Nokia

The anniversary of the smartphone

Remember snake? That Pac Man-like game that saw you ‘eating’ blocks of food, growing in size, and then trying to avoid crashing into your own slowly extending self? Yeah. In 1998, it was a standard upload on most of Nokia’s phones.

Well, four years before that, on the 16th of August in ’94, the IBM Simon Personal Communicator – a chunky black box of a thing – was released. And guess what…

It was a smartphone!

It had a calendar; it could take notes, and send emails – basically plan your life. For all intents and purposes, indeed, it was a smartphone. That means that 2015 will mark its 21st anniversary, scary huh?

Here’s BBC’s article with a bit more information on, arguably, the birth of the smartphone… which predates Snake. Check it out.