MacWorld 2008 Conference & Expo

The MacWorld Conference and Expo 2008 kicked off beginning of this week. I am not a Mac user, more for economical reason than technological. But secretly I have always been an Apple fan and consistently been impressed by the products that came out of Apple each year. And so I looked forward to this MacWorld Expo with great anticipation to get the "Wow" effect, just as it was last year when they revealed the iPhone. I thought the iPhone was not only a great innovation on the part of Apple, it basically leads the pack in the telecommunication world. The latest statistics was that in the first 90 days, iPhone has captured 19.5% of the SmartPhone marketshare. To date they have sold 4 millions iPhone, about 20,000 each day. That certainly says something about this product.

Unfortunately I am unable to attend the Steve Jobs Keynote address yesterday. But I did watch the video they put out on Apple website later the same afternoon.

Having watched the Steve Jobs Keynote address, this is the impression that I had. Even though there are a couple of 'wow's but I have to admit that it was not as impressive as the time Apple first introduced the iPhone, which was totally a new innovation, something we have not seen before in the products of its kind. For me, 2008 product announcements were basically improvements of the technology that are already existing. For example the software upgrades for the iPhone and iPod, the MacBook air, Apple TV, these are all improvements of what is already exists. Granted that they are good improvements nonetheless.

The Time Capsule is a neat addition to the gadgets you might already have at home. The fact that it is also an Airport Extreme base station makes it more appealing. No need to have another wireless router lying around. Hopefully that will encourage people to do backups, although not necessarily so. An unused great tool is equivalent to a useless tool.

The new software for the iPhone and the iPod are somewhat expected. Partly to keep the excitement going for these two products. I think with the introduction of the SDK kit, the software library is going to multiple quickly.

I thought the iTune movies rental is a great idea and a step forward. Although I do not like the time limit of 24 hours to watch your movie. In today's busy world, sometimes we can't even finish a movie in a couple of days, much less in 24 hours. The rental fees though are reasonable, in my opinion. I like the convenience and the ease of movies renting. The Apple TV might just catch on with the new features introduced into it, like movies rental ready, connection to the Internet for other videos, podcasts and photos, and not forgetting iTune music selections.

I was impressed with the accomplishments in getting the MacBook Air into that thin dimension, cramping everything into that tiny space. In doing so, compromises had to be made, even though Steve did not highlight those compromises obviously. The throwing out of the optical drive and the Ethernet port are a couple of them. Even though information could be transfer wirelessly to the MacBook Air, it can still be an inconvenience in certain situations. For example, if you need to transfer some data to someone else quickly, an optical drive would come handy. Just pop in a CD and write on it and hand the CD over to the other person. Or what if you are in a location with only wired access, as in some customer's office? Or if the wireless access is temporarily down? Well you are basically stuck then. Not having the option of being able to swap in a battery can be a bother for some people, though not all. I ,for one, do not carry extra battery. Nor do I even own an extra battery. so not having the option to swap in battery when the juice runs out, is not a issue for me. But for some, it could be. Having said all that, the improvements certainly outweighs the compromises, in my opinion.

In conclusion, the new products announced at MacWorld 2008 Keynote address were impressive but not as it was last year with the introduction of the iPhone. I think the iPhone is one tough act to follow really. Nonetheless it will not surprise me one bit to see Apple continue coming up with new innovative products, as it has been doing all along.