The iPhone UI Revolution

I have held off from blogging about the iPhone here much thus far, but I am going to chuck some opinion out there. This is not just about the iPhone though, it is more about how the industry needs to react because of it.

Let me say this right off the bad: the iPhone is not a device I would buy myself. It is an influential device that will do fantastically in the market, that is for sure, but its omissions are too deal breaking for me. They are also things that could have been easily remedied by Apple, and I am sure they will be fixed in a second-generation product, but for now I will do without a device that can’t record video, use 3G networks and A2DP headphones, and other things I appreciate. But more on my actual iPhone pros and cons in a future post.

What the iPhone has achieved though, is forcing the industry in general to rethink the whole user interface paradigm. Touch sensitive devices have long used a stylus, and are only now evolving to use the finger. This fact, combined with the swishing, swirling, and sliding seen in the iPhone’s UI make it a much more organic device, one that consumers may find easier to ‘relate’ to.

On top of this more organic approach to UI design, the iPhone’s interface just looks so damn good. Sure, Windows Mobile is functional, S60 is pretty, and so on, but the iPhone interface is sexy. User interface design cannot take a back seat to device design any longer, and Apple has shown us that an attractive physical design can be accompanied by a functional and attractive UI design.

While other manufacturers may not have to play catch up to Apple with technical specifications, they definitely need to with UI design. Verizon’s new Motorola Q9m features a fun circular UI enhancement, and devices like the LG Prada and HTC Touch are certainly steps in the right direction, but the iPhone just integrates everything so nicely; this is what Apple does best.

The iPhone is not the device it could have been, but for UI design, it is revolutionary. If manufacturers take nothing else away from the iPhone release, I hope it at least forces them to take a step back and reevaluate the user interface experience.