which revolutionised humanity and were needed for the iPhone to ever exist. But also all of which were evolutionary ideas that emerged from several inventions predating it, already inching technology in that direction.
In short, we all stand on the shoulders of giants.
All of which revolutionised humanity and were needed for the iPhone to ever exist. But also all of which were evolutionary ideas that emerged from several inventions predating it, already inching technology in that direction.
In short, we all stand on the shoulders of giants.
Was reading the thoughts of a living old-timer the other day, and to them running water was the killer app. After that, indoor toilets.
Landlines were also important. Walkie-talkies, less so.
Landlines were also important. Walkie-talkies, less so.
No matter what your opinion of Apple [and mine is pretty low!] it's churlish to deny this.
Yes, people wil point out that Phone X had a touchscreen, Phone Y had a browser, Phone Z had something else. But the iPhone was the first phone to bring them all together in one package.
I used to run an Apple user forum way back before the iPhone was released, when all we had were the occasional rumour that Apple 'might be' thinking of bringing out a phone.
Smartphones are so ubiquitous now that I reckon people forget just how much excited anticipation there was at the prospect that Apple would do for the phone what they'd recently done for computers [remember how revolutionary the coloured iMacs seemed at the time?] and portable music [the iPod]. Back then no-one was enthusiastic about their phones. They were just some utilitarian gadget you carried, like a wallet, a pen or your car keys and there was an almost messianic belief that, if Apple brought out a phone it would be an equally miraculous device.
The launch of the iPhone actually kick-started [for better or worse] the promotion of the formerly humble phone to the ranks of 'gadgets you dreamt of owning'
Yes, people wil point out that Phone X had a touchscreen, Phone Y had a browser, Phone Z had something else. But the iPhone was the first phone to bring them all together in one package.
I used to run an Apple user forum way back before the iPhone was released, when all we had were the occasional rumour that Apple 'might be' thinking of bringing out a phone.
Smartphones are so ubiquitous now that I reckon people forget just how much excited anticipation there was at the prospect that Apple would do for the phone what they'd recently done for computers [remember how revolutionary the coloured iMacs seemed at the time?] and portable music [the iPod]. Back then no-one was enthusiastic about their phones. They were just some utilitarian gadget you carried, like a wallet, a pen or your car keys and there was an almost messianic belief that, if Apple brought out a phone it would be an equally miraculous device.
The launch of the iPhone actually kick-started [for better or worse] the promotion of the formerly humble phone to the ranks of 'gadgets you dreamt of owning'
That's like a funniest thing I read all day, assuming you are being serious. Was an iPhone revolutionary in terms of smartphones? Sure. But calling it a greatest invention in human history, within 100 years of literally thousands of other groundbreaking inventions, is just hilarious.
It’s not that crazy, assuming they’re equating it with everyone having a general purpose computer in their pocket (probably a greater impact on society than the previous personal computer revolution). But yeah, maybe a bit over the top...
I mean, even if you are, what does that have to do with an iPhone specifically? People had all kinds of smartphones before iPhone even launched(that were perfectly fine for browsing the internet, reading email, taking and sharing photos etc.....even if it wasn't the most polished experience), and even for years after it was just a weird curiosity that only rich people could afford(outside of select few markets like US). Calling it the biggest achievement of humanity reads like a really poor joke, unless I don't know, you are relatively rich and iPhone was your first smartphone, then I guess it felt revolutionary, but that's an extremely narrow perspective, and again, comparing it to human achievements of just the past 100 years it pales completely, for the simplest example I'd say the internet was a bigger and better invention.
> People had all kinds of smartphones before iPhone even launched
Not only that, but Apple never even had (or was anywhere close to having) a majority on that market. The actual popularity of modern-day smartphone skyrocketed due to Android devices replacing all sorts of feature phones.
Not only that, but Apple never even had (or was anywhere close to having) a majority on that market. The actual popularity of modern-day smartphone skyrocketed due to Android devices replacing all sorts of feature phones.
I'd agree as far as the "i" part of "iPhone" goes. In my opinion, the internet is right up there with the greatest inventions in human history.
