Wall Street Journal Q&A With Steve Jobs [Updated]

On the eve of the iPhone's debut, The Wall Street Journal posts a Q&A with Apple CEO Steve Jobs and AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson (paid subscription required). Update: Samples from a USAToday interview have also been included.

The two talk about many topics ranging from reflecting on the iPhone launch to discussing the decision to stick with AT&T's EDGE, to speculating about how the iPhone will affect the companies. We post a highlight of some of the discussion here. Note that some responses have been paraphrased for brevity.

WSJ: What do you both envision being added over time to the iPhone, in terms of access to ringtones through Cingular's (now rebranded AT&T) platform and maybe through some other manner, like turning your iTunes songs into ringtones?
Mr. Jobs: As you may know, iTunes is now the number three distributor of music in the U.S., ahead of Amazon and Target and behind Best Buy and Wal-Mart, and obviously the largest online distributor of music in the world. Of course, you can play that music now on your iPhone. One might imagine a lot of things down the road.

WSJ: Is one of those things offering music purchases and video purchases directly from the phone?
Mr. Jobs: There's a lot of things you can imagine down the road.

WSJ: [Editor's contraction: Why did you choose EDGE over 3G?]
Mr. Jobs: [Paraphrased] Every AT&T Blackberry gets its mail over EDGE. EDGE is great for mail, and it works well for maps and a whole bunch of other stuff. Where you wish you had faster speed ison a Web browser. It's good enough, but you wish it was a little faster. That's where sandwiching EDGE with Wi-Fi really makes sense because Wi-Fi is much faster than any 3G network.

When we looked at 3G, the chipsets were not low-enough power for what we were looking for. They were not integrated enough, so they took up too much physical space. We cared a lot about battery life and we cared a lot about physical size. Down the road, I'm sure some of those tradeoffs will become more favorable towards 3G but as of now we think we made a pretty good doggone decision.

WSJ: Did you make enough of these to meet demand?
Mr. Jobs: [Paraphrased] We're building a fair number of them... we've built factories to build these things... but it wouldn't surprise me at all if it ain't enough.

USAToday: What if you are sold out by Saturday? Will you let people buy them, and pick them up later?
Mr. Jobs: No, you're going to have to come back in. When you start taking people's money and can't deliver the product, there are lots of legal issues. It's easier to disappoint people.

USAToday: What about corporate e-mail? I understand that's an issue for many consumers, who may not be able to hook up to their company networks?
Mr. Jobs: You'll be hearing more about this in the coming weeks. We have some pilots going with companies with names you'll recognize. This won't be a big issue.

USAToday: [Editor's contraction: Now that you've done it with the iPhone, will you begin pre-announcing products more?]
Mr. Jobs: [Paraphrased] I don't think we will. We did this because of the FCC certification process and because we had to have hundreds of people test it because it was going to be on a network. We had no choice but to do it the way we did it, and I'm glad we did it this way. It worked well, but most of the time, we will do what we normally do.

Related Forum: iPhone

Top Rated Comments

Flowbee Avatar
219 months ago
Steve Jobs said "ain't?"
Score: 1 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Popular Stories

reset password request iphone

Warning: Apple Users Targeted in Phishing Attack Involving Rapid Password Reset Requests

Tuesday March 26, 2024 4:34 pm PDT by
Phishing attacks taking advantage of Apple's password reset feature have become increasingly common, according to a report from KrebsOnSecurity. Multiple Apple users have been targeted in an attack that bombards them with an endless stream of notifications or multi-factor authentication (MFA) messages in an attempt to cause panic so they'll respond favorably to social engineering. An...
Generic iOS 18 Feature Purple

iOS 18: What to Expect From 'Biggest' Update in iPhone's History

Wednesday March 27, 2024 11:10 am PDT by
At least some Apple software engineers continue to believe that iOS 18 will be the "biggest" update in the iPhone's history, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Below, we recap rumored features and changes for the iPhone. "The iOS 18 update is expected to be the most ambitious overhaul of the iPhone's software in its history, according to people working on the upgrade," wrote Gurman, in a r...
maxresdefault

Apple Announces WWDC 2024 Event for June 10 to 14

Tuesday March 26, 2024 10:02 am PDT by
Apple today announced that its 35th annual Worldwide Developers Conference is set to take place from Monday, June 10 to Friday, June 14. As with WWDC events since 2020, WWDC 2024 will be an online event that is open to all developers at no cost. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. WWDC 2024 will include online sessions and labs so that developers can learn about new...
apple maps 3d feature

Apple Maps May Gain Custom Routes With iOS 18

Tuesday March 26, 2024 3:10 pm PDT by
Apple may be planning to add support for "custom routes" in Apple Maps in iOS 18, according to code reviewed by MacRumors. Apple Maps does not currently offer a way to input self-selected routes, with Maps users limited to Apple's pre-selected options, but that may change in iOS 18. Apple has pushed an iOS 18 file to its maps backend labeled "CustomRouteCreation." While not much is revealed...
General iOS 17 Feature Orange Purple

Apple Releases Revised Versions of iOS 17.4.1 and iPadOS 17.4.1 With Updated Build Number

Wednesday March 27, 2024 5:59 am PDT by
Apple on late Tuesday released revised versions of iOS 17.4.1 and iPadOS 17.4.1 with an updated build number of 21E237, according to MacRumors contributor Aaron Perris. The updates previously had a build number of 21E236. The revised updates are available for all iPhone and iPad models that are compatible with iOS 17 and iPadOS 17, but they can only be installed via the Finder app on macOS...
maxresdefault

Apple to Launch New iPad Pro and iPad Air Models in May

Thursday March 28, 2024 11:07 am PDT by
Apple will introduce new iPad Pro and iPad Air models in early May, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Gurman previously suggested the new iPads would come out in March, and then April, but the timeline has been pushed back once again. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. Apple is working on updates to both the iPad Pro and iPad Air models. The iPad Pro models will...
applephilschiller

Apple's Phil Schiller Works 80 Hours a Week Overseeing App Store

Wednesday March 27, 2024 2:03 pm PDT by
With the App Store and app ecosystem undergoing major changes in the European Union, The Wall Street Journal today shared a profile on App Store chief Phil Schiller, who is responsible for the App Store. Though Schiller transitioned from marketing chief to "Apple Fellow" in 2020 to take a step back from Apple and spend more time on personal projects and friends, he is reportedly working...