Why the iPhone wound up being invented here
Could the iPhone have been invented anywhere but Silicon Valley?
I'm obviously asking that rhetorically. But too bad you missed the scene this morning when my colleague Declan McCullagh walked in with the iPhone he bought over the weekend.
So much for hard-ass reporters. The bunch of us were reduced to cooing and oohing as if someone had brought their brand-new baby to the office for the first time. All the advance hype notwithstanding, Apple put together quite the package.
Again.
Apropos, the NY Times carried a timely piece Monday morning about early dismissal of the iPhone by South Korean and Japanese tech circles and how they're now starting to change their tune.
"Analysts and executives in South Korea say that the iPhone, with its full-scale Internet browser and distinctive touch screen with colorful icons, is more than just another souped-up cell phone. They fear this Silicon Valley challenger could leap past Asian makers into the age of digital convergence by combining personal computing and mobile technologies as no device has before."
It's not like the handset makers don't know how to pull many of the same functions together into the same unit. But they're going to be hard-pressed to come up with an iPhone killer anytime soon. Same for tech companies across the Atlantic. The ballyhooed "value add" always comes down to software. And there's where Silicon Valley--and Apple more than any other product house--enjoys the perennial advantage.
So what is it about Apple or the Silicon Valley culture? To be sure, there's Steve Jobs' well-chronicled history of demanding exceptional performance from his underlings. But is this only a tale of a brilliantly successful perfectionist? I think that only scratches the surface. And what's even more intriguing is that the U.S. advantage remains even as worries about the skills of American students in math and science climb.
I had a long talk with a developer friend of mine about that question last week. Maybe at a certain level of achievement, software design morphs more into the realm of art. More about that later, but in the meantime I'd like to read your thoughts.
Chime in, folks.
Charles Cooper has covered technology and business for more than 25 years. Before joining CNET News, he worked at the Associated Press, Computer & Software News, Computer Shopper, PC Week, and ZDNet. E-mail Charlie. 
Its important to remember that the genius behind much of the iPhone's design is not an American, but rather a Brit, Jonathan Ivey. I guess you could say that the iPhone owes much of its design to Apple's ethos, and Apple is an American company, but I think the issue is probably more complicated than simple matters of birthright or nationality.
quite a while now, all right. But Apple has had pretty
comprehensive software design guidelines since the days of the
first Macintoshes, and adherance to them must have a lot to do
with both the consistency and intuitiveness of the interface not
only of the iPhone, but of all of the products Apple and its third-
party developers turn out. They are not so much enforced as
presented as a shortcut to interface design. A lot of the
guideline features are built into the development systems and
libraries that you get for free from Apple. I think the guidelines
must be a tremendous help in herding the thousands of
software engineer "cats" involved in design and programing at
Apple, those in Mr. Ive's organization and elsewhere. The
guidelines probably also function as a great organizer for the
new interface ideas that seem to pop up in Apple products on a
regular basis. Just my thoughts, I could be wrong.
cheers
Pre-release critics of the iPhone dismissed Apple because it had no experience in the cell phone business. To the contrary, this is Apple's advantage, especially when combined with their more important experience of user interface design. They know how to make products that just work. And without the preconceptions that come with being an existing cell phone producer they were free to apply their skills to create such a different device.
I'm not sure that you could argue that this a Silicon Valley thing, or even a US thing. It's an Apple thing. And if Apple can do it, then any other software design company that places a high enough value on the user experience can also, eventually, do it.
IMHO opinion, keep the programmers away from the UI.
enhanced, and made easy to implement over the whole time the
Mac has existed.
I've been a programmer for almost 13 years, writing software from everything from old school point of sales systems (still love the POS acronym) to telecommunications and digital asset management systems.
I can tell you from experience that keeping the programmers away from the UI is not necessarily the solution, if it was that simple the magic of Apple would have been duplicated long ago.
Great products are the result of everyone working together in an environment where individuals are free to openly and effectively communicate ideas.
