> Your counterpoint is a little confusing to me. Apple reversed their sinking fortunes when they released the iPhone. That seems to make the exact opposite of your point.

Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1996 and one of the things he stopped was the heavy bleeding from having too many (confusing) SKUs.

His first new product was the iPod, released in 2001 while development of the iPhone started around 2005.

The release of the iPhone would happen ~11 years after his return.

While it wasn't as big a smash commercially as the iPod, the Bondi Blue bubble iMac was Jobs' first big new product after his return, several years before the iPod.

Apple's fortunes were by no means sinking when they released the iPhone. You could make that argument for the iPod, perhaps. I've always seen OS X and the iMac G3 as the turnaround point, both of which play into GP's idea of simplification and focus.

The G3 definitely, it was marketed, and marketed heavily, to the average person in the days of a beige box and computers being complex boring office tools.

People forget about that period between Jobs coming back and the iPhone since their rise afterwards was so incredible. Their laptops and the imac were such a better alternative to the pc at that time and the fan base they developed helped create the conditions for success of the iPhone (which as a bit of a weird product when it arrived).

Yeah agreed the iPod saved apple. I have 0 clue how everyone has this pre-iPhone amnesia.

Yes. Me, either. :)

>when they released the iPhone.

You mean ipod and itunes, perhaps?