[BIG QUESTION] Why Is It Always 9:41 On Apple's Latest iPhones?
You may (or may not - depending on the level of your obsessiveness) have noticed that throughout the course of Apple's iPhone 6 marketing extravaganza, the clock always showed 9:41. But why? In the 22nd instalment of our weekly TECH TUESDAY column, we find the answer to this baffling question.
By Sadho Ram — 04 Nov 2014, 04:50 AM — Updated about 10 years ago
In the land of Apple Inc. and everything that this Cupertino giant markets, almost nothing has been left to randomness. Everything that happens at Apple, happens NOT by co-incident but by design. Even the time on Apple's iPhone carries a marketing message.
This image showing Apple's iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, depicting the time as 9:41, as if frozen in time...
...is similar to other images of the iPhone that have run in marketing materials across the Internet, including this one:
So what gives? Why does the iPhone 6 (along with iPads and other Apple products) always spot 9:41?
Hint: It's actually a nod to Steve Jobs' time at Apple, when the first iPhone debuted.
You see, the origins of Apple's perma-clock can be traced back to January of 2007, when Steve Jobs delivered a perfectly-timed keynote at the Macworld Conference & Expo in San Francisco
Steve Jobs worked very hard to create great drama and excitement in his product launch keynote presentations. From the classic “…and one more thing” to the great use of the Keynote software to maximum effect, Steve commanded the stage and his audience.
quora.comThere simply is no executive in technology or just about any business category that has come close to his use of excitement, humor, and drama. None of what Steve did on stage was unplanned, in fact everything was planned to just about the minute.
quora.comOn January 9, 2007 at 9 am, Jobs, the visionary, took the stage and just about 35 minutes into his presentation he said, "This is a day I have been looking forward to for two and a half years…"
Jobs went on to explain that "every once in a while, a revolutionary product comes along that changes everything." And then he went on to announce: "Today Apple is going to reinvent the phone."
theatlantic.com
And at just about 9:42 am, he debuted the iPhone. Thus frozen in time is the near exact time the iPhone was officially announced.
The screen behind him flashed to a picture of the first iPhone. It was 9:42 a.m. Because of that, in Apple's marketing literature for the new phone, the displays read 9:42. The new phones were pegged to the keynote—which is another way of saying that they were pegged to Steve Jobs.
theatlantic.com
Then the iPad came around and things changed — but only by a minute. Scott Forestall, then the senior vice president of iPhone software, explained it all in 2010.
refinery29.comSo with every big new product Apple has launched, this tradition has continued. As Apple's former executive Scott explained:
Scott was the senior vice president (SVP) of iOS Software at Apple Inc. from 2007 until October 2012.
Image via technobuffalo.comWe design the product launch keynotes so that the big reveal of the product happens around 40 minutes into the presentation. When the big image of the product appears on screen, we want the time shown to be close to the actual time on the audience’s watches.
But we know we won’t hit 40 minutes exactly. And for the iPhone, we made it 42 minutes. It turned out we were pretty accurate with that estimate, so for the iPad, we made it 41 minutes. And there you are—the secret of the magic time.