With the barrage of products Apple released at the end of 2012, we have to wonder what Tim Cook and company have in store for us for 2013...Click here for the rest of the post.
Showing posts with label AppleTV. Show all posts
Showing posts with label AppleTV. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
Apple Products in 2013 — The Elephant in the Room
Read my latest post at MyMac.com:
Saturday, August 27, 2011
What should Apple do with all of that cash? Here's my "Pipe" Dream...
With repeated record breaking quarterly earnings, Apple has been building up quite a stash of cash. Wall Street has been repeatedly asking Apple what it plans to do with all of that cash, to which Apple always responds that it saving it for strategic investments. One such investment could be for Apple to build a nationwide wireless network to deliver all of the content it hopes to store in its North Carolina iCloud data center.
Think about it, what is Apple's biggest problem that it has with its iCloud strategy? Apple has the data center infrastructure in place to house all of the music, movies, TV shows, pictures and other data we could want. They have the best devices for us to consume that media and data on. What is missing? The network to deliver the data from the cloud to our devices.
We are all at the mercy of the cable companies, telcos and cellular providers and their over-priced broadband and wireless data plans with ridiculous data usage caps. Why are these companies putting caps on they data they provided us? Because they want to control the content we receive and over-charge us for that as well. The cable companies don't want to give up their $80/month TV packages, the phone companies don't want to give up their $50/month local and long distance plans and cell phone companies want to continue to charge $70/month for some ridiculous amount of voice minutes plus text messaging (probably the biggest price gouge of all)! These companies don't want to give in to the the fact they all they are now (or at least should be) are data pipes, that we use to purchase content from the providers of our own choice. This is where Apple comes in and pulls off it's ultimate disruption...
Apple needs to build a nationwide (and eventually global) wireless network using some new technology like super wi-fi or low earth orbit satellites or maybe something we haven't even heard about yet. It needs to be a technology that can blanket vast areas of earth with high speed data. I would have a single internet connection for all of my devices, regards of where I am, at home, in the car, at work, wherever. Then I could access all of my content stored in my iCloud anywhere that I am on any Apple made device I happen to be using, iPhone, iPad, MacBook Air, AppleTV or whatever they come up with next. No more paying the phone company for a landline and/or DSL line. No paying a cable company for TV and DVR service or shared broadband connections and no more high-priced low bandwidth capped cellular data plans with more voice minutes than I need and ridiculous fees for 140 character text messages that use almost no bandwidth at all!
Could Apple pull this off, or is this just a big "pipe" dream (pun intended)? If anyone can do it, Apple can...
Think about it, what is Apple's biggest problem that it has with its iCloud strategy? Apple has the data center infrastructure in place to house all of the music, movies, TV shows, pictures and other data we could want. They have the best devices for us to consume that media and data on. What is missing? The network to deliver the data from the cloud to our devices.
We are all at the mercy of the cable companies, telcos and cellular providers and their over-priced broadband and wireless data plans with ridiculous data usage caps. Why are these companies putting caps on they data they provided us? Because they want to control the content we receive and over-charge us for that as well. The cable companies don't want to give up their $80/month TV packages, the phone companies don't want to give up their $50/month local and long distance plans and cell phone companies want to continue to charge $70/month for some ridiculous amount of voice minutes plus text messaging (probably the biggest price gouge of all)! These companies don't want to give in to the the fact they all they are now (or at least should be) are data pipes, that we use to purchase content from the providers of our own choice. This is where Apple comes in and pulls off it's ultimate disruption...
Apple needs to build a nationwide (and eventually global) wireless network using some new technology like super wi-fi or low earth orbit satellites or maybe something we haven't even heard about yet. It needs to be a technology that can blanket vast areas of earth with high speed data. I would have a single internet connection for all of my devices, regards of where I am, at home, in the car, at work, wherever. Then I could access all of my content stored in my iCloud anywhere that I am on any Apple made device I happen to be using, iPhone, iPad, MacBook Air, AppleTV or whatever they come up with next. No more paying the phone company for a landline and/or DSL line. No paying a cable company for TV and DVR service or shared broadband connections and no more high-priced low bandwidth capped cellular data plans with more voice minutes than I need and ridiculous fees for 140 character text messages that use almost no bandwidth at all!
Could Apple pull this off, or is this just a big "pipe" dream (pun intended)? If anyone can do it, Apple can...
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
I want my AppleTV Apps...
The new iOS based AppleTV is awesome. Streaming from iTunes and AirPlay is great and it is one of the best NetFlix clients out there. But where are the Apps and the AppleTV App Store? We have an App Store for iPhones, iPads and now even for the Mac. So why not AppleTV?
Here is my theory... I think Apple is looking for the best way for the user to interact with the AppleTV before opening up app creation on it. A remote control just isn't an Apple-like way to do user interaction, it is so 1970's. I think maybe Apple is working on something like Microsoft's Kinect for XBox or some other futuristic way to interact with the big screen. Maybe some form of voice and gesture combination based interaction. Imagine a device that plugs into the AppleTV's USB port and sits above or below your TV that has a camera, microphone and other motion sensors like Kinect. This device could respond to voice commands, as well as gestures, to control the user interface or to play games. For example, you could just say "AppleTV open NetFlix" and the NetFlix app launches. Then you could scroll through movie lists using swipe gestures. This device would also allow the AppleTV to be an excellent FaceTime client! Just tell the AppleTV to "Call Grandma" and boom, you are video chatting with Grandma and she can watch her grandchild taking their first steps across the living room.
Hopefully Apple has something like this up it's sleeve for the next version of the AppleTV, then I think it will go from being just a hobby to being the next big hit for Apple.
Here is my theory... I think Apple is looking for the best way for the user to interact with the AppleTV before opening up app creation on it. A remote control just isn't an Apple-like way to do user interaction, it is so 1970's. I think maybe Apple is working on something like Microsoft's Kinect for XBox or some other futuristic way to interact with the big screen. Maybe some form of voice and gesture combination based interaction. Imagine a device that plugs into the AppleTV's USB port and sits above or below your TV that has a camera, microphone and other motion sensors like Kinect. This device could respond to voice commands, as well as gestures, to control the user interface or to play games. For example, you could just say "AppleTV open NetFlix" and the NetFlix app launches. Then you could scroll through movie lists using swipe gestures. This device would also allow the AppleTV to be an excellent FaceTime client! Just tell the AppleTV to "Call Grandma" and boom, you are video chatting with Grandma and she can watch her grandchild taking their first steps across the living room.
Hopefully Apple has something like this up it's sleeve for the next version of the AppleTV, then I think it will go from being just a hobby to being the next big hit for Apple.
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