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I'm not talking about columnists. Journalists are not people who build things. I'm talking about people who build things and think about what to build next. Th

by sho_hn 3y ago

I'm not talking about columnists. Journalists are not people who build things. I'm talking about people who build things and think about what to build next. The option of doing away with the hardware keyboard and going touchscreen-only was always there and always up for discussion, but for the longest time not easy due to the power and performance envelope at the price point. Lots of devices already worked like this outside of phones, for example a lot of touchscreen kiosk hardware (e.g. ATMs). It's just not a particularly big leap of the imagination to do this in a phone form factor. It was also present in mobile form in plenty of media and scifi, e.g. 2001's tablets. What matters is whether you think you can pull it off, and whether you're willing to try, and whether you are able to identify the right moment to try. A lot of companies were not willing to try (e.g. out of fear of cannibalizing existing product lines or rejection by the customer). Others didn't have the tech stack necessary to do so. What Apple did right is to have the good sense (or luck) to try it when the technology supply chain to back it was there, and not do it too early. Other phone makers wrote their tech stacks for much lower-power devices, and really struggled to scale their existing operating systems, dev community, etc. up to making a richer device, and didn't have the ambition to push for it. Apple started, as OP pointed out, by scaling down a desktop-class OS at a point where the hardware had just made it possible, and this worked out well. What made the iPhone a success wasn't just the form factor, it was also e.g. having a proper web browser (which Apple didn't even write themselves). This pattern replicates in a few other aspects of the device (supply chain for capacitive touch, batteries, etc.) The iPhone is a fantastic success story of a good product concept, waiting for the right moment, sensible tech choices, solid tech asset management by a software company, very good industrialization, and great execution and integration. It's not a magic fairy-tale unicorn idea that no on else could think of. It's annoying because it misrepresents and misunderstands what it takes to make a good product, and leads to internalizing the wrong lessons and values. It's one of the subtle reasons why there aren't more Apples.

astrange 3y ago
The novelty in the iPhone wasn't a touchscreen, it was a capacitative multitouch screen and a UI framework that could do their app designs but still at 60fps. Although the last one wasn't purely technical; IIRC Nokia got it, decided it was cool "because it was 60fps", tried to compete just by doing that and failed. > having a proper web browser (which Apple didn't even write themselves) Yeah they did. There wasn't that much KHTML in there at that point.
- sho_hn 3y ago
  > The novelty in the iPhone wasn't a touchscreen, it was a capacitative multitouch screen and a UI framework that could do their app designs but still at 60fps. I'd agree with this, but it's also not the narrative I was arguing against :-)
  - candiodari 3y ago
    In other words: it was the attitude espoused by John Carmack more than Steve Jobs. New technology creates a new market IF you can make it work brilliantly well. And, frankly, Carmack's "trick", which he does but doesn't admit to, is to rewrite everything from scratch every time he makes a release (more or less). That's how, that's why he got so incredibly good at it. Innovate once, optimize 10x (by throwing away what you got), repeat. Companies don't do that, because it means having a department make tech demos and nothing else. Again, and again, and again, the SAME tech demo.
voisin 3y ago
> I'm talking about people who build things and think about what to build next. The market leader in smart phones, BlackBerry (RIM), with some of the best engineering talent in this space anywhere, didn’t see it coming. Their technical co-CEO didn’t believe it in the immediate aftermath of the announcement. Couldn’t imagine how the battery could manage all that. Immediately dismissed it as some sort of trickery. So… I think you’re wrong on this.
- sho_hn 3y ago
  None of what you say is in any way incongruent with what I said, though. It may mean BlackBerry didn't think it could be done, but it doesn't mean that no one in the company could conceive of a phone without a keyboard. They just didn't think it was a good idea or the right time, and didn't try. The original post I replied to claims Apple is a magical place of unicorns with ideas that exist nowhere else. I'm arguing that it isn't the case, and that it's the willingness to try and execution ability that matter. It's more likely to be dismissing the idea that kept BlackBerry from doing it. There is a lesson in there that speaks to the "we can't possibly figure out what they will do" in the original post. You very likely can. You also have to be willing to give your ideas the mileage.
SllX 3y ago
I think what you’re forgetting is that a lot of people thought the iPhone would fail because it didn’t have a keyboard, and at the time smartphones were going more towards keyboard-driven devices than touchscreen-driven, and touchscreen more often than not meant touchscreen + stylus. Apple committed to their own approach. > having a proper web browser (which Apple didn't even write themselves). This is just bollocks.
- sho_hn 3y ago
  > Apple committed to their own approach. That is exactly what I'm arguing. > This is just bollocks. WebKit was forked from our KHTML, even if it definitely had significantly deviated by 2007, and particularly UX-wise Mobile Safari definitely had many fantastic ideas. I didn't mean to be dismissive of it, it was more to point out that they also don't create in a vacuum, even their successes.
  - SllX 3y ago
    On the subject of WebKit, what you said is bollocks for two reasons. 1. You are conflating the rendering engine with the browser. Safari on Mac and iPhone uses WebKit as a core technology—really the preeminent core technology—but they are not WebKit and WebKit is not Safari on either platform. 2. Similarly, WebKit is not KHTML and KJS. WebCore and JavaScriptCore are forked from KHTML and KJS—and Apple did not and to my knowledge has never downplayed that nor denied it—but a fork of a project that sees significant new development work becomes a new project and takes on an identity of its own. By the time the iPhone was released, WebKit had been in development inside Apple for 6 years; and public knowledge since its announcement and Safari’s public beta for 4.5 years. KHTML and KJS deserve and I believe actually receive their due respect, but it is wrong to say Apple did not develop their own web browsers.
    - sho_hn 3y ago
      You know what, I'll go ahead and agree you are right. These are well-argued points, thanks! Let's say I was a bit hyperbolic there. That said--in support of "not in a vacuum", and against myth-making.
funcDropShadow 3y ago
> The option of doing away with the hardware keyboard and going touchscreen-only was always there and always up for discussion, but for the longest time not easy due to the power and performance envelope at the price point. Not only the option was there, there were mobile phones with touch screens before the iPhone. Anyone remembers Windows Mobile? It resembled windows very much, including the start button. It was just ridiculous. One of the central innovations of the iPhone was making scrolling with touchpad as natural as flicking a piece of paper over a table. It seemed instantaneous. Most touchpads before the iPhone weren't capacitive. They required a lot of pressure. Using them for scrolling seemed ridiculous.
- Izkata 3y ago
  My mom had a resistive touchscreen phone years before the iphone. Icons on the home screen and everything. I think it was Samsung, not sure though.

