Earlier Wednesday, we brought you live coverage of Apple's rock 'n' roll-themed event, which kicked off in San Francisco just after 10 a.m. Pacific time. The event has concluded, but for more iPod-related coverage, click here.
9:55 a.m. PDT: Good morning. We're inside and seated, just waiting for the event to begin. There's quite a crowd in here with some notable names already appearing. Greg Grunberg from TV's "Heroes" is sitting right behind us, and Herbie Hancock and Google's Eric Schmidt have also been spotted.
The crowd awaits Apple news inside the Yerba Buena center in San Francisco.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)9:59 a.m.: Now playing "It's Only Rock 'n Roll" by the Rolling Stones, also the title of the event per the invitation. It looks like we'll be starting momentarily.
10:01 a.m.: Steve Jobs walks out. Standing ovation.
10:02 a.m.: People are still clapping.
He encourages everyone to be an organ donor, and extends a heartfelt thanks to the Apple community. Also, on Tim Cook: "He ran the company very ably during that time." "I'm back at Apple, and loving every day of it," he says.
10:03 a.m.: "I'm very happy to be here today with you all," he says. "As you may know I had a liver transplant. I have the liver of a mid-20s person who died in a car crash. Without that, I wouldn't be here without that person's generosity."
10:04 a.m.: Today we're talking about music. Phil Schiller and Jeff Robbin will join him. First, iPhone stuff. "Thrilling to report that in two years we've sold 30 million iPhones."
10:05 a.m.: In the last year, the reason is the App Store, he says. There are 75,000 apps. 1.8 billion apps downloaded by users, he reports. That doesn't include updates, though.
10:06 a.m.: Today: iPhone OS 3.1. Some bug fixes and new features are coming. The Genius playlist technology is now going to work for apps in the App Store. It will recommend apps to you based on the apps you already own. The recommendations will get better as people say what they like and buy, he says.
Steve Jobs announces iPhone OS 3.1.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)10:07 a.m.: Also: as Greg Sandoval previously reported, there will be ringtones for sale for $1.29 each. You can buy them the way you'd buy music.
10:08 a.m.: iPhone OS 3.1 is free for iPhone and iPod Touch users who have 3.0. It will be made available today. Update 2:58 p.m.: Earlier, it was reported that it would cost iPod Touch users $4.95. The update only costs money to those who had not yet upgraded their iPod Touch to 3.0 or higher.
10:08 a.m.: Now on to iTunes: Steve says iTunes is the No. 1 seller of music in the world. 8.5 billion songs have been purchased and there are 100 million accounts.
Jobs says the iPhone is popular internationally.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland)10:09 a.m.: Today, iTunes 9 is out. A new look. Cleaner-looking, better navigation.
10:11 a.m.: In iTunes 9: Genius Mixes. Like Genius Playlists, Genius Mixes is like a DJ that plays mixes of songs that go together from your own library. Will make up to 12 mixes at a time.
Steve Jobs takes the stage.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)10:12 a.m.: He says syncing will be better now, too. When syncing playlists you can also sync particular genres or particular artists. Also specific photo albums or specific faces from iPhoto, and specific movies from iTunes. You can also manage your apps syncing in iTunes.
10:13 a.m.: Also something called Home Sharing. With it, you can copy songs, movies, TV shows to up to five authorized computers in your house. Can see what's in all the other authorized computers right from your iTunes account.
10:14 a.m.: The iTunes Store also gets a new look, along with improved artists, movies, and TV pages--a "cleaner" layout, Jobs says.
10:15 a.m.: Another new feature: iTunes LP. "Some of us here are old enough to have bought LPs," Steve says. You can get album art, videos, liner notes, credits, etc. This is clearly the "Cocktail" we've been hearing about. The artists and labels can now have access to adding extras to their albums now.
10:17 a.m.: Jeff Robbin, vice president of consumer applications and lead software designer for iTunes, is now demonstrating the new iTunes. He shows how to drag and drop apps in iTunes to rearrange how they appear on an iPod Touch or iPhone. You can check and uncheck which games or apps you want on the device.
