10 Years Ago Today, the Original iPhone Officially Launched

[Macaholic868]

You mean among the elementary school population? Otherwise that is a silly statement that could only have been made by someone who was a child 10 years ago and has zero personal or historical reference to the world before that time.

10 years ago "Crackberries" were so prevalent candidate Barack Obama jokingly lamented he didn't think he could live in the WH without one. The SS made had to get a special secured one for him. Palms were also quite common.

The big differentiators between the original iPhone and a Palm were the iPhone's keyboard/style-less touch screen, full Internet, and it was more pocketable. Both the Blackberry and Palm had apps. The original iPhone didn't even have SMS or 3G, both which were quite common in 2007.

What is amazing is how Steve Jobs singlehandedly changed how cellco's operate. Before the iPhone cellcos decided on the hardware specs, they decided on what software would come loaded. If anyone doesn't like Apple's "walled garden," they would have detested cellco's "iron prison" pre-iPhone. That was the real game changer of the first iPhone. Then Apple adjusted the price of the original iPhone. Then it started letting developers make apps for it and that was the end of Cellco control of phone hardware and software.

Agreed. Here’s where I think many people get mixed up. Smart phones, and PDA’s before them, were prevelant in the business world prior to the iPhone. The iPhone didn’t bring smart phones into the world, the iPhone brought smart phones to the masses. Smart phones were business class devices. The iPhone was aimed at consumers who had an iPod in one pocket and a cellphone in their other pocket who didn’t want to carry two devices.

I purchased the original iPhone for that very reason. I was tired of carrying both a cellphone and an iPod. Only having to carry one device was great, especially one that made loading the music I wanted on the device very easy. If you knew how to load songs in iTunes onto an iPod you knew how to do it with the iPhone. That was the primary driver of my purchase. I didn’t come to appreciate the smart phone features until after I bought it. As it turns out that was Apple’s intent. They knew the cellphone was the one device that could usurp the iPod and they knew they had to get ahead of that.

 

[JustSoldOut]

I worked for At&t Wireless at the time. The lines for that thing was insane! I had never seen anything like that for a phone. And this was b4 ppl ordered their phone online and had it shipped. It was like a Black Friday event, only it happened every day for months. None of us had the phone personally unless we wanted to pay the same full price for the phone. But we all swooned over the display model daily. It was a sight to see.

I was clueless and startled by the mob in the AT&T Store parking lot launch morning. I thought some kind of riot was going on.
Little did I know how much $ I would spend on iPhones/iPads for the family over the next decade and that my future children's first clearly spoken words would not be 'Mommy' or 'Daddy' but 'My iPad'.

 

[Born Again]

remember that guy that bought the nokia n95 and said that it's better than an iphone?

he's dead now.

 

[CrystalQuest76]

10 years ago, no one had a smart phone - at least, not one like this one! Now, most people in many countries do. Pretty amazing.

There was the Palm Trio. It did not have graphical web browsing and could add a number of apps.

 

[adepew]

Still have my original and booted up just fine.

How cool to own a piece of history.

Great name too!

 

[jadot]

I remember my initial reaction to the iPhone that it will distract people from driving as they have to look down to rule the phone number. But from there, I have been with iPhone until iPhone 6. I just traded in my iPhone 3g you get galaxy s8. I think SJ was the best when it comes to designing hardware that's so beyond our imagination. And now it's a different story. I cringe every time I see those airpods!

Ouch. I guess that's gonna hurt Apple's '1 Billion iPhone's Sold' marketing trope. They should try harder now that Steve Jobs is dead, etc.

 

[DUIduckSAUCE]

Absolutely not true. Blackberry's were in a lot of hands in the business world.

Exactly, got a 2g on a whim the day after launch. The internet experience was amazing compared to my blackberry, but as a productivity device, the iPhone was crap. Took until the 4 until I bought another iPhone.

 

[chrono1081]

Absolutely not true. Blackberry's were in a lot of hands in the business world.

I used to sell black berries, they could hardly be considered a true smart phone, they were just a phone that did a little more.

The internet was largely unusable, the navigation sucked, people only liked them because at the time they were the most functional thing out there unless you had a Palm Pilot or Clie.

 

[Chupa Chupa]

remember that guy that bought the nokia n95 and said that it's better than an iphone?

he's dead now.

Or was he ever alive? Not just merely breathing, but ALIVE!