by sho_hn 3y ago

astrange 3y ago

The novelty in the iPhone wasn't a touchscreen, it was a capacitative multitouch screen and a UI framework that could do their app designs but still at 60fps. Although the last one wasn't purely technical; IIRC Nokia got it, decided it was cool "because it was 60fps", tried to compete just by doing that and failed. > having a proper web browser (which Apple didn't even write themselves) Yeah they did. There wasn't that much KHTML in there at that point.

sho_hn 3y ago
> The novelty in the iPhone wasn't a touchscreen, it was a capacitative multitouch screen and a UI framework that could do their app designs but still at 60fps. I'd agree with this, but it's also not the narrative I was arguing against :-)
- candiodari 3y ago
  In other words: it was the attitude espoused by John Carmack more than Steve Jobs. New technology creates a new market IF you can make it work brilliantly well. And, frankly, Carmack's "trick", which he does but doesn't admit to, is to rewrite everything from scratch every time he makes a release (more or less). That's how, that's why he got so incredibly good at it. Innovate once, optimize 10x (by throwing away what you got), repeat. Companies don't do that, because it means having a department make tech demos and nothing else. Again, and again, and again, the SAME tech demo.

voisin 3y ago

> I'm talking about people who build things and think about what to build next. The market leader in smart phones, BlackBerry (RIM), with some of the best engineering talent in this space anywhere, didn’t see it coming. Their technical co-CEO didn’t believe it in the immediate aftermath of the announcement. Couldn’t imagine how the battery could manage all that. Immediately dismissed it as some sort of trickery. So… I think you’re wrong on this.

sho_hn 3y ago
None of what you say is in any way incongruent with what I said, though. It may mean BlackBerry didn't think it could be done, but it doesn't mean that no one in the company could conceive of a phone without a keyboard. They just didn't think it was a good idea or the right time, and didn't try. The original post I replied to claims Apple is a magical place of unicorns with ideas that exist nowhere else. I'm arguing that it isn't the case, and that it's the willingness to try and execution ability that matter. It's more likely to be dismissing the idea that kept BlackBerry from doing it. There is a lesson in there that speaks to the "we can't possibly figure out what they will do" in the original post. You very likely can. You also have to be willing to give your ideas the mileage.

SllX 3y ago

I think what you’re forgetting is that a lot of people thought the iPhone would fail because it didn’t have a keyboard, and at the time smartphones were going more towards keyboard-driven devices than touchscreen-driven, and touchscreen more often than not meant touchscreen + stylus. Apple committed to their own approach. > having a proper web browser (which Apple didn't even write themselves). This is just bollocks.

sho_hn 3y ago
> Apple committed to their own approach. That is exactly what I'm arguing. > This is just bollocks. WebKit was forked from our KHTML, even if it definitely had significantly deviated by 2007, and particularly UX-wise Mobile Safari definitely had many fantastic ideas. I didn't mean to be dismissive of it, it was more to point out that they also don't create in a vacuum, even their successes.
- SllX 3y ago
  On the subject of WebKit, what you said is bollocks for two reasons. 1. You are conflating the rendering engine with the browser. Safari on Mac and iPhone uses WebKit as a core technology—really the preeminent core technology—but they are not WebKit and WebKit is not Safari on either platform. 2. Similarly, WebKit is not KHTML and KJS. WebCore and JavaScriptCore are forked from KHTML and KJS—and Apple did not and to my knowledge has never downplayed that nor denied it—but a fork of a project that sees significant new development work becomes a new project and takes on an identity of its own. By the time the iPhone was released, WebKit had been in development inside Apple for 6 years; and public knowledge since its announcement and Safari’s public beta for 4.5 years. KHTML and KJS deserve and I believe actually receive their due respect, but it is wrong to say Apple did not develop their own web browsers.
  - sho_hn 3y ago
    You know what, I'll go ahead and agree you are right. These are well-argued points, thanks! Let's say I was a bit hyperbolic there. That said--in support of "not in a vacuum", and against myth-making.

funcDropShadow 3y ago

> The option of doing away with the hardware keyboard and going touchscreen-only was always there and always up for discussion, but for the longest time not easy due to the power and performance envelope at the price point. Not only the option was there, there were mobile phones with touch screens before the iPhone. Anyone remembers Windows Mobile? It resembled windows very much, including the start button. It was just ridiculous. One of the central innovations of the iPhone was making scrolling with touchpad as natural as flicking a piece of paper over a table. It seemed instantaneous. Most touchpads before the iPhone weren't capacitive. They required a lot of pressure. Using them for scrolling seemed ridiculous.

Izkata 3y ago
My mom had a resistive touchscreen phone years before the iphone. Icons on the home screen and everything. I think it was Samsung, not sure though.