Steve Jobs Macworld Keynote - Live Reaction
I’ll be blogging my initial reactions to the announcements at the Steve Jobs Macworld keynote, as they happen. It’s about to start, right now (9.07am).
Apple sold 14 million iPods in the 2005 holiday season. That’s pretty impressive. Above expectations, I’d have said.
On iTunes, the video sales (8 million since launch) are insignificant next to music sales (rate of 1 billion per year). But it’s still early days.
First announcement is an FM Radio add-on for current iPods. This brings the iPod into line with capabilities of other music players, and music player phones. This isn’t going to change the world.
On to widgets. Over 1500 widgets. I think that’s about tens times as many as Microsoft have gadgets (145 gadgets available, I think); and comparable to the number of Yahoo! Widgets (1825). Apple look competitive here.
New iLife. Still has hard-coded limits e.g. there’s a limit of 250,000 photos. More than enough for most people. But why have hard-coded limits? Feels like old-fashioned software engineering to me.
A giant leap? Or someone changing the size of an array dimension, and re-compiling? Major new feature seems to be “Photo Casting”. Uses RSS to publish photos. It’s a great idea. But I would say that - it’s a little bit similar to something we’re working on! Damn it! Now everyone will get the idea! But competition is good! And this is an execution play. Let battle commence 
iWeb looks interesting. Great idea! Genius in fact! But then I would say that… see above! Looks like we still have a unique angle or three! Excellent!
Interesting. I really wasn’t expecting Steve’s keynote to be so directly relevant to us. Just shows how important it is to stay outward-facing…
Intel iMac looks good. Would have preferred a laptop. No mention of the new machine running Windows. Wonder if it does? Shipping today, though. Good news.
OK - good! So the “One More Thing” is that an Intel-based PowerBook is released as well… now not called PowerBook. Name is MacBook Pro. At this point, I’m really hoping for a “and another one more thing!”. And that’s Windows. If it runs Windows, with virtualisation - I will be super-impressed.
Oh well. No mention of Windows. Pity.
Asam Bashir wrote:
iWeb very nice, now if they would just bring in a partner like Google. All those cal features you keep talking about, they’ve been in Mac universe for about 3 years……
Posted 10 Jan 2006 at 11:33 pm ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
You should take a look at .Mac sometime Simon, sync your contacts, iCal, share iCal, bla bla, everything you’ve been talking about, except .Mac about what, 4 years old now?
Posted 10 Jan 2006 at 11:39 pm ¶
simon wrote:
Well. I probably have to get a Mac now, to keep an eye on what today just became competition! Let’s hope they have something interesting for me to buy, eh?!
Posted 10 Jan 2006 at 11:41 pm ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
That’s reason that bloke from Yahoo been blogging about Macs for last year then suddenly went back to the party downstairs, he was copying all the .Mac stuff for Go Mobile……
Posted 10 Jan 2006 at 11:44 pm ¶
simon wrote:
Russell likes new things, I think. I’m sure he’ll buy an Intel-based Apple product when they’re available.
Posted 10 Jan 2006 at 11:51 pm ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Yeah but respect for nice technology is respect, thought his Mac bashing since new year well out of order, specially something like Yahoo which should stay neutral to all platforms……
Posted 10 Jan 2006 at 11:53 pm ¶
simon wrote:
Well, it’s shipping today. Excellent!
Posted 10 Jan 2006 at 11:58 pm ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
He’ll have made a lot of Apple enemies now for Yahoo, trust me, the Mac hardcore are not happy about it, you can’t support one platform over another in something universal like searching - that was a mistake….
Posted 10 Jan 2006 at 11:59 pm ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Don’t get that MacBook? PowerBook name was strong and it was a PowerBook before PowerPC, don’t like that but guess marketing guys think new consumers would confuse Power with old platform…..
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 12:06 am ¶
simon wrote:
I suspect he’ll try to rectify that.
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 12:06 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Anyway, most Mac professionals will wait for the rev 2 MacBook with Meron/Napa. So this MacBook targeted to developers…..
Maybe they’ll hold on to Virtualization till WWDC in June when 10.5 ships….
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 12:12 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Microsoft agreement for office for 5 years very important, we know what Microsoft capable of when it feels under threat, heat will be put on slowly, don’t want that rabid dog in a panic…..
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 12:18 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
A nicely fitting Virtualization would need to be done in a major OS update, that would be 10.5 leopard. The new Intel Macs should be able to boot in XP no problem, we’ll see, also developers would need support first so even though we want it now, maybe Steve and Otellini being cautious since no room for mistakes, WWDC will be the place to be in June, wanna go?
