When Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone in January 2007, his words made their way into history:
Today, we’re introducing three revolutionary products of this class. The first one is a widescreen iPod with touch controls. The second is a revolutionary mobile phone. And the third is a breakthrough Internet communications device.
So, three things; a widescreen iPod with touch controls, a revolutionary mobile phone and a breakthrough Internet communications device. An iPod, a phone and an Internet communicator… an iPod, a phone and an Internet communicator… are you getting it? These are not three separate devices. This is one device, and we are calling it iPhone.
Today, Apple is going to reinvent the phone.
If you go back and watch the video, it’s clear that the audience was much more excited about the first two things, but the third one is what changed the world.
image via Basic Apple Guy
The first iPhone was pretty limited. EDGE networking was slow, but Safari felt like magic, even if we all had to wait for pages to load. Mail and Messages were basic, but worked. The biggest piece of the puzzle was the App Store, which came a year later in 2008. It was then that the Internet Communicator began to come into its own.
For a lot of folks today, the Phone app is an afterthought. Some iPhone users have never even held an iPod, let alone remember the yearning we all had for a widescreen iPod back in the day. Instead, we spend our times in apps, doing everything from doomscrolling and ordering burritos to watching videos and reviewing our checking accounts. For a growing number of people, their iPhone is their only computer, which would have been mind-blowing to those of us watching Apple back in 2007.
This leads me to a question. In 2025, what are the three things that make up the iPhone? After some thought, I think the list is something like this:
- A Camera
- An App Platform
- A Communications Device
I have often wondered if Apple was surprised at how popular the original iPhone’s camera proved to be. By today’s standards, it’s a joke, but for many people, the iPhone marked the first time they had a camera in their pocket. To its credit, Apple saw this usage, and has worked to improve the camera every year since. When talking to someone about new iPhones, the conversation always turns to camera improvements.
I may ignore most phone calls, and Apple Music and Spotify may have eaten the widescreen iPod, but the iPhone is still the Internet Communicator Steve promised nearly 19 years ago.
We often don’t think about the Internet when we’re using Instagram or Discord or Venmo or Overcast, but the web powers almost every app we use today. Having such a broad range of experiences and services just a few taps away is truly amazing, and the app ecosystem on iOS is still the best in the industry. The world is available through a grid of apps in our hands.