Things change

Finally, a year and a half after its presentation (January 2007), the iPhone officially arrived in Italy.

Considering the coincidence of the dates, I can't help but think that, 30 years later, in 1977, the same person, Steve Jobs, presented the world with another product destined to revolutionize communications, the way we work, and the way we have fun: the Apple II, the first truly mass-produced microcomputer.

And I can't help but think of a major difference between these two products. The old Apple II was open, in every sense of the word. Anyone with the skills could program it. All the necessary information, including the system memory map, was printed in the manuals, and in fact, Apple II sales began to skyrocket when independent programmers created the first "killer applications," such as Dan Bricklin's Visicalc (the first spreadsheet, 1979; from Dan Bricklin's website, you can freely download a fully functional version (just save it as a VC.COM file); the program is only 27 KB).
But the Apple II was also open from a hardware standpoint. It could be opened and disassembled. The manuals contained the motherboard schematics. Everything was perfectly visible. There were no secrets in the Apple II. More than a system, it was a platform that encouraged programmers to create applications and hardware technicians to manufacture boards.

In contrast, the iPhone is closed. Only Apple can change its contents via remote updates. Its functions are protected, and Apple has already threatened anyone who tries to unlock the original code to run other applications. Eventually, someone will do it because it's a challenge, but they will do it clandestinely, and only a few will be able to benefit.

The essential difference is this: while once the entire world created innovations for the Apple II, now only Apple can innovate for the iPhone. The former was generative; the latter, at best, is functional.

Update

It was rightly pointed out to me that the iPhone SDK, with everything you need to program it, is available for free download from a dedicated Apple website.

But "Free sign up as a Registered iPhone Developer required to download the iPhone SDK"

And they basically want to know who you are, including your physical address and valid email address. This is what bothers me. Why do I have to identify myself just to see what the iPhone looks like?

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