Tumbled Logic

Apple: Five years on

Prediction posts are always amusing to look back on. I doubt this one will be much of an exception.

1. Google will have bought up a chunk of the wireless spectrum in the US, and Apple will have long since ditched AT&T in favour of them for use by the 3rd generation iPhone.
2. Having squared things up nicely with Apple Corps, Apple Inc. went the whole hog and offered artists what they wanted all along: a straightforward distribution platform. iTunes is the king of music, and through a partnership with Amazon, you can have a physical copy of full albums that you download sent to you for an extra $2.99 (or £2.99 in the UK—some things never change). The iTunes front page showcases new (rather than popular) talent on a weekly basis, and the iTunes Store and iTunes WiFi Store let you buy tickets for gigs.
3. Microsoft is still desperately clinging to Windows Media, but very few people care. The Zune and Xbox divisions were merged to much fanfare in 2009, but despite the PR it was really just a polite way of retiring the Zune.
4. Apple finally bought Omni.
5. The latest Pixar-Disney release, “Joe Cannonball” (a story about a circus), is released on iTunes and in cinemas simultaneously.
6. Telecommunications hasn’t come on in quite the leaps and bounds everybody hoped, despite so many promising technologies. Macs, iPods, iPhones and Airports sold today can shift 480Mb/sec wirelessly, but widescale public infrastructure is lacking, mobile telecoms are still pricey, and fixed-line telecoms are barely used (except for the last vestiges of DSL).
7. Microsoft last year lobbied various senators to “encourage” the DoJ to launch an anti-trust probe into Apple for anti-competitive behaviour, largely because Apple refused to license Windows Media from Microsoft (at cost) and incorporate it wholesale into its devices. Nobody cared.
8. iPhones still ship with Marker Felt. Each new generation that does has made John Gruber cry. Gruber was offered a job by Apple PR, but turned them down.
9. Apple ran out of big cat names and decided to revert to a previous theme. The next major release of Mac OS X will be named “Beethoven”.
10. In October 2010, IBM attempted to buy Apple, but was met with such strong protests from Mac fans that it aborted the bid. Rumours circulated that Steve Jobs had persuaded IBM to make the bid as a “Hallowe’en prank”, but that IBM were considering making a move anyway.