To say that Apple has changed the mobile phone industry is an understatement. They changed the MP3 player market before that. Now all rumors point to an impending tablet/touchscreen device, what market will this affect? Everyone else has their ideas, so I’ll throw mine in as well, some of these ideas aren’t just fantasies, but reports from sources familiar with Apple.
iPhone on Verizon
This is a big deal for the US, but not much of a surprise, AT&T doesn’t bring anything of exclusive value to the table, so the exclusivity contract will not last. This is such a no-brainer, that I won’t spend much time on it. If you have a contract with any carrier, and it’s about to expire in the next 3 months, great, just stay with them and go month to month, you don’t need to buy a new phone yet.
Tablet/Slate/Larger iPod Touch
I know for a fact that this is happening, and is bigger than people think it is. This is not just an addition to their line up, but an attempt to change theway we interact with computers on a daily basis. The iPhone and iPod touch were nothing more than experiments, and we all paid willingly, to be their lab rats. The first victim of this device will be the Amazon Kindle and other ‘e-readers’. The proponents of current readers thought people would love to be able to carry the same number of books with them, as they do their music. Forgetting that most songs are less than 3 minutes long, and don’t require the undivided attention of the user. Even with things like “read to me”, the form factor is plain unsexy and cumbersome. Combine that with text only display for magazines and periodicals, and the process of reading just becomes downright painful. Now imagine a device that lets you check your email, surf the web, and read your favorite magazine or book at any time, and it does it all in color. That’s what the tablet will do. The first generation will not make voice calls via a cell network, but will have EVDO built in. Now how is this better than any other tablet, or laptop/netbook?
As a consumer, it’s better because it’s further consolidation of multiple devices, it’s a bigger form factor than an iPhone, and I am 99% certain, won’t require a contract with AT&T. All data will go through Verizon’s EVDO network, with Sprint/Clear 4G coming in 2011. You can take this device to your office, “dock it”, and use it with a bigger/newer display and your existing keyboard/mouse.
As a publisher, your content is delivered the way you want it, including Ads you sold in your hard cover editions, except now these ads are interactive. There will be a lot of naysayers when the product is first announced sometime in January/early February.. but the device will improve very quickly. There are multiple form factors in prototype stages already, anywhere from the 10 inch tablet, to a 15, 17, and 24 inch version.
Did anyone notice that the 24″ iMac is missing in the lineup, yet there is a 24″ Cinema Display? My bet is on a 24 inch dock/display for the tablet.
Oh, this device will run OS X, not iPhone OS.
OS Touch
Details will emerge during WWDC, but expect a lot of changes, this will probably be OS XI, 11, or whatever you want to call it, but move to a full touch system requires more than just the ability to handle multiple fingers at once, expect a lot of changes in how we boot up, shut down, and over all reliability of day to day computing devices. How we connect peripherals, how we charge the devices, how we game, how we input information and extract it, is all set to change. I expect this road to be bumpy, but how the majority of us interact with computers today, will be dramatically different in 2015.
Keep in mind, so far we’ve only had incremental improvements, but we’re still using a mouse, a keyboard, and are tied to our desks, even if we have “laptops”. But the way we interact is no different than 1985.
It’s funny that a $600 phone is next to impossible to brick, but a $3000/laptop can be bricked without trying.
So, what are your thoughts?
