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Apple To Make "Music To Your Ears" Announcement
supa_k writes "According to an offical Apple invitation sent to the good folks at
MacCentral, on April 28th
Apple will make 'announcements that will be music to your ears.' It remains to be seen if this involves a purchase of Universal - something Apple offically denied just a few days ago but it will undoubtedly be the announcement of their online music subscription service and the other announcement will surely be new iPods."
Mac rumors hey, the best source of 'news' we can get? forgive the cynicism, but with Apple's typical tight reign on information about just what they're up to I know by now NEVER to trust rumours. How many of the last year's worth have come true?
The iWalk?
Video iPod?
G5?
USB2?
Dualscreen powerbooks?
The best strategy is to NOT go with the rumors people, except for the dull ones.
It'll be just another iPod.
I doubt getting rid of stock is the reason. Word on the grapevine is that Apple is starting to tighten its grip on the retail front of their business.
It's an odd, but perfectly legitimate trend; Apple wants complete control over how their merchandise is sold. They're opening up Apple stores left and right and driving out old, established resellers in those markets. It's pissing a lot of people off, but it's still within their rights to do this, so long as there are no breaches of contract.
I would expect to see Apple try to continue what they have done with the iPod - that is, making it easier to get your favorite artists, and listen to them, and maybe even make payment unobtrusive. Only if you have a Mac, of course. So if buying Universal is the only way to do that, then they would love to buy Universal, but chances are better that this is about some secret Apple squirrel society that is available to all Mac owners, but better if you pay.
There. I'm not fried.
Schrodinger's cat is either dead or really pissed off...
On the other hand, yesterday some"very well-informed Apple Employee" at J and R said he'd never heard of 10.3 (Panther) being previewed at the WWDC and released in the Fall. It's been all over the web and on the Apple front page since March 21st when they changed the date of the conference.
All I really want is Cocoa version of iTunes. I don't download music off the internet and I don't have an iPod. I just want the apps I use most on OS X to be true OS X apps. But all I am expecting is iTunes 3.1 with music service integration and new iPods. Hopefully Panther will usher in a Cocoa Finder, Cocoa iTunes, and Cocoa Quicktime.
it is like that at a lot of retail stores. the reason being is that corporate knows that the retail worker monkeys would squeel the news to sites like this.
i don't work for an apple store, but i do work for circuit city and thats how they work.
Beer Die is the game of champions Learning To walk my own path.
If Apple is starting a subscription service - they ought to seriously consider the US mobile phone model:
Sign up for one year and get a $XXX discount on one of our pieces of hardware
Imagine how many more people will sign up for a $40 monthly fee if it meant they could finally afford an iPod and have access to an easy to use music subscription service.
If you're waiting for Apple to port OS X to commodity PC hardware, don't hold your breath. If they do switch to x86, which I view as unlikely, it'll require an Apple x86 machine with an Apple BIOS.
Personally, I think it's more likely that they'd switch straight to a 64-bit CPU from AMD, but that's just me.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
I believe that the settlement only stated that they couldn't use the name Apple Records. They'd probably stick with Universal as a name.
do not read this line twice.
Even if the settlement doesn't preclude all such claims in the future, all Apple would need to do is retain the Universal brand name for its music business. The legal problem arises only when Apple starts selling music under the Apple brand name, not when Apple obtains corporate control of a different brand name that sells music.
Firewire 400 is not the bottleneck when copying files over to your ipod. The harddrives are. And the FireWire 800 use connectors only available on new high end macs. So you first expectation is highly unlikely to happen.
>Bluetooth (or WiFi, whatever) connectivity.
What would be the point of enable the iPod wireless? Bluetooth is damn slow, 802.11b(and g) is a faster, bur require lots of power. The iPod battery does have short enough life span as it is.
Sure it could be a 'cool' feature, but the increased price, and the decreased battery life will not sell many units.
Not likely, there's no WMA 9 support for OS X, or any OS but Windows. And WMP for OS X is now out for 15 months without one update, and boy does it need some updates!
"Common Sense Ain't" -Unknown
Nope, it's really true. I would listen to a 64 Ogg over a 128 MP3 any day (of course both have artifacts, but the Ogg's high frequency problems are much less than MP3's swirling hi-hats).
Putting the sig back into +1, Insightful since 1995!
No, it should be spelled "renewed."
Once a contract is signed, it's signed. You can't "re-sign" it, any more than you can "re-kill" Jimmy Hoffa.
And my experience is that they typically don't see the products until a few weeks after they've been announced. Jobs: you got me all excited about the 17" notebook; I should be able to drive to your store the next day and see the floor model. After 3 weeks and people tend to lose enthusiasm. How hard can it be to send 20 fed-ex packages with the new floor models at the exact moment of your announcement?
Yeah, I know they probably aren't made yet and you want to get the announcement to coincide with some major event, but its far more fun to go touch the stuff right away.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
It was a real simple hack: get your powerbook, buy an LCD monitor, plug it in. In some cases, you may need to hit the "Detect Displays" button in System Preferences.
Cool tip: you can set Virtual PC to full screen mode on the second monitor only. Freak people out by dragging windows across the two systems.
'Following the announcement, Microsoft shares rose $3 and Apple shares were $12 down at close of trading. The usual suspects predicted the demise of Apple within 3 weeks, citing the failure to keep up technically with the PC market, and Steve Jobs was slightly injured by a troll from slashdot complaining about file copy speed on a 9600/300. ...try to keep posts on topic'
Too true. Why is that everytime Apple makes some announcement of pending Great Things, their share prices drop? Sales are up. Share prices down. Good reviews from Wintel-centric publications. Share prices down. Apple can do no right for Wallstreet. Who cares about low marketshare? I didn't think the goal of business was to rule the world--only to make a profit.
Apple does great things. Not the answer for everyone's needs, but fills a niche pretty well.
Don't think the announcement will be as great as a G9/3000, but hope that it's nothing as boring as a 40G iPod...
There is possibility of an "independent" iPod update, which would add OGG support. This Wired article discusses a version of uClinux which runs Mad (a media player for Linux which is able to play OGG files).
Incidentally, I think understating the importance of open standards when it comes to something as ubiquitous as digital music, is a mistake.
understating the importance of open standards when it comes to something as ubiquitous as digital music, is a mistake.
Ogg support isn't important in terms of customer demand, that's all I'm saying. Add it, don't add it, almost nobody will care or even notice. I am not saying that standard formats aren't important from a "general benefit to the consumer/public" perspective.
And, BTW, in what way is it more open than AAC? Specifically? MPEG4 is, after all, a real standard. What am I missing?
You like your Macintosh better than me, don't you Dave? Dave? Can you hear me Dave?