In 2007, Apple revolutionized the smartphone industry.
The announcement of the iPhone in January took the tech world by storm.
And on launch day 5 months later,
thousands of people lined up at both Apple and AT&T stores across the
country to be one of the first to get the phone.
Some had even spent the night.
It was clear that people were excited about the iPhone.
And for a device that was radically different from any other phone on the
market at that point, why wouldn’t they be?
Now whether you’re an Apple fanboy or a hater, you can’t ignore the impact that the
first iPhone had on the smartphone industry.
But while practically everybody knows about the iPhone today,
did you know that it technically wasn’t Apple’s first phone project?
That’s because back in 2005, there was another mobile phone that Apple was
working on.
And no, I’m not talking about some sort of prototype or anything like that.
This was a real product that was manufactured by Motorola.
It’s known as the iTunes Phone.
And if you’ve never heard of it...
there’s a good reason for that.
Let’s get into it.
[♫ delightful, classy music ♫]
Back in September of 2005, Steve Jobs, on stage at Apple’s annual music event,
announced the very first iTunes Phone,
officially known as the Motorola ROKR E1.
This phone was essentially a rebranded version of another Motorola phone,
the E398, with the addition of an Apple- designed iTunes client, which essentially
gave the phone iPod-like capabilities.
You could plug this phone into your Mac or Windows-based PC and it would be
recognized by iTunes.
This enabled you to sync music from your iTunes library with the phone just like an
iPod.
Now this was the very first time that Apple’s iTunes technology was integrated
into a phone.
But was it the phone that Apple was rumored to be working on?
You see, there had been rumors for years about Apple possibly making a cell phone.
Even all the way back to 1999, when the company purchased the domain name,
iPhone.org.
Ever since then, the rumor mill was churning, posting articles and even
mockups all speculating what an Apple phone would look like.
This would go on as Apple quietly registered for ownership of the iPhone
trademark in various countries over the next few years, beginning with Singapore
in 2002.
But it wouldn’t be until July of 2004 when Apple and Motorola announced in a press
release that they were working on creating a phone with an integrated
iTunes player.
So, this was it, right?
This was what the blogs and news articles and mockups were all pointing to,
right?
An Apple phone...?
Well, you see, the iTunes Phone was not created exclusively by Apple.
It was more of a partnership.
The phone itself was just a regular Motorola phone with some Apple-
designed software on it that worked with iTunes.
And sure, it was cool to have iTunes on a phone for the very first time...
but judging from the reaction of the crowd that day,
they didn’t appear very excited about the whole thing.
Especially when you compare it to the reactions seen at the iPhone’s
announcement at Macworld 2007:
[STEVE JOBS] There’s one more thing about iTunes that we’re announcing today.
[phone rings]
You’ve probably heard about this.
Uh, today, we are introducing...
the iTunes Phone.
These are NOT
three separate devices.
This is one device!
[Applause]
And we are calling it...
iPhone.
[MJD] It also didn’t help that images of the ROKR E1 running the iTunes player were
leaked to Engadget 2 months prior to the launch.
OK, but even with all that aside, iPods were flying off the shelves and iTunes
was THE way to purchase songs digitally.
So you would think that a device that combined the music-playing functionality
of the iPod and the massive music library offered on the iTunes Store with a
cellphone would do the same.
...But this wasn’t the case.
The ROKR instead launched to a rather lukewarm reception.
Even though you could use the phone just like an iPod by connecting it to your
computer to sync with iTunes, it still wasn’t exactly the same experience.
Because it lacked support for USB 2.0, transfer times were much slower, and the
phone was also limited as to how many songs could be on the device at one time.
Its firmware only allowed the iTunes player to store 100 songs,
or one-tenth the amount of songs able to fit on a 4 GB iPod.
This was despite the fact the ROKR had a Micro SD card slot for expansion.
Not only that, the phone used a 2.5-mm headphone jack,
meaning that headphones using the more popular 3.5-mm standard would have to
use an adapter.
Apple would ALMOST get this right with the first iPhone, as they did include a
3.5-mm headphone jack,
but it was recessed.
Meaning that, (you’re gonna love this), headphones that had larger ends would
need an adapter to fit in the iPhone.
Some also criticized the design of the ROKR as it was very similar to the E398,
aside from the addition of an extra button on the phone’s keypad to launch right into
the iTunes player at any time.
The Motorola ROKR was priced at $249.99 on contract with Cingular.
Cingular was another important partner in the creation of the iTunes Phone, as they
were the exclusive carrier.
On the day of the phone’s announcement, they showcased a huge iTunes + Cingular
advertising campaign with both print and video ads to promote the device.
Now, the iTunes Phone deal didn’t last very long, but there was actually another
Motorola phone released with the iTunes player;
The lesser-known Motorola SLVR L7 came out in late 2006, about 1 year after
the ROKR, and is the device that I have here.
The SLVR has a special bootup animation unique from all of the other
Cingular/Motorola phones.
The regular Motorola interface is similar to what you’ll find on a RAZR with the
exception of the iTunes application.
Unlike the ROKR, the SLVR does not have a dedicated button to launch the player,
but there are two customizable buttons on the phone’s keypad which can be
configured to open the iTunes player.
