UNITED STATES

Apple roll-out of the iPhone 10 years ago created a retail frenzy

June 29, 2017

Apple Inc. launched the iPhone on Jun 29, 2007, on a drum roll started by ace marketer Steve Jobs six months earlier. The first iPhone introduced the world to customers camping outside stores to buy a new technology product.

The retail frenzy has long been a ritual of the company’s marketing, and the 10th anniversary celebrations, in Cupertino, California, starts a 3-month drum roll for the iPhone 8.

Jobs, who founded Apple in 1976 and died in 2011, described the original in his keynote speech at the Macworld Conference in San Francisco as a reinvention of the phone, combining a phone, iPod, and internet mobile communicator in one device. The technology magazine The Verge notes that the iPhone revolutionized smartphones and shaped the industry. The first iPhone mixed a 3.5-inch multi-touch display with touch-optimized software in a simple package that was unlike anything else on the market, according to the magazine.

Time magazine named the first iPhone its invention of the year. Apple went on to release updated models of the iPhone, including the 4S, which debuted in October 2011 and introduced Siri, the voice-activated digital assistant. By October 2015, according to Apple sales figures republished by the AboutTech publication, 773.8 million iPhones had been sold around the world.

Apple has released new models or upgrades every year since the launch, and the iPhone 8 is rumored to be as revolutionary in its way as the original.

It might have a glass body. Apple is reported to be working with Energous to provide the device with wireless charging abilities. The rumor mill provides the new phone with a flexible OLED display, a 3D camera, a 10-nanometer chip and Touch ID Fingerprint Sensor.

Demand for iPhones remains high, but the Apple Store customer line is dying. The Bloomberg news service explains that being first through Apple store doors is no guarantee of securing the top-of-the-line new iPhone. A combination of limited supply and Apple’s push toward online pre-orders meant walk-in customers are sometimes disappointed.

#21965 Published: December 17, 2016