Whether you’re on the Android team or the iOS team, you can’t say that the first iPhone that came out in 2007 laid the groundwork for The foundation of modern smartphones. Apple’s phones were the first to popularize touchscreens, and the company was the first to launch an app store. Other suppliers quickly followed suit, with one successfully surpassing Apple in smartphone sales: Samsung.
This definitely leaves a sour taste in the mouth of the company’s top dog. Perhaps in an effort to downplay Samsung’s success, a company executive said the South Korean giant’s phones were just poor copycats.
iPhone is 15 years old
Wall Street Journal’s Joanna Stern made a Documentary (via MacRumors) on the evolution of the iPhone since its inception on June 29, 2007. She interviewed top Apple executives, including some who no longer work at the company, and a couple whose first child was born on the same day as the iPhone.
When Apple co-founder Steve Jobs was asked to make a bigger iPhone because the 2010 iPhone 4 suffered from signal drops due to its 3.5-inch size, he said he didn’t like bigger phones from companies like Samsung because ” You can’t get your hands on it,” and “Nobody’s going to buy it.”
By 2013, as sales slowed, Apple began to reconsider this. At the same time, phones larger than 4 inches are on the rise.
The leading big-screen phones at the time were Samsung’s Galaxy S and Note phones.Apple responded by equipping the 2014 iPhone 6 with a larger display and efficient.Never miss an opportunity like this, Samsung It was quick to make fun of Apple for reneging on its promise.
When Stern asked Greg Joswiak, Apple’s marketing chief, about how Samsung and other Android makers were making bigger phones at the time, he said he found them annoying because they were just making low-quality knockoffs of the iPhone.
They are annoying. They are annoying because, as you know, they steal our technology. They took the innovation we created and created a bad copy, just put a bigger screen around it. So yeah, we’re all not too happy. “
Interestingly, the video begins with iPod and iPhone co-founder Tony Fadell saying that the company started working on the iPhone after competitors started launching feature phones with camera and music capabilities.
Apple actually took Samsung to court in 2011 for copying its design and user interface, and initially awarded nearly $1 billion in damages.This The two companies settled in 2018, but Apple stood by its stance of starting a smartphone revolution, while Samsung blatantly copied its designs.
Around the same time, Apple was also embroiled in legal battles with manufacturers including HTC, Motorola, Amazon, and Nokia, some sued by it and others by it.
When contacted by Stern, a Samsung spokesperson said the company pioneered many industry firsts, such as large OLED displays (which Apple buys from), and water and dust resistance. The first few Apple phones used Samsung processors.
Both Samsung and Apple lag behind some The best phones of 2022, at the end of the day, if they copy each other’s features, it’s a win for consumers.