Can you believe that the first iPhone launched exactly 18 years ago on June 29? Do you remember what you were doing that day? Oh hang on, maybe you weren’t even born then.
The late Steve Jobs, then Apple’s CEO, had unveiled the revolutionary smartphone five months earlier, in January 2007. In the intervening months, the company created enough hype to encourage hordes of people to descend upon Apple Stores in the U.S. and beyond to purchase the device that was to truly transform the fortunes of the California-based tech company.
An old ABC News clip about the iPhone’s launch day features tech writer Steven Levy, now editor-at-large at Wired, summing up the level of excitement that surrounded the iPhone’s launch.
“There’s been nothing like this in my memory,” Levy tells ABC News reporter John Berman. “I’ve been covering technology for over 20 years and I can’t recall the anticipation for a product like this has.”
Berman, meanwhile, has clearly been bedazzled by Apple’s ad campaign, telling Levy: “I consider myself at least of average intelligence, but they’re in my head. Apple is in my head. Must get iPhone. Must get iPhone.”
Levy responds with a comment that’s aged well: “Apple has always, throughout its history, struck a chord among people who like technology, and like it done really really well … it’s a religion almost, for some people.”
An unnamed contributor then takes up the religious theme: “Steve Jobs — master marketer,” she says. “The guy is incredible at bringing the Mac faithful to a fever pitch, and then those early adopters, those high-end geeks, go forth and spread the gospel of Apple.”
Jessica, a woman waiting in line outside an Apple Store in New York City on iPhone launch day, offered her own take, telling Berman: “Steve Jobs is an innovator, he always comes up with new creative things before anybody thinks of them.” She adds that everything Jobs comes up with is “top notch,” prompting the reporter to mention the Apple Lisa, the failed PC launched by the company in 1983. But Jessica has never heard of it.
Next, we see the Apple Store opening and the first customers heading inside to collect their brand new iPhone. Jessica buys two of them — one for her sister — and is shown counting out more than a thousand bucks for her purchase. “I feel like I won the Olympic gold medal,” she says.
The original iPhone featured a tiny 3.5-inch display and a basic 2-megapixel camera and went on sale for $499 (4GB) and $599 (8GB). The iPhone has been an astonishing success for Apple, generating around $1.5 trillion for the company over the years. Many iterations of the device have come and gone, with Apple expected to release the iPhone 17 later this year.
Below is another news report from the same day, this one from CBS News:
