Now that we’ve got the iPhone, the only thing currently left to fantasize (fetishize?) about seems to be the iTablet, with rumors increasing at an exponential rate — and maybe bringing more than a little crazy on with them.
First up, following Brian Lam’s story yesterday concerning the iTablet and it possibly shipping soon, former Macworld’er Jim Dalrymple says on The Loop that his sources confirm it ain’t happening before 2010, which matches up with what John Gruber’s hearing on Daring Fireball, and previous accounts from Apple Insider. Hopefully this will be settled before the Twitter nerdfights escalate (or we run out of popcorn).
Hey, maybe Apple can show off the iTablet during an October 2009 laptop event, then ship it next year, like they did with the Apple TV and original iPhone? That make everyone happy?
Brian Lam also mentioned a mysterious, yet “it all made sense” code name for the iTablet. Funnest theory we’ve heard so far? “Molotov” from Twitter user Jason Diaz who thinks Apple’s going to use the iTablet to make their upcoming Cocktail initiative da bomb this winter. (Wikipedia it).
Next up, Justin pointed us to a MacLife post which shows a Border survey asking if an Apple iPad is high up on the “will be purchasing” list. We’ve heard the name iPad before, so is this just a resurgence of old rumors by a company sadly out of iTouch, or more fuel for that naming fire?
Lastly — for today at least — the Macalope thinks that if Apple is really ready to ship a tablet, they must have found “a hook”. We think so too, but like the ‘lope we struggle to see what it is aside from “big screen iPhone/iPod touch”. Likely hindsight, come this or next year, will fix that…
Daring Fireball posted a tremendous article about how Verizon, AT&T, and Apple benefit if the rumors about an iPhone Lite and iPad media tablet on Verizon are true-ish (Gruber also looks at Apple’s iPod strategy mapped to the iPhone — go read it now, I’ll wait).
What struck me, however, was how Verizon, AT&T, and Apple benefit from the rumors themselves rather than the actual devices and/or their eventual carriers, if any.
Apple is, according to a separate rumor, negotiating with AT&T to increase the length of their iPhone exclusivity agreement. AT&T’s last earning report showed just how important the iPhone was to their revenues, especially their new customer acquisition and premium service charges. This puts them at a distinct disadvantage with Apple, who could theoretically — if inconveniently — re-engineer the iPhone to work on any of the big 4 US carriers (CDMA for Verizon or Sprint, different GSM bands for T-Mobile). Rumors that Verizon is already talking to Apple, then, pushes AT&T over edge of disadvantage cliff. Obviously this is of great benefit to Apple.
Verizon had what could only be termed a lackluster launch of their so-called iPhone killer, the BlackBerry Storm. With AT&T likely getting yet another mainstream hero phone this year in the form of the 3rd generation iPhone. Sprint, the other CDMA carrier, is getting the less mainstream, but still geek-anticipated Palm Pre as their hot summer hero phone. Where does that leave Verizon? The BlackBerry Tour (”Niagara”) and various HTC Touch series Windows Phones which will — eventually — be upgradable to the profoundly incremental Windows Mobile 6.5. Great gear, perhaps, but not hero phones on the same level as the iPhone or even Palm Pre (or last year’s Android G1 launch on T-Mobile). Rumors that Verizon may (soon) get an iPhone of sorts, or iPad, however, give the perception of a hero phone coming to the network. This is a huge benefit to Verizon, and might even keep some users from switching to AT&T (or Sprint) this summer to get a real device.
Inversely, AT&T benefits not one bit from these rumors. They hurt AT&T’s negotiations with Apple and they may cost them some users who would have defected from Verizon.
We discussed this briefly last Wednesday on the iPhone Live! podcast, and no doubt others have made the same observation this week after reading the series of rumors (yes, even the one about the iPhone Lite actually being the Microsoft iPhone-Killer Pink). However, looking past the devices, it does seem like the rumors in and of themselves carry a hefty benefit for both Apple and Verizon.
Until the 4G Long Term Evolution (LTE) networks roll out in a couple years, that might be the closest we really get to seeing Apple and Verizon together.