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 12:23 am ¶
simon wrote:
You’re right about them probably saving virtualisation support for the OS update. Apple WWDC not really for me; too many other committments.
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 12:44 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
This new MacBook same form factor as last PowerBook G4 - that’s suprising, but does point to new form factor coming then. Its only 4.5 times faster for iApps at the moment, since anything running under emulation will be same speed as G4’s. This is geared for developers. Still wondering about iBook Intel, needs to be out in time for US education buying season, what happened to the 13.3″ widescreen? I’d say new form factor.
All the pieces are there for virtualization, but no other mention, caution seems to be the way, maybe Otellini having a calming and controlled influence on Jobs…
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 1:13 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Keynote is up finally, wish the would do it live, guess akami can’t cope:
(macworld.apple.com.edgesuite.net/mw/index.html)
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 3:26 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Little bird just told me Apple’s Virtualization effort even has code now, Red Box. Yellow box is Java, Blue is Classic, bla bla bla in Apple dev code talk.
Appartantly, they didn’t want to scare Microsoft to much just yet, let it sink in slowly, and make sure they’ve got commitment from Microsoft which they have announced as 5 year agreement. Also make sure third party developers understand full implication so they don’t get lazy and think if they’ve got a program already out for Windows they wouldn’t need to make Mac version since it would work perfectly anyway….
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 6:11 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
lol, classic Steve Jobs, demo’s garage band Pod casting studio and makes a Steves Super Secret pod cast…..
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 8:12 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Its perfect, its all there in the show, only watching ‘other’ bits of the keynote now since it was buffering too much before, the problems are Microsoft and Adobe, but Apple is ready with iWork, iWeb and even Quark has a chance to get back its market from Adobe. Adobe’s bought into the Microsoft world too much, and after aquistion of Macromedia has been less flexable to industry standards. Apple’s user interface for Apperture and its use of Core image is leaugues ahead of Adobe. Use of King Kong was for a reason, it was made on a Mac. Adobe also now control the majority of the web authoring tools, Go-Live and Dreamweaver, 90 % of the web is made on Mac.
All this time Microsoft business unit has been making patches for Office 2004 that will make it work better under Rosetta. Apple has clearly instructed its developers to build Universal. Whats the point of optimizing code to run better under emulation, let Apple worry about that, by the time Pro apps are ready we’ll be seeing Meron and Conroe chips, that will make Rosetta faster then native G5 speeds.
Not only is the demonstration of Intel and Apple’s strong relationship and indication that they really are going to use ‘Red Box’ to set the world free from windows, the reasons why they can’t announce that are also here, its becuase of Microsoft and Adobe’s need to control thier Monopoly….
Perfect…..
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 9:02 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Also MacBook makes sence now, it makes marketing easier for products that are not laptops or desktops, MacTablet, MacPhone, MacPad, MacCenter, MacSuperGIzmo, MacVisor, MacScreen. Why not think beyond phones. Yes people will want one gadget, but a phone? Take a laptop, shrink it, remove screen, add WiMax Video, add Apple Speach Recognition 2.0, add Skype, remove hard drive, add Nand storage, add a custom Levis Jean to hold it………
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 9:08 am ¶
simon wrote:
Well, Red Box has been around since before Max OS X was launched, and long before Intel Virtualisation.
Also, re: Mac name. It looks like they want the Mac letters in all their computer products. But only in the computer products. So, not sure that MacPhone is a goer.
Looks like the new Intel-based iBooks, will simply be called “MacBooks” as opposed to “MacBook Pros”.
I would expect an Apple phone to have a new brand name e.g. iPhone; but they might want to capitalise on the iPod name e.g. something like PodPhone or PodCaller (yuck!). I wouldn’t put anything past them, after coming out with the name MacBook!
Posted 11 Jan 2006 at 9:49 pm ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Yeah, all seasoned Steve Jobs keynote have been thinking this, there was something wrong in between his act 2 and act 3, like a chunk had been cut out and replaced in between announcing the iMac and the MacBook, this was the space occupied by Roz announcing the Microsoft deal. Anyway, not just me been thinking it, rest of mac cummunity picked it up as well,
(wiredblogs.tripod.com/cultofmac/index.blog?entry_id=1385976)
Posted 13 Jan 2006 at 2:57 am ¶
Asam Bashir wrote:
Its not about VMWare, that’s why Apple made the patent to stop them using te tech. They’re just going to add support in the next major Darwin update so that it will run Xen…….
Posted 18 Jan 2006 at 8:42 am ¶