Remember Antennagate?
Back in July 2010, Steve Jobs walked onto the stage at Apple’s Town Hall to deal with the iPhone 4 antenna controversy. Tim Cook and Bob Mansfield joined him for what turned into a lengthy Q&A with the press.
We’ve known about that Q&A for 16 years.
We just haven’t been able to watch it.
Until now.
A previously unseen 47-minute recording of the Antennagate Q&A has surfaced on YouTube, finally giving us a video record of the part of that infamous Apple press conference that was left out of the footage Apple released at the time. (MacRumors)
There’s something wonderfully 2010 about seeing all three of them together, answering questions about the iPhone 4 while the whole “Antennagate” saga was unfolding in real time.
Even more fascinating: Daring Fireball’s John Gruber, who was actually in the room that day, has written about the newly surfaced footage — including his own question at around 18:45, where Jobs, Cook and Mansfield answered without actually saying a word.
They simply held up their iPhone 4s.
Without cases.
It’s exactly the kind of tiny Apple-history moment that photographs can capture, but video makes completely different.
And then there’s Jobs himself. The Q&A contains several lengthy answers that have been remembered for years, including one where he takes time to explain what Apple had learned from the entire episode — and another, much later in the session, where he talks about Apple’s philosophy of owning or controlling the core technology behind its products. (Daring Fireball)
This isn’t some new Apple event.
It isn’t a new product.
It’s something much more intimate.
A missing piece of Apple history.
Sixteen years later, we finally get to sit in the room.