In response to a post on Shacknews regarding woeful state of so-called competitors to Apple’s iPad, a former Research In Motion employee shed some light into what really went on inside RIM, Microsoft and likely every other cellphone maker on the planet, right after Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduced iPhone to the world on January 9, 2007.
All these companies were fighting over what amounts to overgrown PDAs with phones and wireless stacks strapped on. Everyone assumed power density was no where even close to what was needed for general computing, that a full featured browser and heavy duty Internet services were impossible due to bandwidth and latency. Take a look at how our Java expert groups named standards, how people at the time talked about what features smart phones should have, and its clear that no one thought an iPhone was possible. Even Danger, which eventually [led to] Windows Phone 7 and Android, was just working on a better Blackberry.
The iPhone did many amazing things, but what stands out in my mind was how it proved that these assumptions were flat-out wrong beyond any reasonable doubt. Apple pretty gave everyone the finger and said, “Fsck you guys we can build your distant impossible future today.”
I left RIM back in 2006 just months before the IPhone launched and I remember talking to friends from RIM and Microsoft about what their teams thought about it at the time. Everyone was utterly shocked. RIM was even in denial the day after the iPhone was announced with all hands meets claiming all manner of weird things about iPhone: it couldn’t do what they were demonstrating without an insanely power hungry processor, it must have terrible battery life, etc. Imagine their surprise when they disassembled an iPhone for the first time and found that the phone was battery with a tiny logic board strapped to it. It was ridiculous, it was brilliant.
I really don’t think you’re giving Apple enough credit here. They did something amazing that many very prominent people in the industry thought was either impossible or at least a decade away, and they did it in a disgustingly short time frame.
Full post via Shacknews here.
MacDailyNews Take: Unsurprising. As always, anyone who tells you their device is “as good as” an iPhone, iPad, iPod, or Mac are lying and/or in denial. Which reminds us:
[Attribution: Electronista. Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Fred Mertz” for the heads up.]