My Box of Inspiration
My Box of Inspiration
On January 9, 2007 the tech community in Silicon Valley and the world at large experienced one of the greatest shows on earth – Steve Jobs launched the original iPhone.
People oohed and aahed as Jobs went about his masterful ways. When the presentation ended, the audience rushed two levels below to the exhibition hall where the phone was being displayed in a glass case, four feet away from any hands.
We saw the
product, we saw the cool demos, but we couldn’t touch it – not yet!Then on June 29, 2007 the phone became available in the U.S. The line outside the Apple store started forming a day in advance. TV crews from every channel descended on the flagship store in Palo Alto and even Steve Wozniak was spotted standing in line to get his device.
The Apple fandom became delirious with joy. People were reportedly cleaning their homes in order to welcome their new iPhone!
The moment of truth was here. It was in your hands. You could now finally touch it, feel it.
You got the box. You set it on the table. You started to open it.
But – wait. The box cover did not just slide off. You felt that little spring-loaded action. Your anticipation was prolonged for just a few more seconds. Finally the cover came off, slowly and cleanly.
You could now see your prized possession.
Adam Lashinsky in his book Inside Apple talks about how there is a room dedicated to packaging in the creative studio of Apple’s main marketing building. Inside this covert lab are hundreds, yes hundreds, of box prototypes for whatever product the company is about to launch. And the packaging designer would spend months in this room just opening them, trying to find the perfect box that would evoke the exact feeling intended for this product.
My iPhone box inspires me to respect my users.
To remember that no detail is too small.
To help them feel what I feel when I conceive a product.
To evoke that smile, that aha, that feeling of wonderment when they use the product for the first time.
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