 

[BC2009]

The original iPhone was really cool. Whenever I saw it in somebody's hands I wanted to touch it and check it out and play with it. But there were shortcomings that kept me from buying an iPhone until the iPhone 3GS came out. For me, I was holding out for a GPS navigation app to be available since I used one of those apps on my Palm Treo. Apple showed off Tom Tom at WWDC that year the 3GS came out, but NAVIGON was first to market and was my first big app purchase. I still use NAVIGON today because it lets you download and save your Maps. That is great when traveling in parts of the country without cell signal. Although around town I rely on Apple Maps because it works great with Siri and has surpassed NAVIGON in POI information. With iOS 11 Apple Maps will get one of NAVIGON's best features: Lane assistance/guidance. NAVIGON has had that feature since the beginning.

 

[62tele]

Smartphone, hah! Now we have smart watches, and to varying degrees, smart cars.
I have some of my iPhone on my dash of my car with Apple CarPlay. When my 5 year old granddaughter heard Siri reading messages to me, she said "this is a very smart car".
It's not just what iPhone changed that day; it's what it continues to change with related products.
I was a skeptic at first but my brother had one on the first day. Soon after, I knew I wanted one.

 

[Steve121178]

"It doesn't appeal to business customers because it doesn't have a keyboard!"

Daft oaf.

 

[iObama]

Palm, Blackberry, Windows Mobile.

I can remember two acquaintances in high school having smartphones in 2007 -- one Windows Mobile and one BlackBerry.

Walk into a high school in 2017 and tell me it's anywhere near the same.

 

[slash7844]

I remember the comments I used to get.
- "I would never be able to type on a screen. I need buttons."
- "It's way too big, it almost doesn't fit in my pockets."
Those were the usual suspects. Now, who's laughing.

Yup. Steve Jobs said noone will buy big phones because you can't wrap your hands around it, referring to 4-5 inch Galaxies. Where are small iphones at?

 

[nburwell]

That's not true. I had a Palm Treo. There were even two versions, one that ran Palm OS and another that ran Windows Mobile. I had the Palm OS version, and it sucked ass. But it was a smart phone.

This is the same phone I was using for work when the iPhone was released. I then moved to a BlackBerry Curve as my personal device until I caved and finally purchased the 8GB iPhone via Apple's web site. I even moved from Verizon to AT&T just because I wanted the iPhone. And when I got the device, I could not put it down. I haven't looked back since.

 

[TheShadowKnows!]

Ahhh!
Memories.

 

[pnoyblazed]

I was in college when this dropped, how time flies

 

[ani4ani]

Funny my memory says it was quite a muted uptake, i.e. after a few weeks they had to drop the price by $100 because demand had been pretty poor.

Didn't help that it was launched with a single carrier in the handful of launch countries

Also, the phone would be called a poor feature phone these days when it launched; no apps, not even cut n paste! Basically a phone with a web browser; there were phones at the time which were already using MS office apps.

 

[deany]

Truly amazing!, well done Steve Jobs and apple.

Bought the original iPhone and said to everyone I know "I'll never buy another make of phone again" ......proved correct, so far.

 

[slash7844]

The original poster should have said that 99% of normal, regular people didn't have personal smart phones before the iPhone. That is true. Now, practically everyone has personal smart phones.

A lot of people had smartphones before iphone. What is the source of your 99%? It wasn't until launch of Android when smartphone sales skyrocketed.

 

[forerunnerg34]

My first thought was: amazing presentation. software ahead of its time. Ugly hardware. iPhone 4 design was the one that made me buy a smart phone, then iPhone 5 black (I still miss it).

 

[braddick]

Regarding the price drop, Apple really did want the iPhone to be "more affordable," and a lower price was icing on an already sweet cake. A lower price doesn't mean desperation-- it's Apple doing what Apple does: breaking the mold and making things better for consumers.

 

[Applebot1]

Amazing product and so glad I witnessed a game changer. I've had one since the original and they are truly the best phone out there.

Will be interesting going forward how it will evolve.

 

[Labeno]

I was amazed when it was announced. I stood in line for 2 hours to get three (yes 3) iPhones on day 1. One for me, one for my wife, and one for my brother. I never switch to Android or another model because the quality and eco system is not matched by any others. Looking very forward to the next iPhone.

 

[peterdevries]

A lot of people had smartphones before iphone. What is the source of your 99%? It wasn't until launch of Android when smartphone sales skyrocketed.

You can try to spin it in another direction. The central point that the people before you were making is that smartphones that were available before the iPhone were a purely business affair. The iPhone was the first smartphone that found its way into the hands of the regular consumer, the teenager, the parent, the tech savvy person; basically everyone. It went from a niche product to a mainstream product.