An Inside Look at Google's Reaction to the Original iPhone Introduction

[kdarling]

Apple and it's display partner were the first to invent a multitouch method that was suitable for production on scale not even fathomable before ...

It wasn't that multi-touch sensors weren't available, it was more that most manufacturers were geared up to make much larger screens.

Synaptics, who makes the touchpads in darned near every laptop... including Apple's... almost certainly could have produced such smaller sensors on the scale necessary.

In 2006, they were showing off one of the hottest concept phones, the Onyx, with their demo UI that included neat features like dragging one person's picture on top of another to set up a conference call, or dragging a GPS flag onto a contact in order to send them a map.

Their multi-point capacitive surface was sensitive enough to detect fingertips or finger edges, and discern a cheek from a finger. You could even kiss the phone and it could send the lip image it sensed:



It had a borderless screen surface on top of an aluminum back. One blogger described the whole device as "sexy":



The August 2006 Onyx prototype was just one reason why everyone was expecting all-touch phones to take off. Even MacRumors suggested that it might be the tech used in the rumored touch based iPod and iPhone that many were expecting back then.

 

[blackhand1001]

I would take this reaction with a grain of salt. There is absolutely nothing about this Chris Desalvo guy other than this news story.

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No - I didn't say that at all.

If ANY COMPANY released something FIRST, that actually WORKS, I credit them for INVENTING such technology.

The first working multi-touch display was APPLE. Therefore, APPLE invented this. Other companies INVENTED crappy non-working multi-touch displays, but APPLE invented the good WORKING multi-touch displays.

Edison didn't 'invent' electricity. He was the first (with Tesla) to allow people to use it without killing themselves. Someone coming up with a lamp that you plug in which kills you, does not get full credit.

If company Android, Inc. invents Android, then GOOGLE buys company Android, Inc., GOOGLE has therefore invented Android. Simple. Not fanboyism. Just the way the world works. (That's actually what happened - are you going to tell me Google didn't invent Android now?)

Not true at all. Microsoft had working surface tables before the iphone was even revealed. They even had demoed pinch to zoom on it.

 

[Burger Thing]

When reading through this thread (or this forums in general) the usual vocal posters here seem to suggest, that Apple was just riding along on the inevitable change to multitouch phones. Well, if this technology was pretty readily available and everyone and its dog was building prototype devices, then I find it strange, that Google (as per this article) and especially the market leader Nokia that time overlooked this 'obvious' turn in developments. Strange also, that it took them years to catch up?

It is one thing to hack together a pretty prototype but to have something usable for the masses is an entirely different beast. I am certainly not a fanboy but man, give some credit. They took the risk and built and marketed something different, than what the phone market had to offer that time. While it was lacking some features other phones had to offer (think MMS), it was conceived by many as the first true pocket internet computer. It was light years ahead in terms of usability, fluidness and fun factor overall.

 

[Michael Scrip]

When reading through this thread (or this forums in general) the usual vocal posters here seem to suggest, that Apple was just riding along on the inevitable change to multitouch phones. Well, if this technology was pretty readily available and everyone and its dog was building prototype devices, then I find it strange, that Google (as per this article) and especially the market leader Nokia that time overlooked this 'obvious' turn in developments. Strange also, that it took them years to catch up?

Exactly! Where were the other companies' next-gen prototypes? What were they working on?

People always mention the LG Prada with its capacitive touchscreen. While it's true that the LG Prada was publicly shown in September 2006... it obviously didn't have the effect that the iPhone did in January 2007.

And... if capacitive screens were so obvious... why didn't anyone else have one around that same time? Surely something would have leaked out by now...

Strange also, that it took [Google] years to catch up?

You have to look at the timeline of events leading up it.

Apple started developing multitouch glass screen in the early 2000's. They were originally thinking about making a tablet device... but they decided to make a phone instead.

After Steve Jobs met with Cingular in February 2005... the iPhone project was officially greenlit.

Apple worked throughout 2005 on hardware and software. By September 2005... Apple had 200 engineers working on the iPhone. And by the end of 2005 the iPhone project was at full speed.

Google, on the other hand, didn't even purchase Android until July 2005.

That means by the time Google was up to speed with incorporating Android into their company... Apple already had tons of engineers working on hardware and software. That might be why Google was a little behind.

There's also this... Google put all their effort into a Blackberry styled device... (even if they were considering a touchscreen device as well)

Throughout 2006... both Apple and Google worked on their final prototypes. Apple's prototype eventually became the multitouch iPhone we all saw in January 2007... while Google's QWERTY prototype went back to the drawing board.

Google had originally expected Android to be certified by carriers in the summer of 2007, at which point it'd be released to manufacturers. Of course, it wasn't until October of 2008 that the first Android phone hit the market.

As per this article... I think we know why it took Google an extra year

 

[LordVic]

When reading through this thread (or this forums in general) the usual vocal posters here seem to suggest, that Apple was just riding along on the inevitable change to multitouch phones. Well, if this technology was pretty readily available and everyone and its dog was building prototype devices, then I find it strange, that Google (as per this article) and especially the market leader Nokia that time overlooked this 'obvious' turn in developments. Strange also, that it took them years to catch up?

It is one thing to hack together a pretty prototype but to have something usable for the masses is an entirely different beast. I am certainly not a fanboy but man, give some credit. They took the risk and built and marketed something different, than what the phone market had to offer that time. While it was lacking some features other phones had to offer (think MMS), it was conceived by many as the first true pocket internet computer. It was light years ahead in terms of usability, fluidness and fun factor overall.

one of the reasons why Apple got there first, by a large margin is this thing that occurs regularly in companies.

Momentum.

Nokia, google, and most of the companies who were already working on phones at the time, While they had some prototypes, R&D and the like going, and even demoed what they were doing, where all stuck by momentum that they previously had using existing technologies.

The new tech's were coming, and they were working on it. But it's hard when you have been selling phones for 10+ years exactly the same way with same manufacturing methods and the same business ethos to suddenly switch directions and think outside the box.. They were working on such devices like the iPhone, but they due to prior history in the tech market figured it was either A, a long way off or B, afraid to hurt or change business directions from what was already working.

Apple was not saddled by Momentum in the mobile phone space. They had nothing prior to the iPhone. They were Able to start fresh and new without a corporate mandate to continue exactly the way they always were. Also put Steve Jobs at the helm.

Nobody here is discounting what they did. They released a product that was excellently designed. Actually worked well, had the Apple logo on it, and a company with a strong reputation for building quality devices that just work.

They were Able to jump the gun on these types of devices because of their freedom in the market and a leader who could steer the ship quite quickly if he wanted.

They did change the course of history by doing so. NOBODY is saying otherwise.

ONly thing people are saying is that Apple didnt invent the world here. like all technology that has come before them. And all technology that has come after them. Everyone stands on the shoulders of eachother.

 

[kdarling]

Even obvious and inevitable changes often take more time to deploy than expected.

Heck, Apple waited years before they finally made a fairly simple (and overdue) UI makeover.

If the iPhone finally gets a large screen next year, then it will have also taken Apple many years to come out with a desirable option that was not just obvious, but selling well for other companies - no guesswork needed.

And those are relatively minor changes. Imagine the inertia and legacy issues that other companies faced, who had been making phones for decades.

 

[hchung]

You're right about what is needed, but everything you mentioned about target size, response, effects etc was well researched and documented to anyone working in the touch field for the past decade or two.

Oh I agree they're well researched and well documented. But that doesn't do much good if rarely implemented.

I'm out of town, so I left my Nexus at home and therefore can't get screenshots. But it's a perfect example of how despite the decades of UI research, people still don't know how to properly space their buttons and sliders. Google Play Music on Android 4.x simples crowds too much too closely. Likewise, the iPod App on iOS7.
Google, I could understand; UI is just not their forte.
Apple, on the other hand, shouldn't have gone backwards.

Fitts' law and button targets for cursors on desktops have been researched at least as long and you can see bad decisions all over the place there too. Having the Windows-style menubar-within-a-window in Linux desktop environments shows that research is useless if nobody reads it.

Now that I've insulted every major platform, nobody can call me a fanboy, huh?

 

[hchung]

It wasn't that multi-touch sensors weren't available, it was more that most manufacturers were geared up to make much larger screens.

Synaptics, who makes the touchpads in darned near every laptop... including Apple's... almost certainly could have produced such smaller sensors on the scale necessary.

No, you're clearly mistaken.

