3 ms·

Not true, there were phones with much better cameras - as other user pointed out Sony Ericsson made phones with decent cameras (e.g. K850i) and they were actual

• kalleboo 6y ago
  Sony Ericsson had much more success in Europe and Asia and as such most Americans don't realize they exist - their memory of the dumb phone era is centered around crappy Motorola flip phones like the RAZR. And Americans get to write most of the tech history online.
• lmilcin 6y ago
  Just because there existed phones with much better cameras does not change the fact that almost everybody had a phone that had shit camera that was barely usable. Today it would be inconceivable to create a flagship phone without matching bleeding edge camera, but at that time, it was true (regardless of the fact that there were some phones with good cameras) that most people did not use phones for photography on a daily basis. This means there was no immediate expectation the phone will have best camera. I just went through the original unveiling of the iPhone and the focus is completely on UI and form factor and there is very, very, very little about the camera (basically, yes, it has a camera).