Apple

A Stevenote at CES? Don't hold your breath.

(Credit: James Martin/CNET News)

A report that Apple is planning a visit to CES next year had eyes rolling Friday morning from Las Vegas to Cupertino.

Cult of Mac reports, citing a source with "friends at Apple," says that Apple is planning to "go large" at CES 2010, now that Macworld is out of the way. The source called it a "done deal," noting that since Apple is really more of a consumer electronics company these days, the Consumer Electronics Show makes more sense.

Too bad nothing else in this report makes sense. Apple has never liked to participate in big industry conferences, steadily backing out of things like NAB and now Macworld in favor of holding its own events. Apple executives and managers rarely even show up at the kind of low-key industry roundtable discussions and panels that almost every other company in this industry adores.

Apple explained its decision to leave Macworld by saying that it doesn't need trade shows anymore to get its message across, given its network of retail stores. And Apple's Phil Schiller hinted that the company wasn't crazy about the idea of having to tailor news and product introductions around an early-January event, such as Macworld or CES.

The report says "if Apple were to be a presence at CES -- with Steve Jobs possibly giving a keynote speech -- it would no longer have to compete with CES for press attention." But that's not true at all; CES is so huge, that companies compete desperately with each other for attention at the show, adorning taxicabs with their logos, throwing lavish parties, and giving out all manner of silly free prizes.

Jobs would certainly make a splash at CES, but Las Vegas doesn't seem like his kind of town.

Updated 4:55pm - AppleInsider is also reporting that Apple plans to attend CES next year, so perhaps there is more to this story than I initially thought, stay tuned. Others think that the CEA, which puts on CES, is merely planning to have a booth or pavilion next year that focuses on the Mac and Apple in hopes of drawing Macworld exhibitors to Las Vegas.

Macworld attendees listen to IDG's Paul Kent (standing, left) discuss the future of Macworld.

(Credit: Tom Krazit/CNET News)

A middle-aged man in a faded NeXT T-shirt raised his hand for the microphone. If IDG wanted to save Macworld, he said, it should hold a "schwag-fest," where Macolytes could bond over swapping tchotchke from Macworlds past.

The Mac community had its say Wednesday night, at least for one evening. Whether IDG, the organizer of Macworld, takes up the suggestion is another question.

IDG World Expo vice president and general manager Paul Kent hosted the discussion, which saw several hundred people pack into a room at San Francisco's Moscone Center to discuss the future of the event.

IDG has a few of its own ideas for next year's show. Kent revealed that next year's Exhibit Hall at Macworld will be free for those attending this year's show; a similar pass cost $25 this year. The New York Times' David Pogue has committed to give "The Anti-Keynote," which presumably will be one of Pogue's trademark song-and-dance satirical routines. And 60 companies have pledged their support, including Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, and Intuit.

But there is no plan right now beyond 2010. Kent confirmed our story that Apple's decision caught IDG totally by surprise, speaking often of the "new business reality" that has been thrust upon the company in a very short period of time.

It sounded like Kent would like Macworld to get younger, capitalizing on the popularity of the Mac with the under-30 set, who were sorely underrepresented during Wednesday's meeting. He suggested future Macworld shows as music or art festivals, showcases for digitally created art.

That suggestion was met with a lukewarm reception by meeting attendees who seemed to want IDG to focus on preserving the existing community. A handful of suggestions included:

• Smaller, more focused meetings held more frequently in multiple locations. New York, Boston, and Texas were mentioned: Kent said IDG was committed to San Francisco for the 2010 show but had no commitments beyond that.

• A return to Macworld as a conference for professional users of Mac technology, such as educators and design professionals. That category used to be the most significant portion of Apple's customer base but has been neglected over the past few years, as the Mac drew more and more consumer attention.

• Developing a way to let exhibitors know that their products were purchased online by someone who saw them at Macworld, giving them a reason to keep coming back.

Despite having to scramble in the aftermath of Apple's decision to leave Macworld, IDG and the Mac community have plenty to time to consider what lies in store for 2011 and beyond.

And although Apple seems to think it can reach the majority of its customers through its growing network of Apple retail stores, several attendees expressed a desire for the type of interaction that they can't get at those stores: deep, meaningful conversations with fellow technology enthusiasts who share similar passions and knowledge of the Mac. That bodes well for the conference because it would seem that those people are willing to travel and pay some sort of fee for the experience.

