Too Early To Tell?
I too wonder if we just aren't in-the-know enough to understand the full picture. I'm guessing (or is it hoping?) we are not.
As stated above, today, I am not seeing a good reason to go out and buy a new HD set so I can watch what little the iTunes Store has to offer. Nor am I interested in breaking any contracts with current carriers just so I can get an iPhone.
While I agree that DVDs are done, there is a huge gap between what the iTunes Store offers and what I want to watch/own/lend/etc. Again, maybe there are aspects of Leopard, dot Mac, iTunes, etc. that will change my mind.
And if Apple is serious about that 10M stat, at&t better offer not only to cover my broken contract fee but also some tasty packages if they even THINK they have a chance at hitting 10M. Again, we know nothing about what at&t will offer - contracts, fees, etc. That too could change my mind, once public.
The short of it: we're ALL going to have to wait and see how this plays out. Something tells me these 2 products aren't as completely "neat but how?" as we all seem to think.
But what do I know?
I think Apple is either making assumptions concerning these two products based on its past successes with the ipod (I'd call this attitude "hubris"...) or it's basing its rush to market these two products (tv and phone) on information that we don't have -- that, or a combination of both these things.
OS X 10.5 , 10.5.1, .mac, or ichat might have added functionality that would make either or both of these products more attractive to most people, but in their current stand-alone iterations I can't see most people rushing out to buy either of them unless they are some kind of an early adopter AND apple fanatic. I'd be very surprised if itunes movies/tv show sales take off in the near term but can see that its not in apples best interests to bundle dvr functionality in the apple tv due to the current reliance on itunes for revenue -- they'll make more overall hardware sales if an apple-tv-based dvr app is integrated in the OS and especially if an updated and price-tiered .mac service is part of the equation. Integrating visual voicemail into ichat and/or .mac would also boost sales. But personally, I have no desire for a combined ipod/phone (I rarely use my ipod) and I intend to buy a MythTV box and add 1TB of hdd space rather than use an Apple.
I too wonder if we just aren't in-the-know enough to understand the full picture. I'm guessing (or is it hoping?) we are not.
As stated above, today, I am not seeing a good reason to go out and buy a new HD set so I can watch what little the iTunes Store has to offer. Nor am I interested in breaking any contracts with current carriers just so I can get an iPhone.
While I agree that DVDs are done, there is a huge gap between what the iTunes Store offers and what I want to watch/own/lend/etc. Again, maybe there are aspects of Leopard, dot Mac, iTunes, etc. that will change my mind.
And if Apple is serious about that 10M stat, at&t better offer not only to cover my broken contract fee but also some tasty packages if they even THINK they have a chance at hitting 10M. Again, we know nothing about what at&t will offer - contracts, fees, etc. That too could change my mind, once public.
The short of it: we're ALL going to have to wait and see how this plays out. Something tells me these 2 products aren't as completely "neat but how?" as we all seem to think.
But what do I know?