The iPhone has come a long way since its release in the summer of 2007. During the Macworld conference that year, Steve Jobs promised that the device would change the cell phone industry — and it has. However, the first iPhone did not live up to its billing in the minds of many.
The original iPhone had many revolutionary features. It was the first cell phone to have multi-touch, a technology that enabled the use of multi-finger gestures to navigate instead of a stylus. Visual voice mail is another novel feature that allowed voice messages to be listed in an inbox type style, removing the need to listen to all voicemails prior to the one you want to listen to. In addition, the iPhone’s distinctive, elegant design was like nothing else on the consumer mobile market. Despite all this, there was much to be desired. The device only had a 2 megapixel camera and could not perform rudimentary tasks such as copy and pasting text. Another huge blow was the lack of support for 3G data. Apple opted instead to run the iPhone on AT&T’s slower edge network. This was done to prolong the device’s battery life.
Fast-forward to 2010 and the release of the iPhone 4 which has patched up all the short-comings of its predecessor. The device now boasts a 5 megapixel rear camera in addition to a .3 megapixel VGA front facing camera, 3G network support, as well as a clever copy and paste mechanism. The most significant difference between the first and latest iPhone is the presence of the app store. The original iPhone came pre-installed with 15 programs and no ability to add any additional ones. Today, the app store contains over 400,000 different applications — many of them free — to download. With rumors ablaze regarding the impending release of the iPhone 5, there are sure to be even more changes.More info here: Watch Steve Jobs introduce the original iPhone