Steve Jobs did listen to customers--more than most business executives. He famously read his own email and would write back to customers directly. He made major strategic decisions based on customer feedback, for instance by reversing direction and releasing an SDK for native apps on the iPhone.
He just didn't let customers set the future direction of products. The reason for that is well explained in The Innovator's Dilemma.
That's what he said in public, but there was a lot of suspicion that an SDK just wasn't ready for the iPhone launch, but was planned all along. Jobs never would have gone on stage and talked about how an SDK was ~ a year down the road, during the launch of a brand new product. It would have detracted from the, "look at this brand new shiny thing that we've built," buzz.
Every piece of reporting I've read, including books like Isaacson's bio and Lashinsky's Inside Apple, shows that the initial plan was to not have an SDK for the iPhone, because of fears about security and terrible apps "ruining" the experience.
It was only after it launched that Jobs reversed himself and Apple came up with the idea of the App Store process to manage those fears.
It's not as though the public SDK was a totally new thing. It contained some new components, but AFAIK most of it was existing stuff that they just hadn't released an SDK for (heck, a lot of it was stuff the iPhone inherited from OS X). All the awkwardness surrounding the SDK's actual release — for example, the neverending, absurdly restrictive NDA that seemed to flummox Apple's own community reps — really did feel like a rush job. I find it a little weird to think that Apple didn't intend to release the Cocoa Touch SDK after touting it so highly, but it did kind of feel that way.
And the App Store was just an extension of the iTunes Store. Adding a section to your existing online store in one year is not exactly breakneck speed.
Apple had obviously already developed the tools (most of them being extension of the OSX tools) and some (or many) of the APIs (again most of them being extensions/rethinks of the existing OSX APIs) for their own internal use.
A year later, things still felt pretty awkwardly rough.
as i remember, iPhone sdk was released after Android. it seemed to be that iPhone sdk was not intended for developers, but Android forced them to, because it seemed like an obviously good idea.
"The Software Development Kit for iPhone OS was announced at the iPhone Software Roadmap event on March 6, 2008. [...] The App Store opened on July 10, 2008 via an update to iTunes. On July 11, the iPhone 3G was launched and came pre-loaded with iOS 2.0.1 with App Store support." [1]
"Android 1.0, the first commercial version of the software, was released on 23 September 2008." [2]
"The Android Market was announced by Google on 28 August 2008, and was made available to users on 22 October. Support for paid applications was introduced on 13 February 2009 for developers in the United States and the United Kingdom" [3]
Of course there was a SDK, how else would developers make apps for the platform? Are you implying Google was planning an app store back then? The video doesn't speak of it. Or are you stating that date as a start of Android? In which case, you can go back way further in time.
The first commercial Android phone, the T-Mobile G1, went on sale on October 22, 2008. It had a small screen, a hardware keyboard, and a clunky UI reminiscent of Symbian. I doubt Android was on Apple's radar then, let alone back in 2007.
Or the lock orientation button, which Steve wanted to be used only for turning sound on/off, but after many users complaining about there was an option put in the settings.
>> The reason for that is well explained in The Innovator's Dilemma.
Side note/question: I know there's three books in that "series": Innovator's Dilemma, Innovator's Solution, and Seeing What's Next. For someone who has not read any of them, what's the correct order? Are all three required, or is there overlap between the contents?
Innovator's Dilemma is much more academic and research-filled, Innovator's Solution is more "here's what you do with it." I'd recommend Innovator's Solution first as it's a somewhat lighter introduction. (I haven't read Seeing What's Next, so can't comment there.)
I've only (yet) read Innovator's Dilemma, I would definitely recommend it. As for order, I suspect publication order would be the best as it would show progression of ideas/learning.
The SDK example is a great example of "faster horses." The crowd clamoring for the SDK was not asking for the App Store, it was asking for a model like PCs.
He just didn't let customers set the future direction of products. The reason for that is well explained in The Innovator's Dilemma.