One interesting thing: not a single attendee or IDG employee at the town hall meeting mentioned the iPhone, even though several attendees checked their e-mail throughout the hour-long discussion on iPhones. Macworld offered a session on the iPhone during this week's conference, but if that segment of Apple's business continues to grow there's an awful lot of territory there to explore that has only been done at local levels, such as the iPhone Dev Camp.

Click here for more Macworld Expo coverage from CNET News.

IDG will have some big shoes to fill without Apple at Macworld: will people still want to come?

(Credit: Tom Krazit/CNET News)

Macworld Expo will go on in 2010 without Apple's participation, but what will it look like? And will anybody show up?

We might get an idea Wednesday evening, when IDG World Expo plans to hold a town-hall style meeting open to Macworld attendees to solicit ideas for the future of the show. Apple stunned IDG in December with its decision to pull out of the show completely. It also pulled CEO Steve Jobs from his usual starring role and had Phil Schiller deliver what was widely considered one of Apple's most lackluster Macworld keynote speeches in years.

A handful of conference goers interviewed following Tuesday's final keynote address from Apple cautiously endorsed the idea of an Apple-less Macworld, but said a lot would depend on how the show itself is constructed.

Northern California resident Peter Speros, a cable technician in San Bruno, figured he would definitely stop by next year's show, since it's basically in his back yard. Speros has attended several Macworld Expos to get tips and information regarding his photography hobby, not so much for the Apple experience itself. Still, "it will be a shame not having Apple," he said.

Macworld has always been about more than Apple to a certain degree: it's a gathering place for the famously tight Mac community to swap stories, ideas, and have fun, said Sterett Prevost, leader of the Tucson, Arizona, Mac users group. "I go to Macworld Expo for the Mac community, rather than Apple," he said.

But if Apple isn't there to bankroll Macworld--the company is estimated to spend $25 million on the show and its booth is easily four times the size of any other--will there still be a place for the community to go? Lili Hampel, who came all the way to San Francisco from Melbourne, Australia, for Macworld 2009, isn't so sure.

"It's different without Apple; it would be a big difference," she said. Her partner, Les Posen, gives technical presentations on Apple's Keynote software during Macworld, and their attendance at future events would depend at least in part on whether the instructional sessions that are a big part of Macworld would continue.

Still, "we come here to meet people," Hampel said.

That means if IDG can find a way to keep Macworld profitable without Apple's contributions, there might be a way to keep a small core group of Mac loyalists coming to San Francisco each January for Macworld. Macworld 2011 will probably have to be in something much smaller than the cavernous Moscone Center, which might bring the community closer together but would likely doom the show's chances of remaining a must-see destination on the technology media calendar.

Photos: Inside Macworld 2009

Click here for more Macworld Expo coverage from CNET News.

'MacHeads,' a new movie about the Apple and Macintosh culture, will premiere Wednesday at MacWorld.

(Credit: MacHeads)

It's a long-established truism in technology journalism: That stories about Apple are pretty much guaranteed to do better than just about any other subject.

And why? It's certainly not because of the total size of the user base of Apple products. Rather, as has been very well chronicled in newspapers, magazines, online and in books, the passion felt by the community of Apple users far outstrips its size.

Now, with the release of MacHeads, you can add movies to the roster of media documenting the full fervor of the Mac faithful and their particular brand of do-it-yourself brand evangelism.

MacHeads, a 54-minute film by the Israeli director and producer team of Kobi and Ron Shely, has its world-premiere Wednesday with a screening at Macworld, a suitable place for a film about 25 years (or more) of Mac fanaticism, especially because much of it was filmed at Macworld 2007.

It's also a bit of an ironic location to launch a cinematic discussion of hard-core Mac fandom, given the recent announcement that Apple will end its participation in Macworld after this year, a development that could well spell the end for the last large-scale physical gathering of the very people the movie is about.

In a way, however, the end of Macworld as we've known it plays right into the hands of the Shely brothers, as one of the chief arguments their film makes is that the newest generation of Mac users depends much more on the Internet for community than Macworld itself or the users-group meetings that have taken place in any number of cities around the world for so many years.

Either way, though, one thing is made abundantly clear in MacHeads: As long as there are Mac users, new or old, on working computers or museum pieces, the so-called cult of Mac will stay alive and well.

As a movie, I found MacHeads to be rather uneven. It struck me as haphazardly edited, and it struck me that the filmmakers were never completely clear with themselves whether their movie was about Mac users, their passion, Apple, the computers themselves or the transformation of a small, yet unbelievably vocal community.

Probably, that's because it's about all of the above. But where MacHeads succeeds in amply demonstrating the extent of the feeling the faithful have for their beloved Macs, it suffers from an obvious lack of clarity.

