[coldtea]

There was no usable web browsing on a phone before the iPhone. It had the most advanced browser.

There was no iPod level music players on a phone before the iPhone. There were crappy music players you can revisit and compare.

Mail apps on phones were crap.

Messaging was crap, in tiny little screens.

Just a few things.

People reviewing and getting the iPhone the time was wowed and think of it like magic. It's people not having it, and dismissing it outhand because it had a touch screen or because their unusable Windows ME phone had some crappy third party software that didn't get it. Of course all of those got either the iPhone or an Android clone of it very soon and never looked back.

[fennecfoxy]

Lmao, I had phones before the iPhone, Ericsson especially that had decent (ie usable) browsers, could play mp3 files etc. And you could install apps on them over wap, take photos/videos etc.

iPhone couldn't take videos as people have already mentioned, couldn't install any 3rd party apps to start with (because Mr. Jobs didn't believe in it), no selfie camera, no torch.

All the iPhone did was streamline people's interaction with the phone, with a large multi-touch display and a simple, intuitive (not anymore though) operating system. They definitely improved things, but in the way that Apple usually does; wait for other companies to do the things, then take the cream of the crop, iterate/improve on them, wrap them up/lock into ecosystem (which some people like) and ship.

[alt227]

This is exactly my point. Everything you have mentioned was available on smartphones before the iphone, iphone just made them more accessible and easier to use. Still stands that the iphone was in no way the most advanced smartphone on the market, it just put a prettier and easier to use interface on these features which led to reviewers being 'wowed'.

[gcanyon]

I had a Sidekick, and it had a semi-reasonable browser. But clearly, the iPhone was much better.