In my experience, graphics and UI designers first presentations are very "Isn't this neat and ornate", while programmers come at it from a "What is the logical and most accurate way to solve this problem, how have I solved this problem before?" perspective. What Apple produces is always right in the middle, neither orrnate (pretty icons neatly laid out, but not artistically cluttered) nor the strict programmatic approach of reaching your results by a drill down hiearchy system.
While I don't know what the secret formula is at Apple I can say with a reasonable amount of certainty that the "corporate" culture that Apple fosters is one that incentivises innovation and teamwork rather than rewarding the those that play it safe, climb the ladder at the expense of coworkers, or generally stay under the radar to stay employed.
It's the management of the "talent" as much as the talent themselves that allows and fosters the creativity from all sides of the fence that makes products great.
IMHO, Steve Jobs is a uniquely forward looking businessman and posseses a keen eye for hiring management and talent. He understands how to excite, motivate and dictate the rules of varying environments with the goal of producing the most usable, and thereby the most popular products on the market.
And no, I don't, and never have worked for Apple. I'm just a seasoned programmer with a strong admiration for their products.
lead in design? I'm not to sure I have an answer for this but I can guess
that maybe it has something to do with the culture. The asian workers tend
to stay at one job for their whole career but in America especially in the
tech field, you'd be lucky to hold a job for more than a few years unless
your just truly amazingly gifted. Perhaps it is this constant stream of new
blood in the company that keeps it fresh with new ideas. I kinda have the
feeling that in Apple's case, Steve Jobs work ethic would probably never fly
over in Japan and I think asian workers would shoot themselves if they ever
worked for someone like Steve Balmer. I have to think that leadership has
something to do with it. So those are my two cents.
In fact if you say 'design', especially 'industrial design', it's likely that most students of design would think 'Italian' first rather than 'American' as the pre-eminent nation when it comes to design.
Germany and though they on average seemed to be a little
ahead of us in math & science, only a select few even had the
right to go to a University. Yes, not chance or opportunity,
"right". See, in Germany and a lot countries, people's
educational options are detrmined at an early age. Had a bad
time in 6th grade? Too bad, no chance to ever go to college, off
to an apprenticeship you go at 16. Class, caste, whatever you
want to call it, most of the world is still stuck in 19th century
social systems. That is why America is the leader in innovation
and always will be. Here, anybody can do anything, or at least
they have that right.
But I guess this gives you the incentive not to mess up in school whereas in America you can just be an immature idiot even in college and they'll still let you in. Germany gives no chances, which is really extreme, while in America they give you way too many imo. There should be a line somewhere in between.
Question regarding Silicon Valley:
Was the Walkman designed in Silicon Valley?
Was the Nintendo Wii designed in Silicon Valley?
These are transformational products that provide ( or in the case of the Walkman, provided) a fundamentally different user experience.
I don't believe that these type of products will only come from Silicon Valley in the future. They will come also from India, China etc.
Finally, I don't know who Jonathan Ivey is but I would say that it takes more than a person. As a counter-question, if Jonathan worked at a competitor (say Nokia or Samsung) and had the same budget and resources, would he still be able to deliver the same product. IMHO, I don't think so...
Another commenter stated companies in these countries will often have employees there their entire lives, whereas here people hop from job to job in about a year. Fresh blood definitely has a major role to play, however, outside of that, you have to think about different country's cultures, what allows people to move away from the norm and the collective. Japan and other Asian cultures are based very much around the group collective. Many European cultures imply that if something is not explicitly allowed, it is not allowed. Between the constant fresh blood, but also America's individualistic society and cultural view that all actions/devices/etc are allowed unless specifically not allowed, many of these groundbreaking new product designs are going to continue coming from the US regardless of the decline in math and science abilities.
which one person had deep control. Steve Jobs has his
peculiarities, most notably for uncrackable boxes, and they show
up here--but there are no committee decisions--and Jobs could
say no, go back and fix it. Go back and find a better way.
Other companies don't start out with a clear vision, have it
diluted by cries of 'but that would jack the cost up! We can't sell
a phone without x capability! We don't really need an x!"
Stevve Jobs wanted an insanely great phone that would make up
for the lack of flying cars. He got Apple to make one.
