Kirkus Review
Wide-ranging history of the iPhone, which might just be "the pinnacle product of all of capitalism to this point."Some of Vice science and tech editor Merchant's account of the development of what Steve Jobs called "the one device," the life-unifying little computer that one could carry in one's pocket and incidentally use as a telephone, is a little scattershot. It contributes little to the story to recap the history of "line-of-sight semaphores" and other signaling technologies, for instance. When the author settles in to the facts of the phone itself, though, he delivers a solid if formulaic business history, complete with the trope that a single charismatic leaderJobs, in this caseseldom acts alone but instead has a team backing the "chief proselytizer." In the case of the iPhone, that team was made up of hungry engineers and designers who were avid for the project and wanted to make something that would be not just insanely great, but attractive, with a handsome user interface and a lot of power. The dream team included "an MIT-trained sensor savant with an ear for electronica and a feel for touchscreens" and "a decorated and respected designer intent on marrying industrial design to digital interfaces." Despite the usual stumbling blocks, they succeeded well beyond expectation. Merchant has a good handle on the technologyhow, for instance, accelerometers and magnetometers play in the development of truly smart smartphonesand a good feel for the archly competitive, sometimes oddly monastic culture of Apple. He also does not shy away from the darker aspects of the technology, including working conditions at Chinese manufacturing facilities that border on slave labor. Merchant's story takes sometimes-unexpected turns, but in the end, he paints a thoughtful portrait of how a piece of reigning technology became ubiquitous in just a decade, for good and ill. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
As much as Apple and Steve Jobs, in particular wanted people to believe they invented the smartphone all by themselves, it just ain't so. Smartphones, in fact, date back to 1992 (IBM's groundbreaking and now all-but-forgotten Simon), and the fundamental ideas behind the technology go back even further, to the late nineteenth century. The iPhone, announced with great fanfare in 2007, simply put a new and exciting spin on a preexisting phenomenon. This riveting book (which was not authorized by Apple, although Merchant did speak to some key players) busts the myth of Jobs as a lone inventor who single-handedly created a world-changing device. It's a globe-trotting history that takes us to the tin mines of Bolivia to the labs at Corning to the lithium mines of Chile (to name just a few stops along the way), and lets us hear from some of the innovators who created the elements that Apple would adapt for the iPhone. A fascinating and often surprising book.--Pitt, David Copyright 2017 Booklist
New York Review of Books Review
THE ONE DEVICE: The Secret History of the iPhone, by Brian Merchant. (Little, Brown, $28.) This book dispels some of the fog that surrounds the iPhone, making visible the human labor that creates it - including its development and production and the origin of some of the technologies it uses. MOVE FAST AND BREAK THINGS: How Facebook, Google, and Amazon Cornered Culture and Undermined Democracy, by Jonathan Taplin. (Little, Brown, $29.) A tech pioneer argues that the radical libertarianism and greed of many Silicon Valley entrepreneurs have undermined the communal idealism of the early internet. A FINE MESS: A Global Quest for a Simpler, Fairer, and More Efficient Tax System, by T. R. Reid. (Penguin Press, $27.) Reid approaches the subject of tax reform with a wry voice and a light touch. A world tour of tax systems reveals other countries' efforts to redesign their systems. THE SEEDS OF LIFE: From Aristotle to da Vinci, From Sharks' Teeth to Frogs' Pants, the Long and Strange Quest to Discover Where Babies Come From, by Edward Dolnick. (Basic Books, $28.) Not until 1875 was the process of human reproduction fully understood. This is a fascinating record of the quest. A GOOD COUNTRY, by Laleh Khadivi. (Bloomsbury, $27.) The son of prosperous Iranian-American immigrants, searching for his identity, becomes alienated and eventually radicalized. This powerful novel is marked by moving prose, vivid characters and a balance between compassion and merciless realism. THE COLOR OF LAW: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America, by Richard Rothstein. (Liveright, $27.95.) Most residential segregation in America is de jure - that is, it derives from policy or law, which was supported by virtually every presidential administration since the 19th century. This powerful and disturbing account is also a call to arms. THE HEIRS, by Susan Rieger. (Crown, $26.) When a wealthy New York lawyer dies, his wife and five sons learn he may have had a second, secret life and another family. The sons want the truth; their mother is not so sure. With grace and finesse, this polished novel explores their varying responses. FLY ME, by Daniel Riley. (Little, Brown, $27.) In this debut novel, set in Southern California in the '70s, a Vassar-grad stewardess becomes involved in a drug smuggling operation while her husband quotes Pynchon. Riley writes about the era with captivating authority. HOW TO BE HUMAN, by Paula Cocozza. (Metropolitan/Holt, $26.) A lonely woman becomes involved with a fox in her London garden in this hypnotic first novel. The full reviews of these and other recent books are on the web: nytimes.com/books
Library Journal Review
The iPhone is the best-selling computing device of all time, says author Merchant, senior editor of Motherboard at Vice Media and founder/editor of its future fiction outlet Terraform. He travels from the tin mines of Bolivia and the lithium pools of Chile to the factories and black markets of China and the e-waste dumps of Nairobi. Merchant deconstructs the iPhone to see where each part comes from and goes. He follows the history of the device's technologies, sometimes back a hundred years, to inventors seldom acknowledged. This detail is interspersed with information on the development of the phone at Apple. While Apple's famous secrecy makes piecing this information together difficult, Merchant leaves no stone unturned to present the full story. Steve Jobs's paranoia may be legendary, but the results and impact of his personality and vision are made clear. Merchant more than fulfills his stated goals for the book of tracing the origins and impacts of the iPhone through time and around the globe, of busting the lone inventor myth, and of helping all to understand how the iPhone came to be. Verdict Readers don't even need to own an iPhone to enjoy this well-written history.-Bonnie A. Tollefson, Rogue Valley Manor Lib., Medford, OR © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
