Were they? You could get internet and email on blackberry and nokia phones before the iphone came along. I think what drove iphone sales (besides the apple brand) was the futuristic look of only having one large screen and no physical keyboard.
Those could browse the web, but the iPhone had a full, non-neutered web browser, which I don't think the others really had. The intuitive/natural multi-touch interface certainly helped with browsing.
Not sure why I got downvoted for the above... the first iPhone was legitimately not good at phone calls. A big part of that was that the AT&T network wasn't up to snuff at the time, though, and AT&T was the only option.
