Quote

"Apple management does not see where Bluetooth would be used other than possibly for wireless headphones, but then the headphones would need batteries," he wrote.

For reporting purposes, the first quarter of 2005 for Apple started this month. Exactly what does Milunovich say? The exact quote you gave says "first quarter of 2005", which is vague, and could actually be tomorrow by Apple's reckoning.

Does he specifically say "calendar year 2005" or "color iPod in the first half of next year" or something like that? Or is that your choice of words?

K

Came across this quote about "MCE-braindead" server in the home from Phil Schiller in an Oct 2002 interview with Infoworld: (www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/02/10/18/021018hnapple.html:

"InfoWorld: Are there plans for any kind of collaborative environments that would leverage these wireless technologies?"

"Schiller: We've already demonstrated that in two very real ways. When we introduced Rendezvous, we did the demo of iTunes. Steve [Jobs] is on stage, he's got a desktop, he's looking at iTunes, he's got his music library, then I walked up on stage, opened up my notebook, and I have a music library as well. All of a sudden Steve's library dynamically grew and now had the music from his library with my music in it as well -- in a completely legal fashion, because we're not copying anything. You can just see it as if it's one library. This is the real answer to what you need, for example, in the home. A lot of companies have played around with the idea of a server in the home. That's really dumb. I have yet to meet a consumer who said, "What I really need is a server to manage." You have these computers [with] more power than any server you could afford to buy for under $1,000. You don't need more power, you just need a way to make this completely seamless and invisible."

Also this from Tevanian and Schiller about DRM:

"InfoWorld: Microsoft is coming out with Windows Media Player and DRM [digital rights management] and they seem to have plans to incorporate the Palladium infrastructure as part of that solution to lock down the computing environment from beginning to end. What's Apple's take on this?

Tevanian: What's most important to us is what do consumers want and what are consumers entitled to? We're very intimately aware of the issue of illegal use of these things vs. legal use and who's paying and who's not. We're as big a stakeholder as anyone from that perspective. But we also believe the most important thing is not really how do you make sure people are always doing what's legal by forcing them to only do things that are legal? The bigger question is, How do you provide them something that they really want? For example, I think most people would agree that the reason many people "steal" things over the Net is because it's so easy to do and it's the easiest way to get the things [they want]. Well, imagine if it were easier to pay a fair fee and get the thing. Our view is, Let's look at how we provide things that are the easiest for consumers, because by and large people want to be honest. And by and large, people will pay for what they're getting.

Schiller: Our attitude has always been you've got to protect the content owner's rights and the consumer's rights. We think you can try to do both. We did that with the iPod -- we went down the middle safely. A second part of this is we fundamentally think that an attempt to create an unbreakable system is foolish. Microsoft has more than almost anybody [who's been] trying to build encryption schemes into DRMs. And as we saw with the last version of Windows Media, it was broken before it shipped. So we think the No. 1 task is not to make an unbreakable system that tries to keep ahead of criminals, because criminals are going to find a way to break through anyway. What's important is to find the products and services that help honest people stay honest. And people haven't focused on that."

I thought the year was going by too fast. Now that I have to wait till 2005 for my 60GB color iPod, it is going too slow. Sigh. Waiting for the perfect iPod has been trying. I guess I just need to go ahead and buy one.

If Apple held off on new iPods until Jan at MWExpo, that would be understandable given the current demand for iPods and iPod minis. With the momentum they have and the HP side just getting going, they likely don't need anything else right now to maintain their 92% market share.

That would allow the new iPods to add some juice to the usually-slow post-Christmas quarter, and thereby continue Apple's momentum.

The only thing is that those 60GB drives were rumored to have been ready months ago, with large quantities shipping in Q4. And Toshiba (who makes the hard-drive) is or will be shipping an MP3 player using it real soon. Although Toshiba is the only one to announce, so maybe Apple has an exclusive agreement with them so that Toshiba will not sell the 60GB to anyone else until Jan.

K

So I guess a home media server (iServe?), that is not just another Mac, is dumb.

Well, then Apple better fix it so that one Mac is able to have at least different songs streamed to two different locations in the house, and release that wireless remote control for Mac-iTunes. Because at least in those two "It's the music, stupid" areas, the MCE has Apple's iTunes and Airport Express beat.

If the 60 GB drives are ready, then it might make sense for Apple to hold off for awhile so they can stockpile them and not run short when demand would exceed supply otherwise.

In the article:

"Apple Computer will likely introduce a flash-based iPod in early 2005 and a color iPod in the first half of next year, Merrill Lynch analyst Steven Milunovich predicted Monday in a 10-page report to clients obtained by The Mac Observer."

Uh, how about the very NEXT DAY? See Apple's page:

http://www.apple.com/ipodphoto/