“Distant Witness” Author’s iPhone Added to Smithsonian

Former NPR social media director Andy Carvin used his iPhone to document history during the 2011 Arab Spring in Cairo.

Now Carvin’s phone has literally become a part of history.

The Smithsonian National Museum of American History is featuring Carvin’s iPhone in its new exhibit on enterprise and innovation in the U.S. The 8,000-square-foot exhibit tells the stories of technology that changed the world. Other exhibit showcases items such as the Nintendo Gameboy, the original Google server, Eli Whitney’s cotton gin, and the iPhone, using Carvin’s phone to exemplify its impact.

Curator Peter Liebhold notes, that the iPhone is one of the inventions that helped Americans “really understand who we are as a country.”

For the full story, click here.

For more information on “Distant Witness,” the book that tells Carvin’s story and how he changed journalism by covering the Arab Spring using social media, click here.