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"When we were just planning to do an extreme and unusual super-hero book, we thought the Charlton characters would provide us with a great line-up .. the proposal would've left a lot of them in bad shape, and DC couldn't have really used them again after what we were going to do to them without detracting from the power of what it was that we were planning Alan Moore

"If games were tv, then they would produce a pilot to test the audience, tear down the set, kill the actors and de-invent the camera. If the pilot happens to be liked, they start filming. One episode at the time. But no more pussy-footing about. They don't just tear down the set but nuke the state. Kill the actors entire lineage through time-travel and get god himself to remove light from the universe. "

That's exactly how they make movies, you know.

"If games were tv, then they would produce a pilot to test the audience, tear down the set, kill the actors and de-invent the camera. If the pilot happens to be liked, they start filming. One episode at the time. But no more pussy-footing about. They don't just tear down the set but nuke the state. Kill the actors entire lineage through time-travel and get god himself to remove light from the universe. "

That's exactly how they make movies, you know.

Here is a link to an old "Comic Book Artist" magazine interview with Alan Moore that definitively describes the DC/Carlton/Watchmen connection:
http://twomorrows.com/comicbookartist/articles/09moore.html

Support for 64-Bit architecture
This would be nice; it's truly OS-related and is likely to happen sooner or later.

QuickTime 6.5
Apple has historically shipped QT as its own product (and clearly as its own source of revenue). It might get rolled up with the shipping version of 10.3, but it won't be a major feature since you'll almost certainly be able to get it elsewhere.

iChat 2.0 with videoconferencing capabilities
Granted, OS X as a whole is still a new beastie, so Lord only knows the directions in which Apple will go, but I have a hard time believing that Apple will expect us to drop $120 or so for a bunch of updated applications (particularly when they could potentially sell a suite of updates as its own product a la iLife). Again, this might ship with 10.3. It might even be only supported under 10.3, but is not compelling enough to make 10.3 necessary. Still, H.323 support (or support for whatever its heir apparent is) within the OS is SORELY lacking, according to my videoconferencing friends, so I know they'll gleefully welcome this.

Final Safari release 1.0 GM
Same as above, but I really think this will probably be available as a standalone, free download.

Updated iApps (possible inclusion of iWorks?)
You should be able to anticipate my answer here. iWorks would change things, but I bet if it ends up really happening, it will be like Keynote, a standalone product. Or maybe I should have likened it to AppleWorks....

Enhanced Dock features
Again, not compelling.

Overall system speed enhancements
Something to be excited about, enough for some people to finally make the jump, but not enough on its own. Remember, since adoption of OS X has been pretty high, 10.3 has to appeal at least as much to people who are already running OS X as it does to people who have not upgraded from 9 or lower-- and also to people running Windows.

Optimized for the new systems (AMD, Itanium or PPC970??)
This would present a pretty radical departure and is one sort of exciting "event" that I have to assume Apple have plenty of with 10.3, but again, isn't compelling to people already owning Macs or already running Mac OS X 10.2.

I have to expect, simply from paying attention to the past:

1. several "new" GUI changes, perhaps re-inclusion of OS 7-9 features, such as labels, some maybe from other OSes, some we haven't seen before.

2. some application or GUI features the likes of which just about no one has anticipated. Just like Jack Kirby did, Apple is always forcing you to expect the unexpected.

--Kimota!

I didn't see one credit for Jack.
If you don't know why that's a problem, read this link:

http://twomorrows.com/kirby/articles/18leekirby.ht ml

After Jack left Marvel, the only selling comic that Stan came up
with was "She-HULK". Ugh.