Still, it's kind of fun listening to the so-called MacHeads opening up to the world about their obsession. It's also not at all unfamiliar. I myself am writing this on a Mac, and between my wife and I, we have five Macs, two iPods and two iPhones. And she would probably recount proudly that she nearly dumped me early in our relationship when I told her that I was considering buying a PC for my next computer.

In the film, this distaste for all things Windows takes many forms, some funny and others even more funny.

Early in the movie, for example, the well-known sex author and blogger Violet Blue, says, with only the slightest hint of irony, "I've never knowingly slept with a Windows user. Ever. Ever. That would never, ever happen."

Later, DigiBarn computer museum co-founder Bruce Damer talks about Apple taking on IBM and PCs as "the force fighting against the beige banality."

While the Mac--in its many iterations--is the technological focus of the devotion of the MacHeads, Apple co-founder and CEO Steve Jobs is clearly the human form.

And together, Jobs and the products his company makes comprise a church of sorts, with thousands, if not millions, of followers.

"If you go online and look up the definition of a cult," Shawn King, the executive producer and host of Your Mac Life, says in the film, "Mac users are a cult. You know, complete fealty to one leader."

Fealty and devotion often have a physical component, and for some Mac fans, that's a tattoo. MacHeads, then, features at least two cases of users with Apple logos emblazoned on their legs.

But some Mac users clearly think of their computers as an extension of themselves--a sentiment that some might laugh at, but which others will understand fully.

"Only Mac people really put stickers all over their laptops," digital media strategist Deborah Schultz says in the movie, "and I think it's indicative that this is kind of something that is close to me like my clothing and it's an identification."

These days, with Apple flying high on the strength of the massive success of the iPhone, the iPod and the Mac line, it's easy to forget that in the mid-90s, the company was on the verge of failure. And for the 25 million or so Mac users at the time, events at the time like Macworld were a place to come and share their hopes and fears about their future computing.

"You have to be an optimist to be a Mac user," said former MacAddict columnist Joseph Holmes in the film, "because there were those tough times when we thought, you know, maybe I'll have to use a Windows system. Maybe there won't be a Mac in a couple of years. It was kind of tough."

Or, as fellow Mac fan Debroah Shadovitz put it, "We would have entered the dark ages if Apple went away. We couldn't let that happen."

As is the basis for endless business school case studies today, of course, Jobs returned from the Siberian exile of forced life away from Apple, and brought the company back to glory, first with the iMac and then with the company's next--and maybe biggest--game changer, the iPod.

Oddly, MacHeads hardly covers the iPod, and its importance in making Apple what it is today. I think that's because the whole point of the film is to focus on the passion of a niche group of tech users, and the iPod has been such a mainstream hit that it is the dominant portable music player today, hardly the kind of device that establishes the us against them mentality that many of the Mac fans in the film evince.

Yet, the movie feels like it has a hole without a discussion of the iPod, and I think that's evidence of the lack of clarity I talked about earlier--the indecisiveness as to what the film is really about.

Because this is well-covered ground, there is little in MacHeads that would surprise anyone who is familiar with the cult of Mac. Yet, because that community is so visible and outspoken, the movie is bound to have an audience--at least of the already converted. Whether it will appeal to those outside the fold is less likely, to me, at least.

No matter, though. Apple's fan base alone is large enough to give the Shely brothers a sizable potential audience, even if many of those people really just want to see how their kind is portrayed on film.

After all, in the end, what makes the cult of Mac powerful, and interesting, is the people.

"It's the community that you want to talk about," says Shawn King in the film. "Don't love Apple, love the community."

Add new songs to your iPhone over 3G.

(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CBS Interactive)

Though the addition of DRM-free music is grabbing the most iTunes headlines, there was more music news at the Macworld 2009 keynote on Tuesday.

Apple Vice President of Worldwide Product Marketing Phil Schiller also announced that beginning Tuesday iPhone users will be able sample and wirelessly download iTunes tracks over AT&T's 3G network or EDGE. Previously, iTunes song downloads, unlike apps, were available only over a Wi-Fi connection.

The process works relatively well, though we encountered a couple of hiccups. Like with the iTunes Apps store, you must use Wi-Fi or a wired connection to your computer to download songs over 10MB. When we tried downloading a longer song, we received a warning message advising as such. During our first download, our connection was interrupted once. We were able to reconnect and continue the download

We tried downloading a 6.4MB song over 3G. It took about one minute and 15 seconds, which is about the same as a Wi-Fi download. We then downloaded a 7.2MB over EDGE. As expected, it was painfully slow--after all, EDGE basically is dial-up speed. It took about 20 minutes to get our song, which is too long to bother in our opinion.

