Initial Post-Keynote Thoughts
-The 1.13 iPhone update is very nice, love location in Maps and the ability to create your own main page icons, but Apple definitely should have worked harder to make sure this didn’t leak earlier – would have been big news today, now that we’ve known about and seen it for weeks, not as huge.
-The fact that they’re selling 20,000 iPhone everyday and 4 million overall is really impressive.
-Sucks that they are charging current iPod Touch owners $20 for the new update to that device.
-Having all the major studios on board for the iTunes Movie Store is huge, huge. I still don’t love the 24-hour period, but HD support is a potential killer feature.
-Think I might have to buy an Apple TV now, but I’d still be very tempted to get a Mac Mini instead.
-Menu system for renting/buying movies on the Apple TV looks awesome – I think about my On Demand menu now and just laugh. Experience is important, cable companies don’t get that.
-MacBook Air is slick. Steve Jobs is good at creating devices that fit into things – iPod into pocket, iPod Nano into that little jean pocket, now MacBook Air into manilla envelope. That’s a really smart idea because it gives customers a real idea of how small something is.
-$3,100 is the price of the MacBook Air if you want it with the solid state drive. Very pricey, but that’s what you get for getting on this trend very early in the game. The hard drive alone is costs about $1,000. I find it very hard to justify spending $3,000 when the same thing could be half that by the end of the year.
-5 hours of battery is great, but I hope that’s in real working conditions.
-Remote disk is awesome – a glimpse of the future where you can do everything from a main hub and send it out to remote systems.
-Still not sure I would get a MacBook Air over a MacBook Pro, the Multi-touch keypad definitely weighs in favor of the Air, but the Pro is still definitely more powerful.
-Randy Newman was a horrible choice for performer. I know movies were a big part of the announcement, but there are much better options out there for an event like this. I’m certainly no Republican but his anti-war rant is just out of place. There is a political debate tonight, Newman should go to that if he wants to weigh in, not the MacWorld conference.
-Where the hell is ‘One More Thing…’?
Overall I have to say I’m a little disappointed – not majorly, but a little. I know it’s getting harder and harder for Steve Jobs to knock it out of the park every time with rising expectations, but nothing announced today wows me to the point of absolutely needing to run to the store right this second.
I may get a MacBook Air, but I may just opt for a MacBook Pro. I may get an Apple TV, but I may opt for a Mac Mini. I may get a Time Capsule, or I may just opt for a much cheaper external drive with the same capacity. I think Steve Jobs left a lot of us waiting for that ‘One More Thing…’.