Every year since 1997, Apple CEO Steve Jobs has given the opening keynote address at the Macworld Conference & Expo in San Francisco. These speeches have come to be known as "Stevenotes," and generally feature Jobs in blue jeans and a black turtleneck reporting on the previous year and announcing new products, promotions, and strategies. Expectations for recent Macworld Stevenotes have ranged from "high" to "frenzied." After all, 2006 featured the debut of Intel-based Macintosh computers, while 2007 saw the introduction of the iPhone!
Apple is notoriously tight-lipped about product announcements, and speculation runs wild in the weeks, days, and hours leading up to the event. This year the speculative focus has been on a subnotebook and electronic movie rentals through iTunes, both of which were delivered. Apple remained silent, only hoisting banners prior to the event with the tagline, "There's something in the air." The secrecy helps build intense interest in the event, but Steve Jobs' rock star persona persists only as long as Apple continues to deliver on what it promises. So what does Macworld 2008 bring?
Time Capsule
Time Machine is Apple's backup software solution, providing transparent backups to an external drive. It leaves MacBook and MacBook Pro users out completely, since the entire basis for Time Machine is complete transparency, but Time Machine requires a physically connected external drive, which laptops don't generally have. Time Capsule combines an Airport Extreme 802.11n wireless base station with a 500GB ($299) or 1TB ($499) hard disk, and Time Machine will use the drive, no physical connection required.
iPhone and iPod touch Software Upgrade
Several weeks before Macworld, iPhone operating system v1.1.3 leaked onto the Internet, so this was no surprise, except to those who doubted its authenticity. With today's upgrade, the iPhone gains a pseudo-GPS using cell tower and Wi-Fi hotspot triangulation, multiple-recipient SMS, a customizable home screen, and more. iPod touch users will gain many of the iPhone features previously missing, such as Mail, Maps, Stocks, Notes, and Weather, but they will pay $20 for the upgrade. I suspect that this is the result of Apple's interpretation of tax laws, the same concern that previously caused them to charge $1.99 for a MacBook 802.11n software upgrade, but we will likely have to wait for the next Apple quarterly conference call to be sure.
iTunes Movie Rentals
iTunes Movie Rentals were also highly-rumored prior to the show, even prompting Netflix to make their rental policy more generous in an effort to steal Apple's thunder. All major studios (20th Century Fox, Disney, Warner Bros, Paramount, Universal Studios, Sony Pictures Entertainment, MGM, Lionsgate, and New Line Cinema) will be making movies available via iTunes 30 days after DVD release, for $2.99 or $3.99 depending on whether a movie is considered a "new release." HD versions with 5.1 surround sound will cost $1 more. Once you start watching a movie, you only have 24 hours to finish it, but you can transfer it to an iPod or iPhone mid-movie.
Article comments
1 - Phillip Winn
Left out of the article is my surprise at how much of this speech was known ahead of time. Apple has tended to be very good at keeping things mum, with the occasional betrayal by a major publication on deadline (like Time).
In this case, only Time Capsule and Apple TV weren't discussed ad nauseum prior to the event, which is interesting.
2 - Josh Hathaway
Those damn bloggers are getting better at digging, aren't they? I'm still waiting for that G5 laptop, though. I kid, I kid.
I might be the only happy person that the iPhone didn't get a major upgrade. I'm planning to buy one next week and I didn't want an upgrade to ratchet up the price or screw with the supply. Next Thursday may be the greatest day of my year.
3 - Phillip Winn
Josh, I didn't expect a phone upgrade at all. It's only been 200 days! Look for a phone hardware upgrade closer to the one-year mark, or even later.
I'm waiting for Ken Edwards to show up and complain about something, I bet I even know what he'll complain about, but he could surprise me. :-)
4 - ae
Dear Mr. Jobs,
Over the last 10 years I have been a avid consumer of Apple products. I have been especially happy since you came back and have really brought the type of vision that was required to bring a new level of integrity to the hardware and software produced by Apple. In this time I have purchased over $20,000 of Apple products for myself and my family and have never had to look back. I have always been happy and my family has been too. I have even convinced my employers to switch some of the mission critical activities of our organization to rely on Macs!
But now I feel more than disappointed and betrayed. The idea of thinking different was more than how an OS should look or feel it was about not compromising quality and creating truly innovative products. These two qualities brought the integrity of Mac one notch higher than the rest of the products in the industry and in many ways Apple has maintained that integrity in its products. This integrity was also found in the way customers were treated and assisted to purchase the right product.
However, integrity has been loosing ground in Apple's business model. Greed seems to have crept in. I understand yours to be a business and it to have a model which requires sales to be maintained through the Christmas season. After all, stock holders would not be happy to hear that sales of the Airport Extreme went down for 4 or 5 months because consumers were waiting for a product you had promised them (and there lief the genius of Apple's marketing strategies). They would rather hear that we bought many Airport Extremes and then bough many Time Capsules.
The issue here is that we received messages that would lead us to believe that a new back up system was in development that would favour wireless routers, the Airport Express to be specific, and so we bought it. The new OS would also help in this area and so we bought it too (and as per the numbers of your keynote at MacWorld, we seem to have done in in large numbers) but then we were told, we would not be able to use the Airport Express with Time Machine. We asked why and no one could give us a clear answer. Then came Time Capsule, which is a superb product and is exactly what I wanted to buy two moths ago, came out. I felt stupid. I am sure you know the feeling. Its like when you just bought a fancy trinket at a bazaar and when you got home it did not work. The difference being that Apple is not supposed to be a bazaar and that it was not under $5.
So let me summarise the situation from my perspective. Worse case scenario: we were lied to - we were told that with an Airport Express and Leopard we would be able to use Time Machine. Best case scenario: information was withheld from us that caused us to invest in the wrong product which means that we hare out $179 CND and have a two month old product that is obsolete and mostly useless.
Don't forget that we, the consumers, are also investors in your company and that although we don't participate in the board meetings we are the people that paid your salary last year, the people who made Apple sales soar over the last few years - we are the consumer.
What is the old saying: "Bite me once, shame on you, bite me twice, shame on me!" Well, lets just say that I have now been bitten and seen how you have bitten a few of my friends. My frustration had grown watching some of the actions of Apple such as the price drop of the iPhone, but having been ably persuaded to purchase something that would only make your sales charts look better and that would have little to no use for me is indescribable.
You have spoken of technology being a bumpy road, and it can be, but it seems that this bump is more greed then need. I don't believe Apple executives naive enough not to have been able to foresee this situation. I just wonder why it was not an obvious choice to have a free firmware upgrade that would allow those of us (Apple's early adopters) who had, in anticipation of your products, purchased the Airport Extreme to have the full potential of your products? This greed is also exemplified by have a $20 imaginary tax for all iTouch owner who al wonder why Mail and Maps were not there in the first place.
I am disappointed to say the least because to have integrity in a product and then to loose it in one's business practice for a profit only signal the beginning of the end of an organisation (Sony should be a good example of this).
I sure hope that I am wrong. I sure hope that this is not the end. Just remember if I can't trust your business practices, I can't trust your products, I'll look elsewhere - even if there are compromises.
With hope for a brighter future and greater insight and foresight from the Apple executive than in the last six months, I hope that the firmware update will be pushed out in the next couple of weeks.
Sincerely,
ae