iPhone 1st Generation
Year First Appeared
2007
Creator
Steve Jobs, Jony Ive, Scott Forstall, Tony Fadell
The first‑generation iPhone, announced on January 9 2007 and released on June 29 2007, was Apple’s first smartphone and introduced a 3.5‑inch multi‑touch interface that combined a mobile phone, a widescreen iPod, and an Internet communicator, setting a new standard for smartphones.
Importance in Internet Culture
By placing a full‑desktop WebKit/Safari browser in millions of hands, the original iPhone popularized true mobile web browsing and pushed sites beyond stripped‑down “mobile” pages, reviewers even said it “killed the whole concept of a ‘mobile web.’” Within two years the iPhone accounted for a large share of smartphone web traffic, highlighting the shift to a mobile‑first web.
Interesting Fact
At launch, Apple encouraged developers to create Web 2.0/AJAX applications as the iPhone’s initial “SDK, ” allowing apps that looked and behaved like built‑in apps before the native App Store was introduced the next year.