iPhone SDK and Apple Finally Listening
— Apple Computer’s Steve Jobs just announced that Apple would (finally!) provide an iPhone SDK to 3rd party developers in order to enable them to create native applications for the iPhone (and, incidentally, also for the iPod touch). While the actual SDK won’t ship until February 2008, this announcement is a monumental shift in strategy for Apple, who has thus far tried to control the applications available for the iPhone and limit 3rd party developers to Web 2.0 apps running in the Safari browser.
Pressure on Apple from customers and bloggers alike very quickly led to this turn-around in strategy – and this can only be a good thing or both Apple and its iPhone customers. Having the iPhone be a true mobile platform – similar to Palm, Nokia, and Windows Smartphones – is key to any long-term success of the iPhone product line.