Opinion: Tim Cook, hero of the buttons!
Apple has given its new iPhones two new buttons. Is this just right because it helps the user experience? After all, Jony Ive can no longer fiddle with it.
Camera control on the iPhone: good or unnecessary?
(Image: Apple)
According to Duden, a button is a "small, usually round, flat, spherical or hemispherical object made of solid material on items of clothing". The second meaning given by the reference work is: "usually a round part of an [electrical] device with which something is switched on or off, set in motion or controlled by pressing or turning."
Steve Jobs meant the latter definition when he instructed his employees to develop the first iPhone almost two decades ago: "This phone will only have one button. Find out how." The employees made it easy for themselves and installed a touchscreen. The job was done and the boss was happy. From then on, all iPhone phone users had a large display with a home button on their ear instead of a crummy display with almost 40 Blackberry buttons underneath.
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Ten years later, when Steve Jobs could no longer protest, the then head of design Jony "Minimalist" Ive made the iPhone even shorter by one button: Face ID and gestures replaced the home button. Anyone who thought that Apple had completely switched from the pressing era to the tapping era is now proven wrong.
Firstly, the iPhone never became completely buttonless; employees have always hidden a few buttons on the side frame from their former boss. Secondly, Tim Cook has been upgrading this area since last year. First with the action button on the Pro iPhones, now with the camera shutter button. Even the standard models have both buttons.
If you take a closer look at the iPhone frame, you'll see: There's room for more! My wish for the next few years: 2025 the focus button, 2026 the flashlight button, 2027 Apple Intelligence on/off, 2028 the A, 2029 the B and so on. Around 2050, we will have the entire alphabet as physical buttons. And if there's no room for spaces and special characters, there's always the back. Joking aside: I'm happy about the new iPhone buttons, especially the camera button.
Jony "Button-off" Ive can't interfere with this development, he has long since moved on. What is he up to at the moment? He landed – Irony of history – at meaning 1 of the Duden definition of "button" and took on the "very gentle, modest exploration" (quote Ive!) of the subject. He designed a button for a down jacket for the luxury brand Moncler in four years.
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(emw)