10:19 a.m.: He also shows us how Home Sharing works. You can drag a song or series of songs from other authorized computers to your own library. Can sort by songs that others have that you do not, and can set it so that when others buy new content from iTunes it can be automatically transferred to your library.
10:21 a.m.: There's a new navigation bar in the iTunes Store: music, movies, TV shows, podcasts, audio books, etc.
10:22 a.m.: Can also preview songs directly in the Top Charts section. When browsing the store, you can click an "i" button for a preview of the songs on the album which will allow a quick listen without going to the actual artist or album page. You can also Twitter info and post to Facebook about songs you find in the iTunes Store.
Album view in iTunes 9.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)10:24 a.m.: Now Jeff is showing us iTunes LP. He picks a Doors album. You can see all the songs, all the lyrics, and lots of photos.
10:25 a.m.: There are also videos that he says are exclusive to iTunes LP. For example, Ray Manzarek is talking about how they decided to name the band The Doors.
10:27 a.m.: There's also something called iTunes Extras. Using the movie "Wall-E," he shows there are extra features like short videos, and a way to navigate chapters in the movie.
You can see lyrics with the album view in iTunes 9. Shown here are Dave Matthews lyrics.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland)10:28 a.m.: Jobs is back on stage. He says iTunes 9 is free and ready to download today. Phil Schiller will come up to talk iPods now.
Twenty million of those sold are iPod Touch, he says.
Schiller mocks Dell's non-pocketable small PC.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)10:29 a.m.: First Schiller's going to talk sales numbers. 220 million iPods sold to date, he says. He says they have 73.8 percent of the market, "with Microsoft pulling up the rear with 1.1 percent." There are a few giggles.
10:33 a.m.: Now Schiller's talking up the computing aspect of the iPod Touch, with Wi-Fi, browsing the Internet on Safari, e-mail, etc. "It fits in your pocket. Not everybody can say that," he says. And he shows a picture on screen of a Dell Netbook. More giggles from the audience.
10:35 a.m.: He says the iPod Touch is a better gaming platform than the PSP or Nintendo DS. He points to $30 game titles on those devices and the buying experience as "too expensive" and "not a lot of fun." He says there are 21,178 "game and entertainment" titles on iPhone OS, compared to 3,600 on Nintendo, and 600 on Sony.
Phil Schiller brags about the iPhone as a gaming platform.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland)10:37 a.m.: A few developers of those games are going to come up on stage now. Ubisoft is up first. Ben Mattes from Ubisoft is talking about Assassin's Creed II and how it's coming to the App Store. It'll be out November 11.
10:42 a.m.: Now, Bart Decrem, founder of Tapulous (maker of Tap Tap Revolution) is up. Riddim Ribbon is their new game built "especially for iPhone and iPod Touch." It's a DJ game where you race down a rhythm of a song, Guitar Hero-style. You can remix the song by going different directions down the "ribbon."
10:44 a.m.: Mark Hickey from Gameloft, one of the more prolific App Store game makers, is up. He's showing a new first-person shooter called Nova, where you have to defend humanity against an alien attack in space.
10:47 a.m.: Only one more game developer, Schiller promises. It's Travis Boatman from Electronic Arts. He's talking Madden NFL 10, which is coming to the App Store for the first time.
10:49 a.m.: You can draw plays right on the screen, which draws lots of applause from the audience. Madden 10 is available today in the App Store, Boatman says.
Travis Boatman from Electronic Arts shows the new interface to control the Madden game.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)10:52 a.m.: "$199 is a magic price point in the iPod market," Schiller says. As of today, the iPod Touch is $199 for 8GB and $299 for 32GB. It now also comes in a 64GB model for $399.
10:53 a.m.: OpenGL ES 2.0 is also on the iPod Touch now, so games are faster--except for the $199 version, which will not have that.
