Today marks the fifth year anniversary of the original iPhone announcement back in 2007 at Macworld (now iWorld), as it was introduced by Apple CEO, Steve Jobs. That unforgettable moment changed our lives as we know it, and turned the mobile industry at the time upside down on its head. What emerged was the so-called ‘Jesus Phone’ as everybody called it (remember that?). It was hands down one of the best keynotes ever done by Steve Jobs.
Apple had been working on the iPhone for two and a half years leading up to the announcement, with multi-touch originally designed for a tablet (soon to be the iPad) but was decided by Jobs to put that technology towards a smartphone. The features that hooked me from the presentation were mobile Safari (real internet, not ‘baby internet’ as Steve called it) and double tap to zoom, the iPod app’s Cover Flow feature, pinch-to-zoom especially for photos, and the simplicity of iPhone OS compared to the junk at the time from companies like RIM and Motorola.
Steve Jobs also mentioned the iPhone was a ‘breakthrough’ and 5 years ahead of any other phone. At the time, it sure did look that way. As for today? Android has emerged as a dominant OS that allows for much more customization compared to iOS, and is seen as the biggest competitor to Apple. RIM, it seems, is still stuck back in 2007.
Check out the keynote below if you haven’t seen it already–it’s a work of art:
Part 1:
Part 2:
It was the iPhone that ‘twisted’ my arm to drive down to the Apple Store in Seattle to buy it back in the Fall of 2007, and eventually start this blog. So I have lots of memories tied to this device and the announcement. Happy 5th birthday, iPhone.
Do you still have your original iPhone?
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Yes I still have an original iPhone. I use it to play games once in awhile. I use it to see how slow it really was compared to the iphone 4 I now use. Brings back memories of when I first got it and jailbroke it right away. Man was Cydia every slow back then.LOL
Back then, I don’t even think Cydia was around yet. I believe we all had Installer. But yeah, things were pretty ‘archaic’ back then, LOL
Yeah I used Installer at first too. I hated Cydia when it first came out. Installer was actually awesome. Also remember Summerboard?
Yeah, Installer and Icy were the go to repositories.
Hehe, good ol’ Summerboard–the Winterboard predecessor.
Oh the memories, I was so excited when I got my first iPhone! Thank you gary, seeing this blog in 2007 was the whole reason I got an iPhone and brought it here!
Cheers and thanks for sharing your story about using it in school. That’s awesome.
I still have my original and it’s definitely worth keeping.
I remember using Ziphone to jailbreak it too. Or something like that when I first got it. Im pretty sure thats what it was called
The original iPhone was the first time I became familiar with the term “early adopter”.
Hehe. Remember the shock from strangers in Canada when they realized you had…an IPHONE?!
Yeah, ppl were staring when I was talking on that white “ipod” headset 🙂
i want the preview feature back into mail app!!! never saw this before….
I still have my original iPhone my friend had bought, shipped and unlocked from the US. Only problem is the screen doesn’t work. I plan on getting it fixed one day…
I sold mine off when I got the 3G but I remember when an associate from work came back from the states with 4 of them and asked if I wanted one. Only 499.00. Yeah I guess so – was my response and so glad I did. Not too long after, I did a search on Google on iphones and found this site. Been a member ever since and learned tons about the product. Keep up the good work!!
I remember my original iPhone, still got that beauty, and it still runs fine! It was sweet cause none of the teachers at school knew what it was, so they all thought I was just playing with an “iPod” while I was texting and shit. That worked for a year until the iPhone officially launched in Canada.