Nokia? Sony? They'd say in their corporate voice that that's a
frivolous goal. More important to have a phone that IT people
find manageable. And they'll go on making incremental changes
to their compromise, and never get to the iPhone--until
somebody like Jobs plumps at on the finish line they didn't even
see.
That's not software:that's the total package.
product ? whether it's the iPhone or anything else ? that US
software development reigns supreme. It's a silly conclusion.
The one conclusion that is valid (which you touched upon) is that
Apple's vision and leadership is outstanding.
One can reach this conclusion from the following facts:
1) Apple's engineers are excellent, but not inherently superior to
or work harder than HP's, MS's, Samsung's, or Sony's.
2) Apple has hit more doubles and home runs than the above
companies combined lately.
Conclusion: The reason that Apple can create products such as
the iPhone is that leadership allocates engineering resources and
efforts appropriately.
If anything, this is part of the US's superior management talent
pool...but that's a whole other story...
powers. He simply follows the mantra popular in manufacturing.
KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid). It works every time.
Could you imagine Dell, HP, Microsoft, Motorola, or any other US manufacturer coming up with the iPhone? Hell, no!
the design departments of Apple either OS or shape. Of course the
iPhone could not have been made anywhere else, no other
company has Only American Math and Science school graduates
working on development!
deliberately choosing to ignore it. I don't recall reading your
subject line anywhere in the article. And nowhere does the
author state that only people who are US citizens had and
anything to do with the iPhone development.
You might try rereading the article without adding your own
interpretation to what the author is saying. And I believe you will
find people of many nationalities working at Apple in Silicon
Valley.
recognise sarcasm. As someone who has worked in a US
Univeristy, where only one out of 12 researchers in our group
was a born American, not even the lab head was an American,
this inability to see the intellectual influx from the place called
the RotW, really gripes. An examination of the names on patents
and research papers filled in the US, with the would look slanted
to the easct, remove the Administrators, non hands on Lab
heads, and people whos names are on patent applications for
"political" reasons, and the average American might have a little
problem reading the names.
My point is credit where credit is due, not everything that is a
super success comes from the US, not everything that is built
like a tank, and drives like a tank, is a tank, (or a crysler). As
another poster said, this is a world ecconomy, there is some
freedom to move around the globe, more than ever before, with
that movement go ideas and concepts. The next great American
like Einstein, Franklin... may be born in another country.....even
in a Darfur, we may never know if we educate only the rich ones!
iPhone was composed entirely of born and bred Americans??
American Students' low math and science scores are the reason
that most of the tech industry is dominated by ex-pat workers
(Apple's Industrial Design Chief, Jonathan Ive being one of them)
who have migrated to the US from all over the world. And are
you further suggesting that all of the parts that went into the
iPhone were designed and built by All American Quarterbacks?
This is a global economy and if you guys don't clue into the fact
that you need everyone else just as much if not more than they
need you (because how many of your precious american workers
would be willing to work for the wages and hours that workers
in Asia do) as well as fix your education system and pay more
attention to world benefit rather than self-serving gain in your
foreign policies, it won't be long before revolutionary products
like this are completely conceived of and created outside the US.
As it is, most of their parts are created elsewhere.
Wake up and smell the global economy coffee, folks.
P.S. I cannot believe C|Net is allowing such ignorant, parochial
drivel to sully their pages!!
American company. It does not matter who works in the
company if they are woman or men or yellow, brown, white or
black or gay or not. It is AMERICAN Company.
America has a lot of talent, some bad and some are good and
some are great. It seems that whoever wants to come to US sees
the potential and the rewards.
After the iPhone was digested by critics and copy cats they are
starting to panic and wondering how can America the stupid can
come out with a perfect gadget. The problem is that Europeans
and Asians love to write that Americans are stupid. I call this
jealousy.
Please stop crying ...
necessary part of being proud of a nice product in the USA these
days?
the world call it home, and have the same opportunities. It is this
quality that allows the US (specifically Silicon Valley) to attract
Just check out this fake Iphone from China. It even has a microSD slot and removable battery. The future of development in other countries may be faster than we may think. It just shows how fast the Chinese can just copy our technology and bootleg this stuff so fast that it's scary.