IMHO, it was not so much as iPhone won, it's more like all other phone companies lost.
Nobody innovated, nobody focused on the developer or bothered with creating a platform for developers although developers were asking for it. Sony, Nokia, Ericsson had big fan bases.
There were any number of customizations that people all over the world created for them. But those phone companies didn't care.
Each year, all these phone companies would come out with new form factors to keep their fan bases hooked. That's it. No standardization, no nothing.
They all lost. And deservedly so. And we were left with Google cannibalizing open-source to create Android. Even then, and now, companies only accepted Android because they saw the rise of iPhone. It was a threat. They had to scramble to get something together.
Everyone else just gave up. Even now, all I hear is, "It's not an easy task to create a new phone because you have to create everything from the ground up". It's this attitude which has been the death of mobile communication.
Instead of having something that everyone could use and build upon, we're left with brittle pieces of proprietary software, completely at the mercy of two behemoths who call all the shots.
The PC revolution happened but nobody learned anything from it.
Nobody innovated, nobody focused on the developer or bothered with creating a platform for developers although developers were asking for it. Sony, Nokia, Ericsson had big fan bases.
There were any number of customizations that people all over the world created for them. But those phone companies didn't care.
Each year, all these phone companies would come out with new form factors to keep their fan bases hooked. That's it. No standardization, no nothing.
They all lost. And deservedly so. And we were left with Google cannibalizing open-source to create Android. Even then, and now, companies only accepted Android because they saw the rise of iPhone. It was a threat. They had to scramble to get something together.
Everyone else just gave up. Even now, all I hear is, "It's not an easy task to create a new phone because you have to create everything from the ground up". It's this attitude which has been the death of mobile communication.
Instead of having something that everyone could use and build upon, we're left with brittle pieces of proprietary software, completely at the mercy of two behemoths who call all the shots.
The PC revolution happened but nobody learned anything from it.
I very much agree. Ironically the only relevant 3rd option who truly felt like they were trying to innovate was Microsoft+Nokia (the real Nokia) with Windows Phone.
But failures to market and encourage adoption, and perhaps staining it with the “windows” brand, just led it down the path of being forgotten about by developers and so it withered and died.
But failures to market and encourage adoption, and perhaps staining it with the “windows” brand, just led it down the path of being forgotten about by developers and so it withered and died.
In his defense, the main objections he has are the price, the lack of a physical keyboard, and the fact that Apple had never sold a phone before. In hindsight those seem funny, but in 2007 you would have heard those same talking points everywhere.
If only we all had decided collectively that 500$ really was too much for a phone. No it’s like no one even checks the price tag because their carrier is slowly milking it out of them instead.
If only we all had decided collectively that 500$ really was too much for a phone. No it’s like no one even checks the price tag because their carrier is slowly milking it out of them instead.
> No it’s like no one even checks the price tag because their carrier is slowly milking it out of them instead.
Eh, iPhones are still popular in many countries where paying outright for your phone is the norm.
Eh, iPhones are still popular in many countries where paying outright for your phone is the norm.
And thanks to those people who have to have the newest shiny-shiny and allow themselves to be 'milked' that I can pick up a few years old ex-flagship model on eBay for a couple of hundred £££ or less. So long may it continue.
It might've seem funny to those that hadn't seen the future in 2002.
I had a SonyEricsson p900 (The p800, p900 and p910 series was released from 2002-2005) and it had a numpad for quick dialling, but for "smart" usage you really only used the touchscreen that covered most of the front real-estate (and a dial-knob for navigation since they hadn't figured out how to make UI's like Apple did later).
By 2006 however though I was looking to upgrade but SE chickened out and released successors (P990,M600,W950) that _decreased_ touch-screen realestate in favour of num/keypads on the front. It's really sad that they had everything in their hands but fubbed out totally.
But by 2007 the time was definetly right for the iPhone, disappointed by SE I began looking around and there was some "open" phone with touchscreen as well as that LG Prada. I even made a sketch of an ideal device a few weeks before Jobs came on screen.
Late 2006 sketch.. https://whizzter.woorlic.org/jonasphone.jpg
And yes, about as soon as iPhone 3G went on sale in Sweden I got one.
