When I first saw the first iPhone, I though “They got that right!” in a distributed silent unison with thousands of others. But I may have been alone in my next thought when I wondered how long it would be before I saw a GPS based personal tracking/security/social networking device with the same level of design and useability perfection that the iPhone achieved. Now that I have read “The Untold Story: How the iPhone Blew Up the Wireless Industry” I feel betting in the knowledge that it wasn’t easy for Apple either.
For those of us developing such devices, however, our main challenge isn’t contending with the wireless operators – it is in awakening the consumer desire to have their presence known and making them feel more safe rather that “watched” with a “little brother” device in their pockets. Apple used design and usability perfection to overcome their greatest challenge. Is there a lesson to be learned here?