For the initial iPhone launch, there was no way that Synaptics (nor TI, Motorola, Cypress) would have been able to have suitable sensors available for launch because they just didn't have any capable of tracking 2 fingers independently.

Onyx was built using two Synaptics ClearPad prototypes place side by side over a Nokia communicator screen. It multi-touch capabilities were limited to a subset of the gestures we expect. pinch zoom is possible in most cases, but independent tracking was not, as ClearPad was not capable of full 2D tracking of more than one point. The only claim to full multi-touch capabilities exists while each of two fingers are placed one on each of the two panels.

We know this because Synaptics debuted the ClearPad with the LG Prada, and also contributed to the HTC Dream.

More about their limitations are discussed at the end of this.

The original iPhone could track something like 5 independent fingers. I had heard it was most likely Balta/TPK that supplied the panels, however the controllers used custom Apple code.

 

[i4m]

And they will do something similar with the TV, despite the naysayers. I don't know how and I don't know when, but apple will revolutionize the TV or TV watching experience and it will be just as out of left field as the original iPhone.

yeah, but at what cost to the consumer?

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come on. why do people constantly say this crap

Apple stood on the shoulders of those before them as equally as people have stood on the shoulders of Apple.
Dont get me wrong. Apple had the right product, at the right time, with the right design and the right marketting know how to change the game. nobody is denying that.

But the world was already moving towards smartphones with touch screens. There were many on the market before the iphone, albeit maybe not as fancy or pretty.

The iPhone (Nor any other phones and technology) were not created ina vacume. They are the end product of years of industry advancements from the microcomponents to the overall design.

Apple might have been a catalyst to hurry on the storm of smartphones, but you can't say that smartphones wouldn't have gone this way on their own either

Maybe because Steve Jobs himself disagreed with you. You know that famous quote about destroying Android because it is a stolen phone?

 

[Michael Goff]

yeah, but at what cost to the consumer?

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Maybe because Steve Jobs himself disagreed with you. You know that famous quote about destroying Android because it is a stolen phone?

Whoa, Steve Jobs wanted to destroy the main competitor to the iPhone?

Say it ain't so.

 

[i4m]

Sigh. I know, even though I've been pointing it out for years, with evidence about hardware, development. and especially the market forces at the time. So instead, let me just quote from the same book about why Google bought Android:

Maybe i'm missing something, but why does it matter so much that Android was "initially" targeted at the Windows phone, given that Google instantly became Apple's competitor with the release of Android (Not unbeknownst to the Google executives - mind you - according to this article).

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what are they winning?

... market share?...

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Just speaks to how competent Google's engineering team is.
Sees a change is required, does it and does it well.

Yes, true, and also shows that they recognized the potential and game-changing nature of the phone being released.

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What's the distinguishing factor between the Google, iOS, and Palm OS GUI?

Or the Newton OS? (other than color)

Gary

well it is plain to see: from the images posted, i presume Palm OS on left and Newton on right, aside from the color, the icons are larger and more detailed on the Palm OS.

Is that the answer you were looking for? Because i could swear that an OS amounts to more than the sum of its icons.

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.... and now Apple is copying Google.

That's why we need Forstall back... we need the IOS to be 60% Forstall and only 40% Ive.

 

[Renzatic]

Maybe because Steve Jobs himself disagreed with you. You know that famous quote about destroying Android because it is a stolen phone?

And how's that thermonuclear war going? For a product that's apparently been stolen by the competition wholesale, it's a little strange that Apple hasn't tried attacking Google directly over such? Instead, they're nickel and diming everyone else for simple, relatively low key UI features like screen bounce and slide to unlock, and losing half those battles, rather than going for the throat and destroying Android completely for ripping off iOS from the ground up.

I think the whole thermonuclear war spiel was a subtle attempt at marketing via an appeal to emotion on Steve Job's part. And it worked, because we're still talking about it to this day.

 

[i4m]

Another interesting revelation in the book, is about a wish that people used to bring up here all the time (an iPhone mini):



Rubinstein, of course, is not only known for the iPod, but for leaving Apple for Palm and pushing the development of WebOS.

This brings up my favorite topic, which is: Companies don't invent things. People do.

And in Silicon Valley, it's quite often the same people involved over and over again, just for different companies... moving where their ideas can be brought to fruition. In Rubinstein's case, it was the idea of an HTML based OS with a multitasking card paradigm.

