Back in 2009, I began developing apps for the iPhone and there was something about it that was deeply exhilarating.

The process was simple enough. First, you signed up for the Apple Developer program, which costed $99 USD per year. That gave you access to the developer software and a license to upload and sell your software on the Apple App Store. It then asked you to set a price, describe the app and include screenshots. After a sale, Apple got a certain percentage and you kept the rest. At the time, the App Store was on every iPhone and almost everyone wanted to buy apps to extend the existing operating system. Since iPhone users were in the millions and the percentage of people buying apps on those iPhones was nearly a hundred percent, you had scale. That was exciting. It meant an app you built in Copenhagen could be bought and used by a Japanese guy in Kyoto (which it did for me).

Furthermore, the “education” you needed for this didn’t require getting admitted to an university or some other educational institution. You didn’t need to wait to learn and apply things. Using the internet, you could teach yourself how to code, and with the developer tools provided by Apple, you could apply whatever you learned immediately. Once you had built something, you didn’t have to worry about distribution because Apple would take care of that too. It was the opportunity to make something of your own and share it with others. There was even the possibility of earning enough to support yourself.

The fact that it was Apple that built this platform is no accident, in fact it is simply an expression of an old theme running throughout their history. As a company, Apple was making “tools” (ie. computers) for everyone, tools that amplified the individual person’s capacity (“a bicycle for the mind”, as Steve Jobs put it). Each computer was personal to you and it gave you the ability to express yourself uniquely. It was a tool for artists, a tool to create things. Even if you weren’t developing apps, there was the whole iLife (iTunes, iMovie, iPhoto, iDVD, iWeb, GarageBand), iWork (Pages, Numbers, Keynote) suite, which allowed you to make movies, photo albums, websites, etc. A cynic would dismiss this as merely good marketing, something solely meant to appeal to a niche, and ultimately turn a profit. After all that is the end result. But I don’t doubt the sentiment behind it was genuine. The people building these tools, did so with care. They loved what they did and when using a Mac or iPhone SDK, you could sense that sentiment.

There is one value that is implicit in this. Every person should have the power to create and they deserve the best tools to do so. Within the confines of this little world created by Apple, you were really free to create. Undeniably, it is a restriction that leaves you utterly dependant on Apple but the inherent opportunity was nonetheless real.

Of all the lessons I learned from this humble experience, the power of a company’s marketing was surprisingly not one of them. The most important lesson I learned was how freeing it can be to have this power to create. By providing the “tools” (the knowledge of how and the actual materials required) to build whatever they can dream of and to let them share it with others at scale is an incredibly beautiful thing.