Welcome to a Post-Steve Jobs Apple

It has been coming a long time - his illness has been quiet but well-documented, and he has been on medical leave 3 times - but it was still a shock to see the headlines: Steve Jobs resigns as CEO of Apple. Today likely begins a panicked sell-off of Apple stock, as touchy investors flee a company without the iCEO at the helm. But tomorrow likely begins a smug buy-up of all open Apple stock by bargain hunters, who realize Jobs leaves Apple with a well-trained executive team, molded in his own image, with a strong vision for the future.

First, as an Apple investor and owner of Apple products, I want thank Steve for his many years of service. A life is not to be judged on its wealth, which can be accrued thru virtue or thru sin. But a life is to be judged thru its accomplishments, and Steve has had many. He was part of the personal computer revolution with the original Apple. He was part of the GUI revolution with the Macintosh (technically starting with LISA). He was part of the network revolution with NEXT computers and then the iMac. And he is at the forefront of the mobile revolution with the iPod, iPhone, and iPad. Few men have lead through more transformations of the way we live and do business, and few have kept a consistent focus on customers.

Second, I want to reassure my fellow Fanboys that Apple will not die without Steve at the helm. Tim Cook has been CEO for several years now, de-facto, and the iRevolution has been as much about the executive team he leaves behind, as it is about Steve himself. Surely, he was the unifying visionary behind it, but there are many years of that vision left to go. I doubt the iPad is the last "One More Thing" to come out of Apple... perhaps not even the last one this year.

Third, I want to encourage Mod-Blog readers not to lose sight of the real base of this story. It is NOT a CEO resigning, or a visionary stepping down, or a world-class business changing hands. It is a human being fighting a difficult illness. Likely in the process of dying (although Steve Jobs is notoriously private about such things). Please be praying for him and his family - for healing if it be God's will, or for comfort if it is his time. While others are hand-wringing about supplies of the iDevice they lst after, let us show compassion for the man himself.

My thoughts. I am interested to read yours in the comments, or on Facebook, Twitter, or Google+.

WWDC Announcements

The 5 cent summary:
- iPhone 4 with "retina display" screen, HD camera, new design - $199 starting price with 2 year contract on AT&T - on sale June 24
- iMovie for iPhone ($4.99 from App Store)
- iPhoneOS has been renamed to iOS
- iOS 4 goes Gold Master today, releases June 21
- iBooks coming to iPhone/iPod Touch with iOS 4
- iAds to enable more free/low-cost Apps, coming July 1
- FaceTime - Video calls over Wifi (3G in 2011)

WWDC is today

Those less obsessed with Apple than me may not be aware that today is the first day of Apple's World Wide Developer Conference. Today, at 1 PM EST, Steve Jobs will give the keynote address where he expected to announce:

- the next iteration of the iPhone
- Safari 5, with better HTML 5 support
- iPhoneOS 4
- an updated XCode
- iBooks and possibly NetFlix for iPhone

The keynote will not be streamed live, so if you want to see the announcements check out a liveblog like that of MacRumors.

Steve jobs drops the Blog Bomb on Adobe

It is a rare thing when Steve Jobs bothers to comment on anything that is not his own product. But apparently the criticism over Apple's banning of Adobe's Flash and Cross-Platform Compiler from iPad and iPhones was enough to get him typing. The bottom line: Flash is not on the iPhone/iPad, it's not COMING to the iPhone/iPad, and Adobe had plenty of chances to change Apple's mind in the past.

Flash has not performed well on mobile devices. We have routinely asked Adobe to show us Flash performing well on a mobile device, any mobile device, for a few years now. We have never seen it. Adobe publicly said that Flash would ship on a smartphone in early 2009, then the second half of 2009, then the first half of 2010, and now they say the second half of 2010. We think it will eventually ship, but we’re glad we didn’t hold our breath.

Between this battle and the Gizmodo legal troubles, Apple seems to have decided it likes being the center of all media attention. Good or bad.

Steve Jobs To Return In June

Apple has announced that Steve Jobs will be returning to Apple in June after a leave of absence. We wish Steve Jobs a great time for the rest of his leave of absence and welcome his return.

Steve Jobs goes on medical leave

It did not generate much buzz here on Mod-blog, but for months now there have been persistent rumors of serious health issues for Steve Jobs. Jobs has consistently denied any serious issues, and even put out a letter shortly before MacWorld which claimed recent unexplained weight loss was due to a non-serious hormonal disorder which was being treated. Apple's stock has been jittery about this. It is sure to plunge now that Steve Jobs has officially announced a medical leave of absence to deal with his medical problems. He is still CEO and will be involved with strategy, but the day-to-day operations of Apple are now in the hands of Tim Cook, Chief Operating Officer.

The question remains whether this is a life threatening condition or not. Unlike most CEOs, the modern Apple has become synonymous with Steve Jobs. Only Bill Gates is seen as tightly joined to his company, and as central to its success. The question now is whether the market is willing to wait and see, of it they will use this excuse to cut and run in the midst of a Recession.

MacWorld Realities

The "SteveNote" is done and he announced:
- The new "Time Capsule" - an Airport Extreme with a built-in Hard Drive for TimeMachine to backup to wirelessly
- An upgrade to the iPhone software which brings pseudo-GPS along with other new features
- An upgrade to the iPod Touch which brings iPhone apps to it
- The iPhone SDK (which will actually release in February)
- An upgrade to the AppleTV software which brings iTunes Store integration and Flickr integration (and a price drop)
- The New MacBook Air, which is an ultrathin laptop with no optical drive and an entirely green production method.

Interesting. I still would rather have seen changes to AppleTV to integrate it with over-the-air (or over-cable) TV technology, but I never really expected that to come to pass. My only real fault of the thing is that it will cost iPod Touch owners $20 to get the iPhone apps. This makes NO sense, since there was no incremental cost to deploy them there (people have had jailbroken iPod Touches using these apps since day 1).

Happy MacWorld!

MacWorld officially began yesterday, but today is the "Stevenote" - the annual keynote presentation by Steve Jobs which is traditionally used to announce Apple's biggest products. Last year, it was used to formally announce the iPhone.

This year, the rumor ecosystem is rife with speculation: an ultraportable MacBook, a Mac tablet PC, a souped-up AppleTV (with BluRay or TV recording built-in), online movie rentals, a 3G iPhone, and "Product X - a new game-changer" have all been posited. For now, all we know is that Apple has posted banners which proclaim "Something is in the Air."

Click here for a liveblog of the Stevenote as it happens at 9 AM PST (12 noon EST). It will automatically detect an iPhone or iPod Touch and format itself appropriately.

Apple offers $100 Store Credit to Early iPhone Adopters

The $200 price drop of the iPhone has shocked and angered many early adopters. After reading the angry e-mails, Steve Jobs has posted an open letter stating that those who bought an iPhone at the original price will receive a $100 Apple store credit (online or brick and mortar). Details are still being worked out, but will be posted on Apple's website.