Apple has sold 42 million units of the little fella, and has totally transformed the fiercely competitive mobile market. It's turned the relationship between handset manufacturer and network carrier on its head.
But how highly would you rate the iPhone's impact, in the grand scheme of things?
By 'you' the Round-Up means the person on the street and thanks to a survey out this week we can tell you exactly how influential: 'ridiculously so'.
According to survey respondents, the iPhone was voted the eighth most important invention in history. In case you feared you may have misread that sentence, here's the salient part again: "the iPhone was voted the eighth most important invention in history". Wow.
Here are some of the other things that are considered less important: the car, the camera, the flushing toilet and shoes.
People simply couldn't live without their iPhones, while they could live without transport, photography or even comfortable footwear. Because maybe there's an app for that.
You could be walking barefoot and dodging randomly thrown chamber pots but as long as you can check Twitter and play your Spotify tracks on a touchscreen device with a non-removable battery you're a happy bunny.
Getting back to reality, the wheel was voted as the most important invention in history, with the aeroplane in second place and the light bulb third. At last, some sense of perspective.
Here's where 20th century technology takes over and canters home: the internet lands at fourth then computers at fifth.
While the telephone and penicillin both manage to keep the touchscreen gadget at bay, Apple's darling handset shamed the internal combustion engine, trains, hot water and space travel in the nationwide research, carried out by Tesco Mobile.
The Round-Up likes its iPhone. Quite a lot, in fact. But come on...
After 467 years, Copernicus gets a hero's burial
Somewhat belated Vatican U-turn sees astronomer taken from unmarked grave to a place of honour
EPA
A funeral mass was held for Copernicus after his coffin was taken on a tour of the region
MORE PICTURESNicolaus Copernicus, the 16th-century astronomer whose work was later condemned by the Catholic Church as heretical, was reburied by Polish priests as a hero yesterday, 467 years after he was laid to rest in an unmarked grave.
His reburial in a tomb in the cathedral where he once served as a church canon and doctor indicates how far the church has come in making peace with the scientist whose revolutionary theory that the Earth revolves around the Sun helped to usher in the modern scientific age. Copernicus, who lived from 1473 to 1543, died as a little-known astronomer working in what is now Poland, far from Europe's centres of learning. He had spent years labouring in his free time developing his theory, which was later condemned as heretical by the church because it removed the Earth and humanity from their central position in the universe.
After his death, his remains rested in an unmarked grave beneath the floor of the cathedral in Frombork, northern Poland, but its exact location was unknown. At the urging of a local bishop, scientists began searching in 2004 for the astronomer's remains and eventually turned up the skull and bones of a 70-year-old man – the age Copernicus was when he died. DNA from teeth and bones matched that of hairs found in one of his books, leading the scientists to conclude in all probability that they had finally found Copernicus.
In recent weeks, a wooden coffin holding those remains has lain in state in the nearby city of Olsztyn, and on Friday the coffin was taken around the region to towns linked to his life. That ceremony came 18 years after the Vatican rehabilitated the Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei, who was persecuted for carrying the Copernican revolution forward.
Wojciech Ziemba, the archbishop of the region surrounding Frombork, said the Catholic Church is proud that Copernicus left the region a legacy of "his hard work, devotion and above all his scientific genius". Saturday's Mass was led by Jozef Kowalczyk, the papal nuncio and primate of Poland, the highest church authority in this deeply Catholic country. Poland also is the homeland of Pope John Paul II, who in 1992 said the church was wrong to condemn Galileo.
Copernicus's burial in an anonymous grave in the 16th century was not linked to suspicions of heresy. When he died, his ideas were just starting to be discussed by a small group of Europe's astronomers, astrologers and mathematicians, and the church was not yet forcefully condemning the heliocentric worldview as heresy, according to Jack Repcheck, the author of Copernicus' Secret: How the Scientific Revolution Began. "There is no indication that Copernicus was worried about being declared a heretic and being kicked out of the church for his astronomical views," Mr Repcheck said. "Why was he just buried along with everyone else, like every other canon in Frombork? Because at the time of his death he was just any other canon in Frombork. He was not the iconic hero that he has become."
Copernicus had, however, been at odds with his superiors in the church over other matters. He was reprimanded for keeping a mistress, which violated his vow of celibacy, and was forced to give her up. He was suspected of harbouring sympathies for Lutheranism, which was spreading in northern Europe at the time. Copernicus's major treatise – On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres – was published at the very end of his life, and he received a copy of the printed book on the day he died.
Catholics asked to help fund Pope's UK visit | |
Roman Catholic churchgoers are being urged to help meet a shortfall of more than £3m pounds in funding for Pope Benedict's visit to the UK. The Church has asked them to put at least £1m in Sunday's collection - largely to pay for three big open air masses at which the Pope will preside. Because this is a state visit by Pope Benedict XVI, the bulk of the cost is being borne by the UK government. The Papal visit will cost £15m, not including extra policing and security. The Church's share of the cost is £7m, and with slightly less than half of it raised, congregations are being asked to contribute via the collection plate. Most of the money will be spent on three open-air masses which the Church says could attract up to 400,000 people in total. One of the masses will form the high point of the Pope's visit - the beatification of Cardinal John Henry Newman at Coventry Airport on 19 September. Secularist groups have criticised the use of taxpayers' money to fund the visit of a religious leader. This is probably along the lines of Pay now and Pay later... You work it out I'm going sailing! | |
