Apple awarded patent for the iPhone interface
Hardware
My iPhone with the original screen cover and my Palm Centro phone next to my original iPods.
I love my 16GiB iPhone 3G. it's the single greatest gadget I've ever used. I know as a supporter of free and open source software and open standards I'm not really supposed to like it, but it's just gorgeous and a real pleasure to use. The entire experience is fantastic.
This patent Apple has been rewarded scares me though. We need competition to keep Apple on their toes, and this will only hamper such efforts by scaring away potential competitors. I guess that's the whole point though right?
Before I was an iPhone guy I was a Palm guy; aside from Apple I think Palm have been the only folks who could design a usable mobile phone interface. I still have a Palm Centro I carry around with me too to put my Australian SIM card in when I'm in Singapore, or vica versa. I can't help but think Palm's design of a touch screen device with icons representing different applications taking up the whole home screen was done before Apple for some reason… say a decade before Apple?
I'm not Bill Kurtis.
