In 2008 the iPhone was a $500 subsidised device (at a time when other phones were "free" or up to $200) which really didn't do anything. It didn't do MMS, third party apps didn't exist, google maps didn't have turn-by-turn. I'm sure the user experience of a reasonable sized capacitive touch screen was great compared to the alternatives - but I never even saw one in real life and on paper it was very expensive and didn't have anything to sell me on it.
Once the iPhone 3G came it out was clear the device was a phenomenon and not a rich people toy, but initially the market was pretty confused, from what I remember.
I am not an apple fanboy, but I had a couple generations of Danger products (by far the most modern at the time) prior to the release of the iPhone and owned a few generations of iPhone from the start. The 1st generation iPhone was revolutionary and deserves every last bit of credit it gets. The 3G was a yawner, like adding leather seats to a flying car. Yeah 3G is nice... but seriously, the car is freaking flying how did you not notice that??
Exactly. The iPhone had the revolutionary UI and the revolutionary functionality (functioning web browser that worked with the most pages not specially made for phones) at the moment it appeared.
I think, that you didn’t see it in person was the reason you didn’t expect it to be a success.
The 3G had 3G, but otherwise same hardware specs as the original.
What sold me was that Apple got the UI right (“smooth as butter”), the webbrowser and email actually worked, and jailbroken it was almost Unix in your pocket! It really felt like a phone with so much potential and a far ahead of anything I had seen. The things you mention were just a matter of software updates. Btw. 3G and App Store both came out in 2008.
Yeah to me it was clear after seeing a smooth UI in an internet ad. I got the 1st gen - what surprised me was the empty shop without a queue. Maybe it was luck but to me it was an obvious game changer without even touching it.
The original iPhone was unsubsidized. It required a contract until it was unlocked, but you could only buy it at the full retail price, forfeiting any subsidies.
$500 with a required contract is a subsidised device; it doesn't really matter how you phrase it. AT&T paid for it to be exclusive and the retail price would have been set taking that into account. If it wasn't there'd be no reason for Apple to allow a carrier exclusive with a required contract - the buyer would own the device.
The original iPhone was unsubsidized and it was GSM only, so there wasn't an option to offer it on Sprint and Verizon then. The 4 Gb iPhone was $499 and the 8Gb one was $599. Because Apple was new to phones, they only wanted to deal with one carrier initially.
Back then, you could get a Treo or a Blackberry for less than half as much, as they were subsidized by the carriers.
And because paying that much for a phone at that time impeded sales, Apple discontinued the 4 Gb model and dropped the price of the 8 Gb model to $399 two months after it was released. They also "gave in" to the subsidy model, since that was the standard practice: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPhone_(1st_generation)#Releas...
It was clear to me that there was a phase change when the iTunes store came out - wow, was that 2003? Anyway, the reason I am not rich is because I didn't believe in Steve Jobs, so I didn't have the faith to hold AAPL stock forever. But the iTunes store was the point at which it was clear something spectacular was happening and Apple was moving in to a new world, compared to the days when the WSJ constantly called them "beleaguered".
Once the iPhone 3G came it out was clear the device was a phenomenon and not a rich people toy, but initially the market was pretty confused, from what I remember.