>This is a very common trend in this entire debate that saddens me to no end: the iPhone is being compared to simple feature phones, while in fact, it should be compared to its true predecessor: the PDA. PDAs have always done with few buttons.
So,
1) having "few" buttons + stylus 2) in a different product category 3) in devices that very few people bought or cared about, means, in Thom's reasoning, that the iPhone was obvious.
Meanwhile, let's see the OSNEWS first review of the device, back in the day: (...) And it's innovative too. Everything seems to work via multi-touch, a touchscreen-based input method (...)
Searching for the review, I found this gem:
>This may seem like a bold statement. Apple's just released iPhone is not only very attractive as we would expect from an Apple product, but includes some impressive features and specifications. It's probably unrealistic to claim that anything currently available on the market competes with this offering. However, is it really a revolution in mobile communication devices? Maybe not if there still is something that can overshadow it, and do it very soon.
The thing that would overshadow the iPhone "very soon" was OpenMoko.
Not only the reviews of the people who had tried the device were glowing, even of those who turned into Apple haters lately (either because of the trial or because of app store policies), but the opinion of those who had NOT tried the device is even more interesting, as 99% of those who had never tried a device that had an actually working touchscreen, with the right software inside, thought that the iPhone could only fail ! Everyone was predicting the failure of the iPhone because they couldn't imagine a device without a keyboard nor a stylus could work.
This is the kind of drivel that was shared around the internet at the time of the iPhone's release :
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=iphone
One of the first lines : "First of all, the E70 has a full keyboard, not some shitty stripped down, tap-and-pray smudgy piece of shit."
I wonder what the author and the people who spread that link all over the internet at the time think of most Android handsets, Windows Phone, since they hated so much the idea of a phone without a keyboard.
When you look at the criticism from those who had not tried the device you really have to stop and ask : was the iPhone obvious ? The answer itself is obvious, and it's no, it wasn't. They couldn't imagine a phone that could be usable without a keyboard until they tried it with their own hands. "Tap and pray" ? hahaha.
He also has an entire website devoted to making fun of childrens' drawings.
Point being, Maddox should never, ever, ever, be taken even remotely seriously. Why criticize his "full keyboard" line and not his "I ate the neighbor's kids" article?
Because I'm not really criticizing Maddox himself, but the people who really took that page seriously and used it as part of all their anti-iPhone pseudo analysis during the great flamewars in 2007. You didn't really need to delve further into the site because I already knew about the kind of stuff it is.
Point is, most people in 2007 were criticizing the iPhone for not having a keyboard. That funny maddox link had an opportunity to be taken seriously. Make a google search for things posted in 2007 and you'll see by yourself what people who never handled an iPhone at the time thought of the idea of a phone 100% operated with a touchscreen. How many predicted the iPhone would fail way before anyone even had the opportunity to test one ? sounds like the iPhone and what it does wasn't that obvious.
"illegitimate patents": perhaps, but like others have pointed out, it sounds like your beef shouldn't be with Apple, but with patent system. If Apple has illegitimate patents, I suspect some of the 24,000 patents Google acquired from Motorola Mobility are as well.
I don't begrudge Apple the necessity of obtaining patents for things that shouldn't be patentable in our broken system- otherwise they would be the ones getting sued. However, the use of them to attack competitors that independently developed technology is what bothers me, whether it's Google, Apple, Microsoft, or a do-nothing patent troll that is doing the suing.
This is the best response to the current "it wasn't really innovative" fad -- going back and quoting the reviews of the time, especially from detractors and skeptics. None were saying the iPhone was just more of the same inside a shiny marketing package.
I think the individual pieces of the first iPhone didn't seem innovative to many.
The camera was "meh" and didn't do video, the screen wasn't nearly as nice as the VGA screen on my e800, the OS didn't support 3rd party apps, where was 3G?, etc. etc.
The thing was that the gestalt of the iPhone was vastly superior to any of its predecessors.
They prioritized the right things -- anyone who had a Windows phone who had their phone crash during a call or forgot to quit the camera app and saw their battery die in a hour can attest to that.
>The camera was "meh" and didn't do video, the screen wasn't nearly as nice as the VGA screen on my e800, the OS didn't support 3rd party apps, where was 3G?, etc. etc.
With that you reminded me of the now classic response of Slashdot's Commander Taco when the first iPod was introduced:
You're forgetting the point we are debating here. No-one claims the iPod was innovative. It was simply an excellent product with a well-thought out blend of features that was marketed well.
So you're having a 'was the iPhone a great product' debate whereas this discussion is 'was the iPhone a radical innovation in design'.
Innovation is not only technical in the most narrow term ("first device with an SSD", "new display technology").
There's also innovation in product design (how you've desided to build your product), and also market innovation (how you selected your market and marketed your product to it).
So,
1) having "few" buttons + stylus 2) in a different product category 3) in devices that very few people bought or cared about, means, in Thom's reasoning, that the iPhone was obvious.
Meanwhile, let's see the OSNEWS first review of the device, back in the day: (...) And it's innovative too. Everything seems to work via multi-touch, a touchscreen-based input method (...)
Searching for the review, I found this gem:
>This may seem like a bold statement. Apple's just released iPhone is not only very attractive as we would expect from an Apple product, but includes some impressive features and specifications. It's probably unrealistic to claim that anything currently available on the market competes with this offering. However, is it really a revolution in mobile communication devices? Maybe not if there still is something that can overshadow it, and do it very soon.
The thing that would overshadow the iPhone "very soon" was OpenMoko.