So Mr Ballmer, do you still think the iPhone won't succeed?

The Industry Standard knows how to hold a grudge on behalf of Apple-lovers everywhere: note who dissed the iPhone before it launched, and then ask them a year later what they now think.

So they line up Steve Dan [ta, MrProject] Gillmor:

the dazzle is based in siginficant part on the way it works.. definitely a breakthrough in that category for at least some uses... No other device does exactly what the iPhone does. Conversely, the iPhone doesn't come close to matching the most valuable features of the devices I do use, namely the Blackberry Curve and Nokia N95.

Next: Tim Wu, of Columbia Law School and Slate magazine, who earlier said "Saying the iPhone is a pointless gadget is a bit too strong. But it isn't yet a revolutionary device."

Now he says that "by comparison most other phones are intolerable." But he insists that he wasn't saying it wouldn't be successful, but that it wouldn't change industry structure. (Think he's right there.) He's had a hacked (1.0) iPhone "for a while now."

Lucas Mearian, storage channel editor at Computerworld, Geoff Long of CommsDay (who wrote a column saying "Why the iPhone will fail") and Rob Enderle of, um, the Enderle Group who said "Not everyone buys the hype" all get their day in court - Enderle says he is "a little bit surprised, given how poorly it does email and texting" and that "without Apple marketing I doubt it would have done nearly as well."

And then there's Steve Ballmer, who said in a TV interview: "Five hundred dollars? .. That is the most expensive phone in the world. And it doesn't appeal to business because it doesn't have a keyboard."

And now? Ah, um. "Unfortunately," said the PR firm, "Steve is unable to participate in this interview request due to his busy calendar."

John Dvorak said "there's no likelihood that Apple can be successful in a business this competitive." Did not, it seems, reply to email. And then even Bill Ray of good old Blighty's Register who said "After a year a new version will be launched, but it will lack the innovation of the first and quickly vanish." Apparently he couldn't comment because of the terms of his contract with El Reg.

So there you have it. Who'd have thought we'd see the day when Steve Ballmer and The Register would offer the same responses on the iPhone?

He hasn't bought one.