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It's the app ecossystem that really changed things and makes a true smartphone. Symbian could technically install and run apps. I think there was a Nokia/Symbia
by ufmace 5y ago
It's the app ecossystem that really changed things and makes a true smartphone. Symbian could technically install and run apps. I think there was a Nokia/Symbian app store, but it only had like 10 crappy apps. I never had any idea where you would even start if you wanted to build one of your own or get it on the store. I'm pretty sure even power users of those phone never had more than one or two aftermarket apps. Rumor was that the development experience was terrible. I used Symbian phones for like 10 years I think, and never saw any improvement whatsoever in the app situation.
Apple and Google now both run app store hosting millions of apps, they both maintain their own development environments and adopted more advanced languages to make it easier. It's easy to submit apps (relative to Symbian days) and even nontechnical users commonly install and use dozens of them. The development tech and available APIs are being added and improved at breakneck speed, relatively speaking.
- foobarian 5y agoOne other thing that played a huge part is how Jobs beat AT&T over the head to provide an unlimited data plan. We don't think much of this today, but in those days data was expensive. It put a huge cognitive load on any kind of data operation. Merely turning on the data modem was a "will I be able to eat through payday" kind of decision. It was very stressful! And suddenly Jobs comes along with the cool new phone AND takes away this barrier. Now you could have data always on, not worry about how big the app was you were about to download. You could browse the web and go to any website, with images turned on, without fear. I remember the day this was announced and even though I never bought into the Apple ecosystem I remember feeling that it was a game changing move.