I’ve been to more than my fair share of launches over the last 12 years. Some lavish (first-class flights, a week in Japan, and dinner with a geisha); some not so (four journalists and two dozen product pushers at the London Dungeon - somewhere you don’t even want to head on a day out, never mind for work). There are few companies, though, who can put on a low-budget event in a nondescript location and have everyone - everyone - turn out to hear what they have to say.

At the moment I can think of only one. Apple.

Yesterday’s iPhone launch took place at the Apple Store on Regent Street. A shop. No being flown off somewhere exotic. It was as low-key as any Steve Jobs keynote, with just him and the CEO of O2 sitting on stools at the front of the room. No intro, either - Jobs just walked in, wearing his trademark black top and blue jeans, and started talking.

And no real news, either. That O2 had bagged the iPhone was the worst-kept secret in IT. All we really needed to know was the launch date and price, and we could have got that by email.

Yet everyone - everyone - was there. All the national newspapers. All the magazines and websites, no matter how tenuous their connection to all things Apple. Ranks and ranks of TV cameras, and even outside broadcast trucks so they could report back live to the studio that yes, as everyone knew, the iPhone is coming to the UK, and actually it’s not all that expensive.

There were even members of the general public outside the store (closed for the morning) pressing their cameras up to the windows to take pictures of us inside.

That Apple has achieved this is impressive and laudable, but I’d be surprised if anyone - even Apple itself - could really say why or how it’s happened. The company isn’t known for courting the press, and indeed it often seems that its interest is in maintaining a healthy distance than it is in keeping chummy.

For the moment, though, it makes it an exciting time to be working for a magazine whose main focus is that company’s products and customers, but the concern is whether Apple can maintain the momentum. Apple is undergoing a renaissance. These are its modern glory days, its second coming, but having seen the great players like Palm and Creative lose their one-time magnetic appeal, you have to wonder when - or if - the same thing will ever happen to Apple.

Under Jobs I doubt it will.

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