user
Image of four existing
interface? Here are four smartphones: the
smartphones: Motorola Q,
Motorola Q, BlackBerry, Palm Treo, Nokia
BlackBerry, Palm Treo, and
E62—the usual suspects.”
Nokia E62
“What’s wrong with their user interface? The
The top half of each image
problem with them is in the bottom forty.
fades away, leaving just
It’s this stuff right there [points to keyboards
the bottom half—
on the phones]. They all have these
the keyboard
keyboards that are there whether you need
them or not. And they all have these control
continued
66 CREATE THE STORY
TABLE 6.1 JOBS’S iPHONE KEYNOTE PRESENTATION (continued)
STEVE’S WORDS
STEVE’S SLIDES
buttons that are fixed in plastic and are
the same for every application. Well, every
application wants a slightly different user
interface, a slightly optimized set of buttons
just for it. And what happens if you think of
a great idea six months from now? You can’t
add a button to these things. They’re already
shipped. So, what do you do?”
“What we’re going to do is get rid of
Image of iPhone
all these buttons and just make a giant
screen.”
“How are we going to communicate with
Image of iPhone on its side;
this? We don’t want to carry around a
a stylus fades in
mouse. So, what are we going to do? A
stylus, right? We’re going to use a stylus.”
“No [laughs]. Who wants a stylus? You have
Words appear next to
to get them out, put them away—you lose
image:
them. Yuck. Nobody wants a stylus.”
Who wants a stylus?
“So, let’s not use a stylus. We’re going to use
Stylus fades out of frame
the best pointing device in the world—a
as image of index finger
pointing device that we’re all born with.
appears next to iPhone
We’re born with ten of them. We’ll use our
fingers.”
“We have invented a new technology called
Finger fades out, and
‘multi-touch,’ which is phenomenal.”
words appear:
Multi-Touch
“It works like magic. You don’t need a
Words reveal upper right:
stylus. It’s far more accurate than any touch
Works like magic
display that’s ever been shipped. It ignores
No stylus
unintended touches. It’s supersmart. You
Far more accurate
can do multi-finger gestures on it, and boy
Ignores unintended
have we patented it!” [laughter]
touches
Multi-finger gestures
Patented
INTRODUCE THE ANTAGONIST 67
Make note of how Jobs asks rhetorical questions to advance
the story. “Why do we need a revolutionary user interface?”
he asked before introducing the problem. He even raises prob-
lems to his own solution. When he introduced the concept
of replacing the keyboard with a touch screen, he rhetorically
asked, “How are we going to communicate with this?” His ready
answer was, “We’re going to use the best pointing device in the
world . . . our fingers.”
Nobody really cares about your product or Apple’s products
or Microsoft’s or any other company’s, for that matter. What
people care about is solving problems and making their lives
a little better. As in the smartphone example in Table 6.1, Jobs
describes the pain they’re feeling, gives them a reason for their
pain (usually caused by competitors), and, as you will learn in
Scene 7, offers a cure.
Making His Case to CNBC
“Why in the world would Apple want to jump into the handset
market with so much competition and so many players?” asked
CNBC’s Jim Goldman in one of the few interviews Jobs granted
immediately after the iPhone announcement. Jobs answered the
question by posing a problem in need of a solution: “We used all
the handsets out there, and boy is it frustrating. It’s a category
that needs to be reinvented. Handsets need to be more power-
ful and much easier to use. We thought we could contribute
something. We don’t mind if there are other companies mak-
ing products. The fact is there were one billion handsets sold in
2006. If we just got 1
Image of four existing
interface? Here are four smartphones: the
smartphones: Motorola Q,
Motorola Q, BlackBerry, Palm Treo, Nokia
BlackBerry, Palm Treo, and
E62—the usual suspects.”
Nokia E62
“What’s wrong with their user interface? The
The top half of each image
problem with them is in the bottom forty.
fades away, leaving just
It’s this stuff right there [points to keyboards
the bottom half—
on the phones]. They all have these
the keyboard
keyboards that are there whether you need
them or not. And they all have these control
continued
66 CREATE THE STORY
TABLE 6.1 JOBS’S iPHONE KEYNOTE PRESENTATION (continued)
STEVE’S WORDS
STEVE’S SLIDES
buttons that are fixed in plastic and are
the same for every application. Well, every
application wants a slightly different user
interface, a slightly optimized set of buttons
just for it. And what happens if you think of
a great idea six months from now? You can’t
add a button to these things. They’re already
shipped. So, what do you do?”
“What we’re going to do is get rid of
Image of iPhone
all these buttons and just make a giant
screen.”
“How are we going to communicate with
Image of iPhone on its side;
this? We don’t want to carry around a
a stylus fades in
mouse. So, what are we going to do? A
stylus, right? We’re going to use a stylus.”
“No [laughs]. Who wants a stylus? You have
Words appear next to
to get them out, put them away—you lose
image:
them. Yuck. Nobody wants a stylus.”
Who wants a stylus?
“So, let’s not use a stylus. We’re going to use
Stylus fades out of frame
the best pointing device in the world—a
as image of index finger
pointing device that we’re all born with.
appears next to iPhone
We’re born with ten of them. We’ll use our
fingers.”
“We have invented a new technology called
Finger fades out, and
‘multi-touch,’ which is phenomenal.”
words appear:
Multi-Touch
“It works like magic. You don’t need a
Words reveal upper right:
stylus. It’s far more accurate than any touch
Works like magic
display that’s ever been shipped. It ignores
No stylus
unintended touches. It’s supersmart. You
Far more accurate
can do multi-finger gestures on it, and boy
Ignores unintended
have we patented it!” [laughter]
touches
Multi-finger gestures
Patented
INTRODUCE THE ANTAGONIST 67
Make note of how Jobs asks rhetorical questions to advance
the story. “Why do we need a revolutionary user interface?”
he asked before introducing the problem. He even raises prob-
lems to his own solution. When he introduced the concept
of replacing the keyboard with a touch screen, he rhetorically
asked, “How are we going to communicate with this?” His ready
answer was, “We’re going to use the best pointing device in the
world . . . our fingers.”
Nobody really cares about your product or Apple’s products
or Microsoft’s or any other company’s, for that matter. What
people care about is solving problems and making their lives
a little better. As in the smartphone example in Table 6.1, Jobs
describes the pain they’re feeling, gives them a reason for their
pain (usually caused by competitors), and, as you will learn in
Scene 7, offers a cure.
Making His Case to CNBC
“Why in the world would Apple want to jump into the handset
market with so much competition and so many players?” asked
CNBC’s Jim Goldman in one of the few interviews Jobs granted
immediately after the iPhone announcement. Jobs answered the
question by posing a problem in need of a solution: “We used all
the handsets out there, and boy is it frustrating. It’s a category
that needs to be reinvented. Handsets need to be more power-
ful and much easier to use. We thought we could contribute
something. We don’t mind if there are other companies mak-
ing products. The fact is there were one billion handsets sold in
2006. If we just got 1
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