I had a SonyEricsson p900 (The p800, p900 and p910 series was released from 2002-2005) and it had a numpad for quick dialling, but for "smart" usage you really only used the touchscreen that covered most of the front real-estate (and a dial-knob for navigation since they hadn't figured out how to make UI's like Apple did later).
By 2006 however though I was looking to upgrade but SE chickened out and released successors (P990,M600,W950) that _decreased_ touch-screen realestate in favour of num/keypads on the front. It's really sad that they had everything in their hands but fubbed out totally.
But by 2007 the time was definetly right for the iPhone, disappointed by SE I began looking around and there was some "open" phone with touchscreen as well as that LG Prada. I even made a sketch of an ideal device a few weeks before Jobs came on screen.
Late 2006 sketch.. https://whizzter.woorlic.org/jonasphone.jpg
And yes, about as soon as iPhone 3G went on sale in Sweden I got one.
I still miss my two last physical keyboard phones. Nokia E71 [0] as my last pre-Android/Apple-era phone, and HTC Desire Z (T-Mobile G2 in the USA) [1] as my first Android.
Thinking about it, I’d love an updated E71. Small, high-res touch screen, Lineage OS or something similar, physical keyboard. But that would be niche enough that it’d probably be very expensive for what it is.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_E71
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTC_Desire_Z
Thinking about it, I’d love an updated E71. Small, high-res touch screen, Lineage OS or something similar, physical keyboard. But that would be niche enough that it’d probably be very expensive for what it is.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_E71
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTC_Desire_Z
He might be laughing on screen, but internally he was panicking. By the next year he had dismissed Peter Knook and installed myerson and shuttered windows mobile 7 to completely rebuild from scratch windows phone 7.
As far as I remember, in those days here you often paid nothing or very little out of pocket for a new phone. It was more like an extra 10-20EUR on your monthly subscription. At least for the phones normal people had.
It was the same in the US, you could get a new phone for $199 every two years, without any additional statement charge.
However it all changed after T-Mobile’s “uncarrier” bluff, now it’s all about lock you in 36 months with monthly payments and some credit against the payments.
However it all changed after T-Mobile’s “uncarrier” bluff, now it’s all about lock you in 36 months with monthly payments and some credit against the payments.
It was also a "smart phone" with no data connectivity. Not much use giving it all these features and leaving it with a 2G radio stack.
2G has mobile data (via GPRS/EDGE) and the original iPhone absolutely supported it.
You could browse the web on cheap phones much earlier, but the rendering engines were limited (some mobile subset of HTML?). A big selling point of the iPhone was that it included a full browser.
You could browse the web on cheap phones much earlier, but the rendering engines were limited (some mobile subset of HTML?). A big selling point of the iPhone was that it included a full browser.
I used to browse the Web with Opera Mini, which was a J2ME midlet, on feature phones such as Motorola C651 and Nokia 6230i :) It worked by rendering the full blown site server-side and sending it back in a simplified format for the phone to display, which worked much better than bundled browsers which weren't very useful for much more than WML or XHTML-MP. I have also chatted with people via XMPP extensively thanks to Bombus (remember when Google Talk was a fine, open and federated XMPP implementation and pretty much everyone was reachable there? Those were the times...).
Smartphones such as Symbian ones already had more usable native browsers though.
Smartphones such as Symbian ones already had more usable native browsers though.
Yes, but it was 64kbps at most, when everywhere had 8Mbps 3G coverage.
EDGE goes up to 384Kbps, and everywhere most certainly did not have 8Mbps 3G coverage in 2007.
https://www.wired.com/2008/08/global-iphone-3/
https://www.wired.com/2008/08/global-iphone-3/
3G sure was pretty common in 2007. US was always behind when it comes to cellular networks.
> European T-Mobile users reported the fastest 3G Download Speeds: 1,822 Kbps on average.
Getting 8Mb was rare, hence the link. The other poster is taking the theoretical maximum for 3G, and understating 2G, rather than just admitting that his original statement - that the first iPhone didn't have mobile data at all - was just wrong.
