Counter said:
I have had similar suspicions. And there's precedent for it, too. At least with other companies. Nikon does this quite frequently.
I recall an "accidentally" published page showing photos of the Nikon D200 digital SLR several months ago, long before an official product announcement was made and at a time when most people in the industry were speculating about the possibility of a D200. The D200 page was quickly pulled (naturally!) but not before several keen observers snapped up the page, archived it and posted it on other sites. People who were in the know were buzzing about the D200 and were excited that all of their speculation had been confirmed. Word of mouth spread so quickly that when Nikon did announce the D200 is was a mere formality and certainly no suprise to many photographers. Talk about max ad value for very little money!
So with iWeb, well....what better way to generate a little buzz before MWSF than to throw a little hamburger to the lions to give them a tease taste?
Although there's no way for us to conclusively prove that this iWeb leak was anything other than an accident, I'm quite sure that Apple knows how to push the buttons of the "rumor community" and manipulate it to some degree to get people talking and squawking. And yes, I also have a hard time believing it was an accident to begin with. Don't they lock/password protect files before "go time"?? You'd think they would have some fairly stringent security safeguards in place for these sensitive areas.
PS - Ya gotta hand it to RealMac and Karelia. They're probably a bit more nervous than they are letting on, but both companies seem more determined than ever to see if small size and speed can kill. They may be right.