Although, the ability to customize these buttons is a standard feature on other
Motorola phones like the RAZR.
So, how does the iTunes player itself look?
Well, the answer is...
very similar to an iPod.
You have the same menu options and even the same sliding animation when
navigating between the menus.
Obviously, there’s no click wheel, so you have to use the phone’s arrow keys to
move around.
And there’s even an option to shuffle songs right from the main screen.
It was this reason that Apple positioned the ROKR as being similar to the iPod
Shuffle, since both held about 100 songs and didn’t have a click wheel.
So you could say that the iTunes Phone was like an iPod Shuffle with a screen, but
this still didn’t make the device sell any better.
In fact, it appears that even people inside Apple were unimpressed with the ROKR.
This led some to speculate that Apple’s work on the ROKR was intentionally below
par, a claim that father of the iPod, Tony Fadell disputed by saying,
But when it came to the song limit, Motorola claims that it was Apple who
insisted on this limitation, saying in a 2005 Engadget article that the company
originally insisted on a 25-song limit due to licensing issues,
but that later on, the two companies agreed on 100 songs.
When asked about this, Motorola’s CEO simply said,
“Ask Apple.”
And even Steve Jobs himself didn’t appear to be very excited about the whole
thing.
[STEVE JOBS] Hello?
(through phone) [Hey, Steve, it’s Eddy.]
Hi Eddy, hey, I’m uh, kind of in the middle of something right now.
[OK, uh, gimme a call back later.]
Yeah, I’ll talk to you later, thanks, bye.
So, I go there and I just...
resume my music right back to where it was.
Well, I was supposed to resume my music right back to where it was.
[MJD] So, you might ask yourself,
“If people inside Apple weren’t so enthusiastic about the ROKR,
then why did they agree to partner with Motorola to release it?”
Well, you see, a couple years before the iTunes Phone came out, mobile phones
were beginning to gain the ability to play MP3s and Apple saw this as a possible
threat to the iPod.
With the iTunes Phone, people could get the best of both worlds;
an iPod inside of a cellphone.
Plus, with the 100-song limit, it was seen as a way to introduce people to the world
of iPods by giving them a small taste of the full experience.
But there was also another reason:
You see, Apple was not only partnering up with Motorola but with Cingular as well.
And having a good relationship with a carrier would help to solve one of the
inevitable problems that Apple faced when they would go on to create the
iPhone.
And that is control over the device.
Steve Jobs detailed this well at All Things Digital 2005 when he stated,
I personally don’t think Apple would’ve been so enthusiastic about having to slap
a giant Cingular or Verizon logo on the back of the iPhone,
and have carrier-bundled applications and branding throughout.
But through the Motorola ROKR, Apple was able to develop a relationship with
Cingular,
a relationship that would become vital when Apple was developing the iPhone.
And this is where Cingular was smart.
Apple reportedly tried to come to a deal with Verizon initially, but could not reach
an agreement.
Cingular was able to give Apple control over the design of the phone itself
in exchange for one thing:
Exclusivity.
This is another way that the iPhone was such a unique phone at the time.
The only real indication that the device even ran on the Cingular network was
from the subtle text in the status bar.
There was no carrier branding on the back of the phone, and applications like
the Cingular Mall were not included with the iPhone.
But Cingular was willing to give Apple the control that they wanted.
Stan Sigman, Cingular’s CEO at the time, was present at the iPhone’s launch and stated:
Apple, being the secretive company that they are, did not allow Cingular to even
see a working prototype of the iPhone until a few weeks before the device’s
launch in January 2007.
It was a huge risk for the carrier, but it paid off BIG TIME.
Because Cingular, who would later be acquired by the new AT&T, was the
exclusive carrier of the iPhone for 5 years until the launch of the Verizon iPhone 4
in 2011.
The Apple/Cingular partnership also led to another big innovation:
Visual voicemail,
the ability to select voicemails from a list, rather than having to listen to each one in
order.
As for Motorola, well, you might say they got the short end of the stick.
As I mentioned, the iTunes Phone didn’t sell very well,
and it could be partly due to the fact that Apple launched the much more
successful iPod Nano on the very same day.
Motorola’s CEO at the time, Ed Zander, later criticized the Nano by saying,
But the funny thing is...
he was right!
I mean, how many of you carry around an iPod with you today?
In fact, even having songs stored on your phone isn’t enough, as now, music
listeners have turned to subscription streaming services, which made up
almost 80% of all music revenue last year.
So, while the iTunes Phone wasn’t the amazingly innovative phone that was
anticipated to come from Apple, it is still a very important device.
A device created through a unique partnership between 3 companies:
A cell phone manufacturer,
a wireless carrier,
and a computer company.
And while it didn’t fly off the shelves when it launched back in 2005,
it serves as an important chapter in the history
of the iPhone.
So, that’s all for today’s video.
I hope you all enjoyed this retrospective look back at the short-lived line of
iTunes Phones.
If you did, be sure to give this video a like and get subscribed.
And hey, if you actually used the Motorola ROKR or the SLVR years ago,
be sure to share your experience down in the comments.
And as always, I want to thank you all so much for watching and I will see you...
in the next video.
[♫ Music ♫]