It was released 13 years ago in June.
Two housekeeping things this week, both of which will be reminders of how quickly time flies when you're around electronics.
Thing One: If the iPhone were a child, it would now be a teenager.
The birthday came the last Monday in June. The year was 2007, when people were lining up at Apple stores around the country. The iPhone was a phone with a touchscreen that could also play music.
Tracking companies that keep a watch over the electronics industry put iPhone sales worldwide at 185 million last year. That's about 506,000 a day. (In the past 10 years, total sales have been 1.5 billion iPhones.)
The original iPhone had a 3.5-inch screen — a postage stamp by today's standards — and came in two sizes: 4 and 8 gigabytes. The smaller model sold for $499; the larger, $599. A two-year contract was required. The original iPhone was discontinued in July 2008, when the iPhone 3G was released.
Apple's iPhone sales in the 2019 fiscal year made up just over half the company's revenue.
Thing Two: There's a website that's about three years older than the iPhone. On July 12, 2004, the website went online from Carrollton, Texas, a suburb near Dallas.
It was founded by Matt Rutledge, an electronics wholesaler. It worked like this: Each day, an item would be put up for sale on the website. Frequently, the item would be deeply discounted because it was being discontinued or replaced by a new model. In the beginning, the offerings were normally computer hardware or electronic gadgets. In the website's younger years, the items ranged from laptops to lightbulbs and everything in between.
When the item of the day was sold out, that was it. No rainchecks. No reorders. And all shipping was $5. It didn't matter what it was. In later years, when the website branched out to sell non-electronic items — like mattresses — shipping was $5.
The website: Woot! (www.woot.com).
Woot turned 15 on July 11. It's still making daily offers, but instead of one per day, there are several deals in many categories, including electronics, computers, home, tools and sporting goods.
Woot was acquired by Amazon in mid 2010, and because of that, Amazon Prime members get free standard shipping on most items. Shipping for non-Prime members was increased from $5 to $6 about two years ago.
One more thing: Twenty years ago this month (next Thursday to be exact), Tiger Woods won the British Open and thus became the youngest player to win all four major golf tournaments at least once. He was 24. (Woods’ wins in those four tournaments were over two seasons, starting in 2000 and ending in 2001. Technically, a "grand slam" if done in a single calendar year.)
Woods was born in late 1975. The next year, Steve Wozniak would introduce the Apple-1 with his business partner, Steve Jobs, and the seed of Apple Computer would be planted.
Neither the iPhone nor Woot was around when Woods won the British Open. For another reference point, Google was around, but wasn't even 2 years old yet.
Lonnie Brown can be reached at LedgerDatabase@aol.com.
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July 24, 2020 at 10:44PM
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Gadget Daddy: iPhone is now a teenager - The Ledger
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