About iPHONE - History

The genesis of the iPhone was Jobs' direction that Apple engineers investigate touch-screens. At the time he had been considering having Apple work on tablet PCs. Many have noted the device's similarities to Apple's previous touch-screen portable device, the Newton MessagePad.Like the Newton, the iPhone is nearly all screen, and likewise its form-factor is credited as well by Apple to their head of design, Jonathan Ive. Comments made by Jobs in April 2003 at the "D: All Things Digital" executive conference expressed his belief that tablet PCs and traditional PDAs were not good choices as high-demand markets for Apple to enter, despite many requests made to him that Apple create another PDA. He did believe that cell phones were going to become important devices for portable information access, and that what cell phones needed to have was excellent synchronization software. At the time, instead of focusing on a follow-up to their Newton PDA, Jobs had Apple put its energies into the iPod, and the iTunes software (which can be used to synchronize content with iPod devices), released January 2001. On September 7, 2005, Apple and Motorola released the ROKR E1, the first mobile phone to use iTunes. However Jobs was unhappy with the ROKR, feeling that having to compromise with a non-Apple designer (Motorola) prevented Apple from designing the phone he wanted to make. In September 2006, Apple discontinued support for the ROKR and released a version of iTunes that included references to an as-yet unknown mobile phone that could display pictures and video.On January 9, 2007, Jobs announced the iPhone at the Macworld convention, receiving substantial media attention.