iPhone: 10 Years of Leading the Way

The top and side of an iPhone 5S. (Photo by Calerusnak via Wikimedia Commons)

On this date in 2007, Apple announced the iPhone.

Here are some things you may not have known about the smartphone.

The iPhone wasn’t Apple’s first foray into the portable communications market. The company introduced the Newton MessagePad in 1993. The Newton was a personal digital assistant, which was an electronic calendar, contact list and notebook. The Newton interface was based on handwriting recognition, which led to its limited appeal. The first Newton had 640 kilobytes of RAM and was powered by four AAA batteries. The Newton was discontinued in February 1998.

Later that year, Apple introduced the iMac, an all-in-one computer which was designed by Jonathan Ive, who would go on to design the iPod and the iPhone.

The iPod debuted in 2001, selling nearly 400 million units since then.

In 2005, Apple partnered with Motorola to release the ROKR E1, the first mobile phone to feature a version of iTunes, Apple’s online music store. About a year later, Apple discontinued the project to focus on developing its own mobile phone.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs made the announcement at the Macworld convention, and the iPhone was released on June 29, 2007.

Apple made a deal with Cingular Wireless to be the iPhone’s exclusive carrier. Cingular changed its name to AT&T before the phone’s release.

AT&T reported that almost 150,000 iPhones were activated during the first weekend it was available.

In November 2007, the iPhone was released in the United Kingdom, Germany and France. Today, the iPhone is available in most countries.

In 2016, Apple announced that it has sold more than 1 billion iPhones.

Our question: What country saw the most recent official release of the iPhone?

We’ll have the answer after this break.

Today is unofficially International Choreographers Day, National Apricot Day, and National Cassoulet Day.

It’s the birthday of former U.S. President Richard Nixon, who was born in 1913; musician Dave Matthews, who is 50; and the Duchess of Cambridge, the former Kate Middleton, who is 35.

This week in 2007, the top song in the U.S. was “Irreplaceable” by Beyonce.

The No. 1 movie was “Night at the Museum,” while the novel “For One More Day” by Mitch Albom topped the New York Times Bestsellers list.

Weekly question: Who was the first person to appear in a commercial for the iPhone?

Submit your answer at triviapeople.com/test and we’ll add the name of the person with the first correct answer to our winner’s wall … at triviapeople.com. We’ll reveal the correct answer on Friday’s episode.