Fulfilling a Steve Jobs Vision
Posted on November 28, 2011
Today’s podcast is a twenty-five minute interview with Ulik Broida who is the Vice President of Marketing at Israel-based Wavion, which is a subsidiary of wireless equipment maker, Alvarion. Wavion specializes in Wi-Fi access points designed for outdoor use.
Earlier this month the senior founder at Trilogy Partnership disclosed that Steve Jobs was originally seriously considering whether Apple could build a nationwide Wi-Fi network for the iPhone. Since Wi-Fi spectrum is unlicensed Apple could build its own network thereby avoiding the possibility that the iPhone user experience would be dependent upon cellular carriers. Presumably, with the iPad on the drawing board, Jobs could see that much of Apple’s future growth would depend upon the availability of reliable wireless service at reasonable fees.
Download 25 minute audio interview to iPod, iPhone, or iPad.
According to Trilogy’s John Stanton, who spent a lot of time with Jobs during iPhone gestation, “(Jobs) wanted to replace carriers. He and I spent a lot of time examining whether a new carrier could be created synthetically with a national Wi-Fi network using unlicensed spectrum.” Jobs eventually partnered with AT&T, partly because the carrier agreed to subsidize the iPhone subscriber costs. Nonetheless, Stanton concluded, “If I were a carrier, I’d be concerned about the dramatic power shift that occurred.” Read more…
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Why Steve Jobs Wanted Apple’s Own National Wi-Fi Network
Posted on November 16, 2011
On Monday the Chairman of a prominent venture capital firm named Trilogy Partners disclosed that Steve Jobs initially wanted Apple to deploy its own national Wi-Fi network to service the iPhone.
The reasons are precisely those discussed in our blog post six months ago entitled, “Should Apple Become a Wireless ISP?”
Download three-minute audio to iPod, iPhone, or iPad here.
According to Trilogy’s John Stanton who spent a lot of time with Jobs during iPhone gestation, “(Jobs) wanted to replace carriers. He and I spent a lot of time examining whether a new carrier could be created synthetically with a national Wi-Fi network using unlicensed spectrum.”
Jobs eventually partnered with AT&T, partly because the carrier agreed to subsidize the cost of an iPhone for subscribers. Nonetheless, Stanton concluded, “If I were a carrier, I’d be concerned about the dramatic shift in power that occurred.” Read more…
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Missing Notes at iTunes-10
Posted on September 1, 2010
In the movie Amadeus, Mozart eagerly asks the Austrian Emperor for his opinion of the composer’s new opera, The Marriage of Figaro. At first the Emperor is evasive but upon Mozart’s insistence he responds that “there are too many notes.” An offended Wolfgang sarcastically asks “which ones should I exclude?”
Download audio narration to iPod, iPad, and iPhone here.
Evidently somebody in authority decided the tenth version of iTunes that Apple released today would also benefit from a mystifying exclusion. It’s “Ping” social networking is probably the most significant innovation to promote artists and record labels in the last decade. New release popularity was suffering because digital music forced a decline in radio, the chief recorded music promotional vehicle of the past sixty years. As radio’s successor, Ping permits 160 million iTunes users to spontaneously join affinity groups enabling them to discover new music and artists from one another. They can share recommendations within invitation-only groups, or among people with similar tastes from anywhere in open groups. Read more…
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There is Something There at AppleTV
Posted on March 15, 2010
Phil Leigh
Tim Cook, who is Apple’s Chief Operating Officer, was recently interviewed at a Goldman, Sachs investor conference. He repeatedly minimized the company’s market opportunity in the Digital Living Room of the Future. Instead he implied that portable devices would be the prime growth engines in the years ahead.
For example, he commented that Apple has “no interest” in the TV market and that “AppleTV” remains a hobby because the market size is small by comparison to that for portable units. In contrast he observed that the “vast majority of Apple’s revenue now comes from mobile devices and content purchased for those devices.” Read more…
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The Future of Apple
Posted on February 20, 2010
The Need:
Since the turn of the century Apple evolved from a secondary computer company into the most potent force transforming media. It is the premier Digital Media innovator as evidenced by the iPod, iPhone and most recently the iPad. Basically each introduction defined a new product category or enabled an incipient one to “cross the chasm” into mass market acceptance. More of the same is expected in the future, not only from products but also from transactional services.
Most any business affected by the future of media will be directly impacted by Apple’s future innovations. Moreover, its existing product lines alone will carry the company past the $100 billion revenue threshold in less than five years.
Revenue Forecast - Percent Sales by Product Line
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Inventing the Future at Apple
Posted on January 30, 2010
Phil Leigh
As Xerox PARC pioneer Alan Kay once put it, “The best way to predict the future is to invent it”. Much like it did with the iPod and iPhone, Apple again invented the future when it introduced the iPad tablet computer in January.
From one perspective the iPad is an evolutionary extension of the iPod Touch. It uses the same operating system and user interface. Consumers familiar with the iPod Touch will quickly get the hang of the iPad. Neither device has a hard drive, or unpacks out of the box with a keyboard. Both can use the approximate 140,000 apps available at the Apps Store. The most obvious difference is the iPad screen which is about seven times larger. Read more…
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Apple Service Might be a “Game Changer”
Posted on January 18, 2010
Phil Leigh
It’s become obvious over the past seven years that Apple can develop innovative products that revolutionize both emerging and established industries. An example of the first is the iPod. When it hit the market about seven years ago it was the first portable MP3 player with enough capacity to enable most of us to carry our entire music collection around with us. An example of the second is the iPhone which forever changed our concept of what a mobile phone should be able to do. In short, it combined voice telephony with unlimited Internet access.
Now, speculation is rife that Apple is at the threshold of introducing not only a new product but a new service as well. Read more…
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Analysis of New Products from Mac World
Posted on January 24, 2008
Summary: If you would like a professional opinion on the products from the recent Mac World conference, this interview is for you.
Our guest today is Jefferson Graham who is a Technology Reporter with USA Today. He and Ed Baig are the Co-Hosts of the Talking Tech podcasts. After stints at The Hollywood Reporter and Entertainment Tonight, Graham joined USA Today in 1984 covering entertainment. He switched to tech in 2000. Graham is also the author, or co-author, of nine books, including Aaron Spelling: a Prime-Time Life.
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