With its launch of iPhoto 09, Apple has begun showing some reasons why it's worth enduring the hassle of geotagging your photos.

It's generally not easy right now to label your photos with information about where you took the pictures--the process usually is done with special software to marry the photos with location data taken from a separate GPS receiver.

Phil Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide product marketing, demonstrated geotagging in iPhoto 09 at Macworld 2009.

(Credit: James Martin/CNET Networks)

Phil Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide product marketing, demonstrated what you can do with iPhoto at the Macworld 2009 keynote Tuesday.

iPhoto 09 works best with photos that already have been tagged. That's getting more common, as GPS hardware support becomes less of a rarity. For example, Nikon's Coolpix P6000 has a built-in GPS receiver, and Nikon has begun selling its GP-1 GPS receiver, which can plug into its SLR's flash mount so location data is embedded in the photo. Apple's iPhone can geotag its own photos, and camera manufacturers say GPS support in cameras has become a matter of when, not if.

But the software also can help you tag your own images. Clicking a photo flips it over, letting you type in a location, then showing the spot using a map. (Google supplies back-end mapping services). Helpfully, iPhoto then can spread that location data to other photos with similar time stamps, and they can be bundled together into a group called an event.

OK, but what can you do?
Once you have geotagged photos, what can you do with them?

For one thing, sift through them geographically using iPhotos' new Places interface. Viewing an iPhoto event can show an associated collection of pushpins on a map, and clicking each pin shows the photo.

For another, you can search for photos based on where you took them, not on whatever filing system you might use. iPhoto can handle geographic hierarchies, so if you labeled a photo with "Eiffel Tower," it'll find it with a search for "France" or "Paris."

At Macworld 2009, Apple's Phil Schiller revealed that the iTunes Store will now sell DRM-free tracks.

(Credit: James Martin/CNET News)

For all of you who weren't able to follow our live coverage of Apple's keynote address at Macworld 2009 earlier Tuesday from San Francisco's Moscone Center, here's a quick recap of the highlights.

•  DRM-free iTunes: As first reported last night by CNET News' Greg Sandoval, Apple announced plans to lift DRM technology from its entire catalog of 10 million iTunes songs by the end of April. Eight million songs are DRM-free as of today, and labels will be allowed to charge different prices for their songs, in a departure from the previous iTunes Store policies.

We're not exactly sure at the moment how the details will work with this announcement, but it sounds like a big win for iTunes customers. One downer is that you'll have to pay 30 cents to replace existing DRM-laden tracks with the new DRM-free versions, essentially upgrading those songs to iTunes Plus tracks. Check out this story from Greg for more details. The iTunes Store was slammed in the aftermath of the keynote, and service was spotty.

•  New 17-inch MacBook Pro: Apple completed its notebook refresh with this new model, which brings the unibody design, trackpad button, and new displays to the company's largest laptop. It will cost $2,799, the same price as the current 17-inch MacBook Pro.

The most interesting part of this announcement, however, is the notebook's battery. Apple is using a new type of battery that it says will allow the notebook to get between seven and eight hours of battery life, depending on which graphics chip is running.

Photos: Jobs fill-in touts media, MacBook updates

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In order to get that technology into the notebook, however, Apple had to make the battery completely enclosed within the chassis: like the iPod and iPhone, you won't be able to replace it yourself. Apple representatives did not have details on how the battery replacement program will work, although it won't ship until later this month. Apple expects the battery to last five years.

Update at 2:08pm: Gizmodo reports the battery will cost $179 to replace, and it can be done at Apple stores or Apple resellers.

•  iLife '09: There were some nice improvements with to the components of the iLife suite, such as geotagging support in iPhoto '09, improved editing capabilities in iMovie '09, and rock star instructors in GarageBand '09.

Are they compelling enough to upgrade? That probably depends on the individual. Travelers will like the geotagging, budding musicians will like the lesson plans. One sour note: it doesn't appear that anybody who bought the new MacBooks released from October onward will be able to upgrade to the new software without paying the full $79 fee.

•  iWork '09: Does anybody actually use iWork? Easily the most underwhelming section of the keynote, the latest version of Apple's office software didn't appear to have anything compelling enough to cause a mass upgrade, other than perhaps Keynote Remote, which lets you use your iPhone or iPod Touch to control Keynote presentations.