Interesting.. What consumers want though, is a smaller phone with a larger screen

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Typical fanboy reaction. Apple can do no wrong. Uh-huh... Pot meets Kettle. Apple has copied plenty of other companies starting with Xerox Parc.

They should expect this sort of thing, since CEO's of these Tech company sit on each others Board of Directors.

Your reaction could also be said to resemble that of an Android fanboi...
Why don't you address the comment itself rather than concern yourself with the poster's personal preference.

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Most people forget that around the time Android launched and started out, Jailbreaking was well established. Android took everything it could out of the jailbreak community to help Android become what it is today.

Apple just took back what was rightfully in its own backyard prior to Android stealing those features and making it theirs.

People forget this recent history from a few short years back. Unreal.

so true!

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Wrong. There is nothing leggy or buggy about iOS on the phone I have. The fact that iOS and Android now look similar has as much to do with Android migrating to Apples way of doing things as it does Apple copying Androids skin and moving away from skeumorphism.

Yes, there is something buggy about iOS 7 for sure.

 

[kdarling]

Oh I agree they're well researched and well documented. But that doesn't do much good if rarely implemented.

So true, and I think we could point out inconsistencies on any device.

For the initial iPhone launch, there was no way that Synaptics (nor TI, Motorola, Cypress) would have been able to have suitable sensors available for launch because they just didn't have any capable of tracking 2 fingers independently.

Thanks, I was unclear. I meant (in my head) that Apple could've worked with Synaptics to get enough suitable sensors for launch.

The original iPhone could track something like 5 independent fingers. I had heard it was most likely Balta/TPK that supplied the panels, however the controllers used custom Apple code.

Yes sir, as I detailed in post #347.

This all brings up a good point though. A lot of people say multi-touch was the big deal with the iPhone, but I disagree. I think the iPhone would've been just as popular without multi-touch capability.

Apple said multi-touch was needed for keyboard rollover, but I think a Swype like method would've solved that.

Multi-touch was also not necessary for a finger friendly UI on such a tiny screen, and dependence on it can sometimes conflict with easy one-handed usage. (E.g. pinch zoom with no one-handed way to zoom back out again.)

 

[titanz91]

One minor detail. Apple didn't steal the tech from Xerox. They partnered and paid for it. It's Xerox managements fault for not realizing what they had.

Microsoft, Samsung, and Google blatantly stole from Apple.

Irrelevant. They still copied it, whether allowed to or purchased. The fact is, they didn't come up with the idea themselves, they copied someone elses.

 

[Michael Scrip]

Irrelevant. They still copied it, whether allowed to or purchased. The fact is, they didn't come up with the idea themselves, they copied someone elses.

So if Apple copied from Xerox... then that means Microsoft copied from Apple and Xerox.

Doesn't that make Microsoft an even bigger fraud?

 

[Renzatic]

So if Apple copied from Xerox... then that means Microsoft copied from Apple and Xerox.

Doesn't that make Microsoft an even bigger fraud?

Considering a bunch of those same Xerox guys ended up working for both Apple AND Microsoft, I'd say the whole point of who copied who only matters to people arguing about crap on messageboards. From inside the industry, it's just a bunch of people moving about working on what they do best.

Though admittedly, MS was found guilty of infringing on one thing Apple did with the GUI. It's the reason why Windows uses the Recycle Bin, while Apple has the Trash can.

 

[LordVic]

So if Apple copied from Xerox... then that means Microsoft copied from Apple and Xerox.

Doesn't that make Microsoft an even bigger fraud?

copying equal fraud now?

that word, I do not think it means what you think it means...


and yes, Microsoft did borrow heavily from those who came before it. Just like apple did as well.

However, by the time Microsoft came around with their GUI, there was actually a standards term and UI concept that had come along with a group of companies to come up with the standard which Windows used for their GUI system called "WIMP"

Microsoft adhered more to the WIMP paradigm and standards in Windows than outright attempt to copy Apple. Alongside at the time anyone else who was attempting a GUI system.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WIMP_(computing)

Apple tried for years to sue Microsoft and failed quite a lot. because of the standards of WIMP in computing, Apple came along after WIMP was already out there, so they were never able to succesfully sue Microsoft over similarities in UI.

 

[Michael Scrip]

copying equal fraud now?

that word, I do not think it means what you think it means...

