[smacktoward]

> The iPhone was released in 2007, but a smartphone that could technically have called a ride predates it by at least a few years.

From a technical perspective, there's no reason you couldn't have had a ride-hailing app on a Nokia Series 60 phone in 2006, or a Palm Treo 270 in 2002. All the necessary components were present in both of them. What was missing was a critical mass of users of those devices -- a user base large enough for third parties to justify building services on that scale for them.

Which could help explain why Amazon is pumping out Alexa devices in so many different form factors; they haven't cracked the nut yet on a single form factor that will attract that critical mass of users, but maybe if you can aggregate enough small user bases together they'll add up to a large enough one to attract third parties.

[the_watcher]

Yes, I completely agree with that. Particularly given that "voice assistant who helps you rely less on your smartphone OS" doesn't have the built in distribution advantage that phones did (pretty much everyone had accepted that they need a mobile phone), so a diverse set of form factors matters (not everyone wants glasses, some people hate watches, etc).