How a Virtual Beer Became the App Store's First Viral Hit

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In 2008, a magician's virtual beer app became the App Store's first viral hit — and a surprising lesson in how fast software economics were changing.

In July 2008, Steve Jobs and Apple were putting the finishing touches on something the world had never really seen before: the App Store. Jobs told The New York Times that "the quality and the sophistication of the applications you can write for the iPhone is in a different class." He wasn't wrong — though probably not in the way he imagined. The store opened with more than 500 hand-picked apps. Games, productivity tools, social networks, and a handful of apps that existed purely to show off what the device could do. But of all those early releases, the one that grabbed the most attention made your phone look like a glass of beer. Here's the story behind iBeer, the magician who built it, and why a virtual pint became one of the defining moments of the early App Store. ### The Magician Behind the Pint The person behind iBeer was Steve Sheraton, a magician who specialized in technology-based illusions. Long before the iPhone, he'd already turned a mobile device into a convincing virtual drink with a trick called E-spresso, which made a phone appear to hold a cup of coffee. The iPhone, though, handed him something the old Palm Pilot never had: an accelerometer. Instead of just playing a video of a drink, Sheraton could make the illusion respond to how you held the phone. Tilt the device and the liquid moved with it. Turn it far enough and the beer seemed to pour toward the edge of the screen. Simple idea. But for 2008, the effect was shockingly convincing. ### From YouTube Trick to App Store Star Before the App Store even existed, Sheraton had already found an audience. He posted a video of the iPhone "beer-drinking" illusion to YouTube, where it pulled in millions of views. People wanted the trick for themselves, so he started selling the video file for a little over $2. At its peak, that reportedly brought in a few thousand dollars a day. When Apple prepared the App Store for launch, iBeer was a perfect demo of the iPhone's capabilities. It used the accelerometer, the touchscreen, and that bright display — all without needing a single word of explanation. You didn't need to know what an accelerometer was. Someone could just hand you an iPhone, tilt it toward their mouth, and pretend to drink. > "You didn't need to understand what an accelerometer was. Someone could simply hand you an iPhone, tilt it towards their mouth and pretend to drink it." When the App Store opened on July 10, 2008, iBeer was among the first apps available. Sheraton kept the same price, and by his own account, it shot to the top of the charts fast. ### Then Came the Copycats iBeer's success revealed something else about the new App Store: if an idea worked, it could be cloned overnight. Later in 2008, Molson Coors — the Canadian-American brewing giant — released iPint, a free app with a remarkably similar virtual beer. The difference? iPint was basically an ad for Carling beer. Sheraton and his company, Hottrix, objected and eventually took legal action. The dispute captured one of the stranger realities of the early App Store. A solo developer could build something silly, reach millions of people, and suddenly find himself up against a multinational corporation. It was a sign of just how fast the economics of software were shifting. ### Why iBeer Still Matters Looking back, it's easy to shrug off iBeer as a novelty. In a lot of ways, that's exactly what it was. It didn't boost your productivity, help you navigate, or connect you with friends. It made your phone look like a pint of beer. But that was the whole point. In 2008, the smartphone still felt new and a little magical. The idea that a phone could respond to how you tilted it — that it could feel alive in your hand — was genuinely novel. iBeer wasn't a tool. It was a wink. A tiny piece of showmanship that hinted at everything phones would eventually become. And that's why we still talk about it. Not because it was useful, but because it was the first time millions of people looked at their phone and thought: wait, it can do that?

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