There's a difference between committing "fraud" and someone being "a fraud"

And the smiley face should have signaled my intent. I'm sorry for using a silly choice of words.

But the main point of my comment was the first line anyway. I should have summed it up like this:

If copying is bad... isn't copying a copier even worse?​

Both you and Renzatic have cleared some things up though... and I thank you both.

 

[LordVic]

There's a difference between committing "fraud" and someone being "a fraud"

And the smiley face should have signaled my intent. I'm sorry for using a silly choice of words.

But the main point of my comment was the first line anyway. I should have summed it up like this:

If copying is bad... isn't copying a copier even worse?​

Both you and Renzatic have cleared some things up though... and I thank you both.

Just for a record, I'm not a fan of outright theft of intellectual property and ideas that are fully explanable and worked out

But, i do understand that immitation isn't necessarily copying, especially if new methods are used to accomplish similar, concepts.

there's a saying.

there is more than one way to skin a cat.

Just because the end result is a skinned cat, doesn't mean its identical.

 

[Michael Scrip]

Just for a record, I'm not a fan of outright theft of intellectual property and ideas that are fully explanable and worked out

But, i do understand that immitation isn't necessarily copying, especially if new methods are used to accomplish similar, concepts.

there's a saying.

there is more than one way to skin a cat.

Just because the end result is a skinned cat, doesn't mean its identical.

True!

By the way... I originally replied to titanz91 who used the word "copied"

That's where I got the word... and tried to make a joke from it.

 

[LordVic]

True!

By the way... I originally replied to titanz91 who used the word "copied"

That's where I got the word... and tried to make a joke from it.

if the world was made to only ever allow only one way of ever doing something... just imagine..

we'd still be driving Model T's.

We'd be using typewriters... no wait, Printing press.. no ... ROCK CAVE CARVINGS!

people do not seem to grasp the notion that every single invention, process, ever made and created by humankind all came as an evolutionary step from the time when Cavemen discovered fire.

if some bold scholar (not myself), ever decided he had a lifelong goal, it would be to catlogue the entire timeline of human invention. the one thing you will see is that Nothing came from nothing. Everything came from something before it.

advances always happen when someone takes something before it and updates it, changes it or makes it different enough for it to accomplish things in new ways, or different ways.

mobile phoen tech isn't any different. Apple rocked the world with the iPhone. But the groundwork was there. set by years, decades, centuries of prior human knowledge and ingenuity.

I love the human race. we are sometimes so incredibly smart and as a massive whole we are brilliant, Absolutely Brilliant.

 

[Michael Scrip]

if the world was made to only ever allow only one way of ever doing something... just imagine..

we'd still be driving Model T's.

We'd be using typewriters... no wait, Printing press.. no ... ROCK CAVE CARVINGS!

people do not seem to grasp the notion that every single invention, process, ever made and created by humankind all came as an evolutionary step from the time when Cavemen discovered fire.

if some bold scholar (not myself), ever decided he had a lifelong goal, it would be to catlogue the entire timeline of human invention. the one thing you will see is that Nothing came from nothing. Everything came from something before it.

advances always happen when someone takes something before it and updates it, changes it or makes it different enough for it to accomplish things in new ways, or different ways.

mobile phoen tech isn't any different. Apple rocked the world with the iPhone. But the groundwork was there. set by years, decades, centuries of prior human knowledge and ingenuity.

I love the human race. we are sometimes so incredibly smart and as a massive whole we are brilliant, Absolutely Brilliant.

Well said!

Are we done here? All I did was make a silly joke reply to titanz91... I never imagined it would result in half a dozen additional replies... maybe you should reply directly to him to clear up his confusion about "copying" and "not coming up with the idea themselves"

 

[LordVic]

Well said!

Are we done here? All I did was make a silly joke reply to titanz91... I never imagined it would result in half a dozen additional replies... maybe you should reply directly to him to clear up his confusion about "copying" and "not coming up with the idea themselves"

he knows how to read (I assume)

but yeah. Have a good evening!(and a happy holidays)

 

[Renzatic]

Just because the end result is a skinned cat, doesn't mean its identical.

In terms of IP, it's more like "there are a thousand ways to skin a cat, and you can claim ownership to some of the ways to do it. But you can't include the skinned cat itself in your patent".

And...yeah...that's gross as hell.