17.45, Wednesday 12 Jan 2005

Apple keynote thoughts:

  • I see why Apple are pushing video. My mum got on broadband a few weeks ago, and started sending me low-res video clips of the dogs. Small filesize (comparable to a bunch of high-res photos), and way, way more bang for the buck. I hadn't had the video epiphany, but now video has broken away from cassettes, TV, and having to endure hour long home vids, I think it'll really come of age.
  • Good to see Pages, cut-down DTP app. That's a big gap in software at the moment, and I'm glad to see it filled. I heard a rumour the file format was LaTeX, which - given the power and openness of that markup language - would rock, if true. Here's the thing: There are three parts of Microsoft: Windows, Office, WMA+DRM. Microsoft are positioning to have their DRM and media format become the ethernet of the next 30 years, every "packet" of audio or video will be stamped by that technology. Office, the power is not in what you do with it, but in its potential as a development platform: You can have a plugin that fires events when you change styles, constrains how you use the app, validates data, adds extra functionality... Office is the Office OS. This is massively important. Given those first two, I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft turned round tomorrow and published the entire Windows API and let people clone the entire thing. It would take the wind out of the sales of anti-trust efforts, and turn the OS into a commodity that'd leave the way completely open for the real money-spinners. So: Pages has got to be not just a DTP app, but a platform, and that's why the script interface has got to be great, Cocoa has to encourage plugins, the document model has to have events attached to it, and the format has to be extensible, tried and tested. Ditto iCal and Mail. (I'm also pleased Apple feel able to release a DTP/word processing app without matching the niches of traditional apps. What next? A spreadsheet/XML/database/data entry app? A photo editing/vector drawing/Flash anim type app? The traditional silos are breaking down.)
  • Mac Mini, also good. Right price. Now we need a TV interface over Airport Express (to control your media much as Airport Express can control your music), and stacks of hard drives which are just as pretty.
  • I was hoping for some surprises with Tiger. Maybe including Mono and an API bridge, more scripting and syncing, and more frameworks to do--hey, I don't know, fun stuff.
  • I love the iLife and iWork logos. Yum. (Didn't ClarisWorks have a similar shape, although not style?)

It'll be fun to see how these pan out.