Apple Tablet Rumor Wrap Up

Since the Apple event is this afternoon, and the submission bin overflows with Apple Tablet rumor stories, I'm putting up a few of the more choice links here so we can all speculate for the next few hours. A McGraw Hill CEO confirmed the tablet on CNBC last night, basically saying it is a big iPhone that has content agreements with publishers. Another blogger wrote in with a expectation list for the event, and technologizer had a nice history of fail in the world of tablet computing. Feel free to add your own rumor, speculation, and exhausted eye rolling below.

Comments

Apple's strategy

[schmidt349]

Sure it could be the next G4 Cube, but I think Apple's approach to emerging new computing niches gives them a fighting chance. Microsoft just throws Windows on the device complete with all the crappy desktop metaphors and UI widgets that are completely irrelevant to the new form factor -- witness Windows Mobile and all the Windows tablets. Apple at least rethinks usability.

Re:Apple's strategy

[Finallyjoined!!!]

Correction: Apple at least rethinks usability properly.

Microsoft bungs hundreds of millions at "usability" & we end up with the stupid ribbon... Pah!

Re:Apple's strategy

[Wingsy]

"I don't mind Apple trying new things, but I fail to see what this device has going for it that is essentially "New"."

Ya think that may be because you haven't even seen it yet?

Re:Apple's strategy

[Low Ranked Craig]

Depends on what you want. If this device is essentially a big iPod touch, and has a good online store for e-books, this is exactly what I want. A device that will let me read a book, listen to music, watch a movie, and browse the internet. I really wanted a kindle but the thing is a unitasker with an e-ink screen and that doesn't work for me. I don't want this to do coding or write documents. This will be much more convenient to carry than my MacBook.

Re:Apple's strategy

[digitig]

Correction: Apple at least rethinks usability properly. Microsoft bungs hundreds of millions at "usability" & we end up with the stupid ribbon... Pah!

Do you really think the ribbon was anything to do with usability? As far as I can see, it was about having a patentable UI element that OO.o and its ilk couldn't copy.

Re:Apple's strategy

[Anonymous Coward]

I fail to see what this device has going for it that is essentially "New".

Lock-in. Ten years ago, would anyone have predicted that products like the iPhone or the Kindle could possibly have any success at all? Back then, it looked like there was a trend toward more freedom, and new products would be competing to be more open and usable than one another.

Somehow, in the last decade, the personal computer market has accepted (in the sense of people actually spend money on some of the products) that personal computers don't need to be totally open to developers; that personal computers can use the same development model as video game consoles, and some people (maybe a minority, but a big enough niche to make a profit and get a SHITLOAD of publicity) will actually buy them.

So what's new here? Well, look at the tablets of the past: they were programmable by the Little People. They were personal computers in the old sense, where when you bought one, you totally owned it, and you could even start a software business on one if you wanted to, with no limits to what you could do. Not this time. This time it's going to be closed up, have a centralized app store that only sells approved products, and yet people are considering it newsworthy and even predict some success.

This isn't some obscure wackjob company that you can safely laugh at by default when they try to commit atrocities against hackers; it's Apple. The atrocities are there, but not the laughter. The mockery will be there, but tinged with a very real feeling of fear and bitterness. This fucking piece of shit just might still be in the news the day after tomorrow. And that's sobering. We're nearing the end of the personal computer revolution that took off about 3 decades ago. We're seeing Apple destroy something that they played such an important part in creating. That's news. First it was the handheld, now it's something bigger. In a few years: the desktop?

Re:Apple's strategy

[lastchance_000]

Why would anyone want to?

Re:Apple's strategy

[digitig]

Lock-in. MS Office is pervasive in schools and in business, and a drastically different interface makes it harder for users to shift. True, for a short term the Ribbon is pushing some users who have the choice away from MS Office, but I think that MS are planning to ride that out and by agressive deals with schools, colleges, governments, etc get people locked in.

Re:Apple's strategy

[andereandre]

can't watch it, it needs silverlight.

Re:Apple's strategy

[Azureflare]

This ties in to exactly what Apple is doing. McGraw Hill releases their textbooks for iPad -> Schools adopt iPad -> Locked in!

It worked for Microsoft, why not Apple?

