Gizmodo "knows" that iPhone will be announced on Monday, and it won't be what they expected at all. People usually assume Monday means this next Monday, December 18, and hope that it won't be about, say, a product called IP-hone, a device for, erm, sharpening your IP address, or something.
In any case, this would certainly be a surprising development. Not just that it's announced days before Christmas, when people have already bought their gift mobile phones (if any), but even more uncharacteristically, because it's not a Tuesday.
Or maybe Apple's just sick and tired of the outrageous speculation and rumormongering going on about the product, even affecting the company's stock price, and wants to clear up the picture by saying, "Here's your iPhone, dammit! You can get it in March! Now leave me the $%^£! alone, will ya?!"
And then Apple can go on about its business, announcing new Leopard and iTV features, iLife 2007, a retooled dot-Mac service, and other business-as-usual stuff at Macworld.
Looks like Jobs just won't let the Mac Web ruin his Christmas. We're sorry, Steve.
Friday, December 15, 2006
Rampant speculation forces early iPhone announcement? Speculation
Sunday, November 12, 2006
So where's the media center Mac Mini?
It has been rumored with great intensity. Apple would release a new version of its entry-level desktop, the Mac mini, with added media center functionality. One major rumor-writeup even called it a TiVo-killer, purported to know its internal codename (Kaleidoscope) at Apple. Estimated time of arrival: the January Macworld San Francisco expo.
Of 2006.
Well, it never materialized. The rumor mill has become rather quiet about it, especially since the announcement of iTV, a device which looks conspicuously similar to a Mac Mini.
Could it be that the "sources deeply entrenched in the grapevine" were fooled by its appearance, and mistook the iTV for a Mac mini?
It has always seemed very odd to me why, apart from the form factor, rumors would want to turn the Mac mini into a media center:
- The Mac mini is the entry-level Mac. It's designed to be as cheap as possible. It was made for people with basic computing needs. Why increase its costs by adding functionality that most of its users don't want?
- It's uncharacteristic of Apple to introduce functionality exclusive to one Mac model, especially the entry-level Mac.
- Hooking up a Mac to a TV is inconvenient, and Apple knows that. "Would you like an iTV with it, sir?"
So were all the "TiVo killer" rumors just simply totally wrong? Maybe, but perhaps recording capabilities will arrive in a second high-end iTV model later. Just in case they do, let me take this opportunity and warn Apple how crucial it would be to be able to start recording a show immediately. As in, pressing the "record" button. Alas, with the Apple Remote, that would look more like emerging from the depth of a five-level menu, and then delving into another three levels elsewhere before recording can commence. And that would probably mean missing the fun part.