But iWork.com will be interesting to watch evolve. It's in beta form for now, but if Apple works out the kinks, it could increase the usage of iWork especially if Apple finds a way to hook it into MobileMe.

•  The Philnote: Phil Schiller acquitted himself well in the starring role, usually accustomed to playing the role of Steve Jobs' sidekick at these events. He wasn't Jobs, although to be fair I've been covering technology events for eight years and haven't run into an executive with anything even approaching Jobs' presentation skills. But he engaged the crowd, made the proper offerings to the demo gods the night before, and ensured that the show would go on.

•  The rest: No Steve Jobs sighting. No new Mac Mini. No new iMacs or Power Macs Mac Pros. The line outside the keynote seemed smaller than in years past, although it also seemed that IDG did a better job moving the line along.

And Tony Bennett is the true ageless wonder.

The last San Francisco Macworld with Apple's participation saw Tony Bennett close out the show.

(Credit: James Martin/CNET News)

Click here for more Macworld Expo coverage from CNET News.

Updated at 4:30 p.m. PST with details on the file formats Apple is using.

Apple and the three largest music labels didn't take any half steps in walking away from copy-protection software at Macworld 2009 Tuesday.

Apple could have announced, as expected, simply that the iTunes Store would begin offering songs stripped of digital rights management from now on. Instead, the country's largest music retailer secured licenses that will enable users to upgrade their existing DRM-wrapped music and strip it of the controversial software--but it's going to cost them.

An Apple spokesman offered more details: Users of iTunes can now upgrade their music libraries with a click of a button. For an additional 30 cents per song, a user can receive a DRM-free version of their existing tracks at a 256-kbps bit rate.

The iTunes files will still be in Apple's preferred AAC format, not the more widely supported MP3. But as Matt Rosoff points out, a lot of recent digital music products do support the AAC file format, including Sony's newer Walkman players and Microsoft's Zune and its next version of Windows Media Player.

Starting Tuesday, Apple will offer 8 million DRM-free songs and will add another 2 million by April. The hold-up for the remaining songs is due to licensing issues, according to my sources.

Photos: Jobs fill-in touts media, MacBook updates

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I'm not going to gripe about that. Those kinds of details work themselves out, and it's impressive that Apple and the major labels--Universal, Sony BMG, and Warner--worked out a deal for the 8 million.

With the move, Apple's iTunes is also making its strongest foray into interoperability. From now on, iTunes' music should play on any digital player, meaning iTunes users don't have to worry about their music libraries being locked out of some future digital music player.

Apple had already offered DRM-free music from EMI, the fourth-largest music label, at a higher bit rate for a premium price.

Click here for more Macworld Expo coverage from CNET News.

We're posting live updates from Macworld 2009 at San Francisco's Moscone Center, where Apple's senior vice president of worldwide product marketing, Phil Schiller, is delivering the keynote speech.

Phil Schiller takes the stage to deliver the keynote speech at Macworld in San Francisco.

(Credit: James Martin/CNET Networks)

8:55 a.m. PST: We're live inside the Moscone Center for Macworld 2009, having braved the elbows of the friendly media hordes and the rather aggressive ushers. The room is fairly full, but the line outside this morning seemed a little smaller than usual, unless IDG did a better job of herding the masses in early. The pre-keynote music is skewing more current than usual before a Jobs keynote, with Death Cab for Cutie and the like, which maybe gives us an idea of what Phil Schiller uses to warm up.

9:03 a.m.: We just got the cell phone warning message, which probably gives us a five-minute window or so. They turned up the volume for Coldplay's "Life in Technicolor," and I'm assuming we're getting close.

9:04 a.m.: The lights dim as the song ends, and Apple's Phil Schiller takes the stage to start Macworld 2009. He appears to be rocking an all-denim ensemble. It's a little hard to tell from here. "I'm so personally excited to be the one delivering Macworld 2009 to you. I'd like to thank everybody for showing up," which gets a chuckle.

9:06 a.m.: Phil's first topic is the general state of Apple, talking about some of the new Apple stores that the company has opened overseas, such as Beijing and Sydney. He's gushing about some of the new store designs. "I can't imagine any other company delivering something like that." Every week, 3.4 million customers visit an Apple store around the world. "That's 100 Macworlds each and every week," a clear pointer to Apple's decision to make this its last Macworld.

9:07 a.m.: Phil's going to start with the Mac, and he seems to be hinting that's all we're going to talk about today. Last year was the best year for the Mac in Apple's history, he said, growing faster than the industry based on what Phil calls Apple's best product line ever. Phil has three new things he's going to cover.