My toilet

[digitalsushi]

I'm excited, cause this is going to really shrink down the pile of magazines on my toilet tank! I love how Apple can always class up everything I do in life.

I was considering one to replace my macbook

[antifoidulus]

but if the rumors of it running the iPhone OS are true, I will pass. Not being able to easily load whatever software I want on to the thing is a big turnoff. Not to mention the class of programs that can run on the iPhone OS are pretty limited(I doubt Apple will release XCode for the tablet....)

So...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Was the McGraw-Hill guy one of Apple's planned leaks, or is he going to start waking up, sweating bullets, to 3AM phone calls from Steve Jobs?

"Terry, you have shown all the subtlety and restraint of somebody who sells dead trees for a living. Know that your pain shall be equalled only by my serenity."

At this point the line goes dead. Terry will never know if this is because Steve is fucking with him, or if it is just AT&T's shitty service disconnecting Steve's iPhone.

Best rumor source yet...

[rayharris]

Jason Calacanis got his tablet 10 days ago

http://twitter.com/jason

Highlights:

- $599, $699, $799 depending on size and memory
- iPhone OS with multitasking
- OLED screen (no size given)
- Verizon and ATT for 3G, WiFi
- Front and back cameras for video conferencing
- Thumbpad on each side for mouse gestures
- Fingerprint scanner for login with up to five profiles
- TV/Monitor output and wireless keyboard
- HDTV Tuner with PVR
- Solar panel for recharging (more a gimmick)
- Battery life is "great" in ebook mode, 2-3 hours otherwise
- No word on name

Major Scoop

[GraZZ]

Apple will today announce a partnership with Taco Bell to deliver tacos wirelessly through the new iTablet. This will prove to be the final nail in OLPC's coffin as the west moves to end world hunger via electronic food distribution.

Also it will wash the dishes.

Re:Major Scoop

[JakeD409]

The folks modding this "Informative" are in for a major disappointment.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:I'll wait for a clone

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

An Apple tablet would certainly be bad news for them; but they might have a future among people who want OSX in tablet form.

Unless Steve Jobs accidentally mind-melds with Richard Stallman in the next hour or so, the tablet is almost certainly going to be a hard-locked app-store only product. Further, the odds that it is x86 are somewhere between slim and none, and slim is bleeding to death.

If most of Axiotron's customers were more or less casual users who just had to have an Apple tablet for some reason, they are completely fucked. If, though, they are substantially people who want to be able to draw directly on the screen in photoshop, or otherwise do full OSX stuff in tablet form, they might survive.

Re:overgrown iPhone / iPod Touch

[TheRaven64]

Apple is earning too much from the App Store

I take it you missed yesterday where Apple disclosed in their financials that they don't make a profit from the app store directly, only through increased hardware sales?

Ribbon might be a bad example

[tepples]

Microsoft bungs hundreds of millions at "usability" & we end up with the stupid ribbon

I'm not convinced that "the stupid ribbon" is the best example of your thesis. Perhaps it is easier for novices to learn a program's tabbed toolbar than a program's menu bar. For one thing, recasting a pull-down menu as a toolbar keeps a class of actions on the screen where the user can see them rather than overlapping the document and disappearing once the user chooses an action. As I understand it, most of the whining about Ribbon came from 1. people who rely on muscle memory from previous versions of the product, the same sort of people who would get confused between Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.org anyway, and 2. people concerned about the legal fees of putting up prior art from 2002 to invalidate the patents that Microsoft engineers were applying for over tabbed toolbars. Sure, Ribbon has room for improvement, but it took a couple iterations for Apple to get pull-down menus right too.

My prediction

[ScottForbes]

It'll have a stylus and handwriting recognition, and they're calling it the "Newton."

Re:Touch screen apps has come of age

[Rockoon]

Translation:

Apple fanboy sees all negative observations as complaints, and ends his post with a question where he is wondering why anyone would ever publicly make negative observations about Apple or Apple Products.

Confirmed!

[LeonPierre]

I have it on the authority of no less than 5 people closely related to the project that the new device will do no less than end world hunger, rebuild 3rd world nations, fix the energy crisis and the economy, and help those poor drowning polar bears whose homes have melted away....

But this next piece of information you will not hear from any reputable website, as they are too afraid to publish it:

It will do no less than make unicorns shit rainbows

You can quote me on that.