Getting 8Mb was rare, hence the link. The other poster is taking the theoretical maximum for 3G, and understating 2G, rather than just admitting that his original statement - that the first iPhone didn't have mobile data at all - was just wrong.
Yeah, but effective 2Mbps was a pretty decent connection speed in 2007, while theoretical maximum of 384Kbps was already underwhelming. Source: I used 2G data around that time extensively :)
Even in the remotest corners of Europe we had absolutely romping 3G coverage.
2G had full internet access, it's just that every smartphone until the iphone had _terrible_ browsers. I had a Windows Mobile 5 device and it was pretty bad, like using IE6 again but low resolution, extremely slow, and navigating with a horrid little joystick to select links.
The first few iPhones also had terrible browsers. When my dad got one in ~2008, Safari would consistently crash 5 seconds after loading apple.com as soon as an animation was triggered. Still a hell of an improvement over my Razr flip phone’s browser.
And around that time, Firefox was being ported to Maemo, being essentially a full-blown browser with mobile UI. It worked on Nokia N810 and N900 first and was ported to Android afterwards, serving there for a few years still before it got reimplemented with Android native APIs.
Maemo also came with their own MicroB browser that utilized Gecko engine already and performed really well.
Maemo also came with their own MicroB browser that utilized Gecko engine already and performed really well.
It was unbelievably slow, and everyone was already on 3G by the time the first iPhone launched.
It's hardly slow. Just checked local plans for what I get for $20/mo prepaid and it's about $150usd/mo for one of those awful folding things.
For those who are not familiar, the other guy is Mike Zafirovski, Nortel's last CEO before they went bust.
To me this really makes this video a fine historical document.
To me this really makes this video a fine historical document.
What a terrible leader
As mentioned in comments on the video, he's responsible for XBox and Azure, so not all bad.
An Azure that was going to be Windows only.
What Ballmer actually succeeded in doing was entrenching windows inside every enterprise Fortune 500 by basically bundling everything from Office, Sharepoint, SQL server etc. This business is still going strong and switching to a subscription model. Before Ballmer, Microsoft was a consumer OS company.
What Ballmer actually succeeded in doing was entrenching windows inside every enterprise Fortune 500 by basically bundling everything from Office, Sharepoint, SQL server etc. This business is still going strong and switching to a subscription model. Before Ballmer, Microsoft was a consumer OS company.
Before Ballmer, Microsoft was a consumer OS company.
Microsoft was always a business facing company. Companies used NT from the start of time, and every business on the planet has been using Windows since the 90s. Microsoft has spent its entire lifetime slowly strangling and destroying other businesses, and pulling them over to their product lines.
Word vs Wordperfect is one example. Wordperfect used to be completely dominant.
Ballmer may have etched up Windows dominance a few points in a few markets, and I agree he continued this trend. He continued to expand into new markets. But it seems very weird to hear someone say he is responsible for getting businesses to use Windows, or caused M$ to focus on businesses.
Microsoft was always a business facing company. Companies used NT from the start of time, and every business on the planet has been using Windows since the 90s. Microsoft has spent its entire lifetime slowly strangling and destroying other businesses, and pulling them over to their product lines.
Word vs Wordperfect is one example. Wordperfect used to be completely dominant.
Ballmer may have etched up Windows dominance a few points in a few markets, and I agree he continued this trend. He continued to expand into new markets. But it seems very weird to hear someone say he is responsible for getting businesses to use Windows, or caused M$ to focus on businesses.
>What a terrible leader
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMrhoOHNOrI
Sorry. I couldn't resist dredging up this old classic. It used to be compulsory viewing any time Steve Ballmer was mentioned.
Although, on a more practical level; with winter approaching and huge energy price rises on the horizon, the burning feeling of vicarious embarrassment you get while watching this might be a warm blessing on those cold December evenings ahead.
Pretty sure he just said whatever he needed to say to promote Microsoft. I can't take anything what any tech leader said/says as truth or their honest opinion. They all have something to sell.
Well, who would have thought back then that Apple would actually succeed in making the whole industry be taking multiple steps back for many years ahead?