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And the iPhone is "just" a more expensive version of its predecessors with a slightly better touchscreen and UX, and Dropbox is "just" a ftp mount with svn on t

And the iPhone is "just" a more expensive version of its predecessors with a slightly better touchscreen and UX, and Dropbox is "just" a ftp mount with svn on top of it. Also cars are just faster horses so that works too :) Honestly I find it hard to argue that Maps and Search haven't been some of the internet's biggest worldwide productivity boosts.

Dylan16807 8y ago
The question is what you would have if that product never existed. That's different from measuring how good the product is in a vacuum. Without the iPhone it may have taken another year or two but the wave of full-screen smartphones had already started. For Dropbox I'm unsure but they definitely have a lot of competitors doing the same thing at this point. Maps... had much better scrolling than competitors? Being pretty isn't revolutionary. Google search itself might qualify. Cars are not faster horses, but if you removed any particular car company from history we would still have cars.
- macintux 8y ago
  > ...but the wave of full-screen smartphones had already started. I’ve heard it argued that someone would have gotten there eventually, but my suspicion is that without a big player committing all their resources to marketing and selling it a similar device would have failed to make headway. Phone manufacturers would never have pushed like Apple did against the headwinds of physical keyboards and flash and operator-managed app distribution (and phone crippling). But I’ve never heard someone argue that the design was already established and going to become a tidal wave. There were a few devices which vaguely resembled a few superficial elements. What examples can you provide to illustrate a wave was already underway?
  - Dylan16807 8y ago
    The first of its kind was the LG Prada, which came out slightly before the iPhone and sold a million units. The technology had all come together just enough to make devices like this possible, and they were starting out at barely good enough. Batteries, screens, CPUs, all of those were advancing rapidly whether phones used them or not. And 3G was spreading rapidly. Even if it took two more iterations of moore's law, the market was growing more and more feasible every month. Even half-baked attempts 2-3 years down the line could easily have been more compelling than the original iPhone. I guess a chunk depends on how critical the operator-independent apps were, but let's not forget that the iPhone was ATT-only for years.
    - scarface74 8y ago
      LG had a touch screen it didn’t have a full OS that allowed it to do the things that the iPhone could do. LG would have never built an entire ecosystem. Apple was AT&T only in the US.
- visarga 8y ago
  > Maps... had much better scrolling than competitors? Being pretty isn't revolutionary. It's a combination of being always immediately available and having so much useful information about every place, all presented in a UI that is accessible. The digital maps we had in our country pale in comparison to current day Google Maps. It even has graphs showing working hours and crowding level and reviews, and picture-perfect 3D simulation. That surely wasn't possible for any GPS or phone maps of that period.
- scarface74 8y ago
  Started by who? Early pre-iPhone Android prototypes were modeled after the BlackBerry and RIM was preaching the need for keyboards long after the iPhone was introduced. Microsoft was also aiming phones at businesses.

Dylan16807 8y ago

The question is what you would have if that product never existed. That's different from measuring how good the product is in a vacuum. Without the iPhone it may have taken another year or two but the wave of full-screen smartphones had already started. For Dropbox I'm unsure but they definitely have a lot of competitors doing the same thing at this point. Maps... had much better scrolling than competitors? Being pretty isn't revolutionary. Google search itself might qualify. Cars are not faster horses, but if you removed any particular car company from history we would still have cars.

macintux 8y ago
> ...but the wave of full-screen smartphones had already started. I’ve heard it argued that someone would have gotten there eventually, but my suspicion is that without a big player committing all their resources to marketing and selling it a similar device would have failed to make headway. Phone manufacturers would never have pushed like Apple did against the headwinds of physical keyboards and flash and operator-managed app distribution (and phone crippling). But I’ve never heard someone argue that the design was already established and going to become a tidal wave. There were a few devices which vaguely resembled a few superficial elements. What examples can you provide to illustrate a wave was already underway?
- Dylan16807 8y ago
  The first of its kind was the LG Prada, which came out slightly before the iPhone and sold a million units. The technology had all come together just enough to make devices like this possible, and they were starting out at barely good enough. Batteries, screens, CPUs, all of those were advancing rapidly whether phones used them or not. And 3G was spreading rapidly. Even if it took two more iterations of moore's law, the market was growing more and more feasible every month. Even half-baked attempts 2-3 years down the line could easily have been more compelling than the original iPhone. I guess a chunk depends on how critical the operator-independent apps were, but let's not forget that the iPhone was ATT-only for years.
  - scarface74 8y ago
    LG had a touch screen it didn’t have a full OS that allowed it to do the things that the iPhone could do. LG would have never built an entire ecosystem. Apple was AT&T only in the US.
visarga 8y ago
> Maps... had much better scrolling than competitors? Being pretty isn't revolutionary. It's a combination of being always immediately available and having so much useful information about every place, all presented in a UI that is accessible. The digital maps we had in our country pale in comparison to current day Google Maps. It even has graphs showing working hours and crowding level and reviews, and picture-perfect 3D simulation. That surely wasn't possible for any GPS or phone maps of that period.
scarface74 8y ago
Started by who? Early pre-iPhone Android prototypes were modeled after the BlackBerry and RIM was preaching the need for keyboards long after the iPhone was introduced. Microsoft was also aiming phones at businesses.