Ever since I predicted poor success for the iPhone, I’ve wanted to return and try to figure out why I was so wrong. I mean, with Apple recently becoming the first company worth $1 trillion, it’s pretty clear I was really far off in my prediction. I still can’t say for sure why I was so wrong, but I can make some hindsight guesses that are probably accurate. And 11 years later seems as good a time as any to reflect on how dumb I can be.
What I’m wondering on this, though, is why get a phone with all those features if it is going to cost that much? I’ll admit that I’m probably not the target demographic for this whiz-bang gadget. I like to get single task gadgets for the most part
Well, clearly most people are happy with multi-function, high-priced devices. As recent iPhone X pricing has shown, people clearly do appear willing to pay even more than the $500 the original iPhone listed for. Yes, the camera is less capable than a dedicated camera. And the music player had (at the time) less storage than the dedicated player did (but oddly enough, as much as any dedicated media player does now). And I remember reading at the time that the audio quality of the iPhone was less grand than what the best sounding phones offered. What I didn’t get then (and even hinted at but didn’t realize) was that people don’t want “The Best!” in most categories – they are just looking for “Good enough.” And while I don’t shop that way (much to my wife’s consternation), I think it’s safe to say that most people do. I may look for statistics to back up this guess, but I’m not too worried about later finding out I’m wrong on this one.
Will the iPhone hit Jobs’ stated 1% of cell-phone sales (10 million iPhones) by the end of 2008?
. . .
Unless Apple improves the camera, offers a higher memory option, and improves the data-transfer speed (set for 2.5G speeds currently), I don’t see Apple hitting much better than maybe half their target. Come back in 23 months and see how I do.
Well, let’s see how I did here:
Hmmm. 11.63 million in 2008. Well, I’d say Jobs’ goal was met. And the growth since shows these iPhones may just have some legs to them after all. So I was way off. About as wrong as I was back when Motorola introduced the PowerPC microprocessor and I predicted to a friend that this CPU would take off and become a global powerhouse. I think maybe I need to stay out of the technology pundit business.