Interviews with Apple employees, including Fadell, Forstall, and others, reveal the secretive and complex process that led to the first iPhone
a huge excerpt from THE ONE DEVICE, a definitive look at how the first iPhone was designed. https://www.theverge.com/... Brian Merchant / @bcmerchant : It was taken verbatim from an on-the-record portion of our interview, which was recorded and conducted in person. I stand by my story 100%. Bret Taylor / @btaylor : Intense work and intense internal politics on the path to create the iPhone and revolutionize our industry https://www.theverge.com/... @stevesi : 1/2 Great read. Literally every platform shift comes down to a debate to the death over which code base to use. https://www.theverge.com/... Benjamin Mayo / @bzamayo : Wow this new book about the iPhone rips on Schiller pretty hard. https://www.theverge.com/... pic.twitter.com/aWQCXNQTXr Jay Yarow / @jyarow : Dang. Ex-Apple engineer trashes Phil Schiller. http://www.theverge.com/... http://twitter.com/... Steve Kovach / @stevekovach : Another weird thing: Tony Fadell was given quote approval in the new Apple book? http://www.businessinsider.com/ ... pic.twitter.com/VJoDdyV7ZH @stevesi : 2/2 At 50,000ft platforms have same parts. At sea level nothing works when making the decision. In between, everyone thinks they're right. Jorge Quinteros / @jorgeq : Interesting article on the birth of the iPhone but really sad to hear stories like this - https://www.theverge.com/... pic.twitter.com/cuPNPiFhpx Casey Newton / @caseynewton : This is great: “The iPhone is the reason I'm divorced.” http://twitter.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
Brian Merchant's The One Device excerpt is the first large-scale oral history of the iPhone's development, built from on-the-record interviews with Fadell, Forstall and other Apple veterans — and it lands in a running argument over who actually built the phone. Ex-Apple figures quoted in the book publicly criticize Phil Schiller's role, while reports that Fadell received quote approval show how much editorial leverage participants held over their own portrayal.
The reception was immediate and contested: Bret Taylor called out the intense work and internal politics, and Steve Sinofsky framed the story as proof that every platform shift comes down to a fight over which code base survives. Merchant publicly stood by his verbatim quoting after pushback, setting a template for how iPhone history gets litigated — a thread he and others have kept pulling since, from retrospectives on the state of mobile at the first keynote to Fadell's own book tour years later.
First-order effects
- Fadell, Forstall and Schiller are repositioned in public memory overnight: the excerpt elevates the engineering-team narrative and puts Schiller's contribution under attack from former colleagues quoted on the record.
- Merchant's decision to publish verbatim recorded quotes — and defend them when challenged — makes source handling itself part of the story, raising the bar for how Apple-adjacent oral histories are sourced.
Second-order effects
- Apple's institutional response to unauthorized storytelling sharpens by contrast: where this book relied on willing ex-employees, the company later sued a departing engineer over leaks to journalists, as in its lawsuit over Journal app disclosures — pushing future accounts toward either cooperation-with-approval or legal risk.
- Other iPhone-era principals gain incentive to publish their own versions: Fadell's subsequent book and press tour, and the After Steve account of Jony Ive's frustrations and 2019 exit, show participants racing to fix the historical record on their terms.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, the iPhone's origin story becomes a contested genre written by alumni rather than the company — with quote approval and selective participation determining which voices dominate, and Apple's leak enforcement defining what never gets told from inside.
- Sinofsky's framing points at a durable structural lesson: platform shifts are decided less by vision than by internal code-base politics, a lens that historians and executives alike now apply to every subsequent platform transition.
The trend: iPhone history is shifting from corporate hagiography to participant-authored oral history, with ex-Apple insiders, authors, and Apple's own leak enforcement competing to control the record.