Phil Schiller shows new prices and memory configurations for the iPod Touch.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)10:54 a.m.: Now Schiller is discussing the iPod Classic. Now it will be 160GB for $249, which is up from 120GB.
10:57 a.m.: The iPod Shuffle gets its turn. Now it will come in more colors. Pink, green, and blue in addition to the silver and black. It's also now $59 for 2GB and $79 for 4GB. There's also a special edition in stainless steel for $99.
Phil Schiller talks new iPod colors.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET )10:58 a.m.: Steve's back up. One more thing...a video camera.
10:59 a.m.: "Video has exploded in the last few years," he says. All those streams are coming from solid-state video cameras. He shows a picture of the Flip Video and its 4GB $149 price point. "We want to get in on this," he says. There will be a video camera in the back of every iPod Nano. There's also a mic and a speaker inside.
11:00 a.m.: He says it's just as thin as before, and shows a quick demo video from the device's camera. The videos will sync back to your iPhoto or to YouTube, with one click (another feature of the Flip Video camera).
11:02 a.m.: The voice-over feature from the iPod Shuffle will also be in the Nano, as well as Genius Mixes which were discussed earlier. The Nano will also have an FM radio, a voice recorder app, and pedometer. The pedometer will sync online with Nike Plus.
Jobs shows new iPods.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)11:04 a.m.: It will come in a variety of colors: pink, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, silver, black. 8GB for $159 and 16GB for $179, both will be available today.
Jobs touted brilliant new iPod colors.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)11:04 a.m.: We're getting a preview of the new ad, which highlights the video feature and colors of the Nano--with a cutesy pop song as backing, of course.
... Read more
Apple wrapped the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts with its trademark iPod look Tuesday in preparation for Wednesday's music-related event at the San Francisco venue.
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)After a long summer of swirling rumors, Apple's now-annual September music event is finally just around the corner.
It's happening Wednesday at 10 a.m. here in San Francisco, and CNET will have full, live-blogging coverage for you. I will be joined by CNET Reviews' Donald Bell, who will be offering his own commentary on all the music-related product announcements. What exactly that will be isn't a complete mystery, but Apple could have a few interesting surprises for us.
It looks like we won't be seeing a touch-screen tablet at this event, but there's plenty left to speculate about. The event, as per the invitation above, is obviously about iPods. Our money is on an updated iPod Touch with a camera, and ready-made ringtones. Plus, we've also heard that the new interactive album format--referred to as "Cocktail"--will also get a lot of play.
But what else? Some are saying there could be cameras in the iPod Nano as well, and even an update to the seemingly forgotten Apple TV. Then there's CEO Steve Jobs. Will he or won't he make an appearance? If he doesn't, the buzz about why he wasn't on hand, when he's been officially back at work since July, could threaten to get louder than whatever his stand-in does end up announcing.
We'll be there to chronicle it all, of course, so be sure to come back to CNET News Wednesday at 10 a.m. PDT.
(Credit:
Josh Lowensohn/CNET)
Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference will open this morning with a keynote address from Phil Schiller, vice president of marketing. We'll be live-blogging the event from Moscone Center in San Francisco starting at 10 a.m. PDT, so head over here to follow our up-to-the-minute coverage of Apple's announcements at the show.
The conference has become one of Apple's highest-profile events, and this year there promises to be much discussion of the new iPhone OS 3.0, as well as a peek at Mac OS X 10.6, also known as Snow Leopard.
And, you know, maybe even new iPhone hardware. Be sure to join us live at 10 a.m. to find out!
(Credit:
James Martin/CNET)
CNET News Apple reporter Tom Krazit and CNET Reviews editor Kent German are both at Apple's iPhone OS 3.0 event at company headquarters in Cupertino, Calif., right now. They're live-blogging the announcements as they happen, so head over here now. The event begins at 10 a.m. PDT.
And be sure to stick around here afterward where we'll have a full recap and analysis of what Apple's announcement means for iPhone developers and users.
If you're interested in live updates from tomorrow's Macworld keynote, we've got you covered.
We'll report live from San Francisco's Moscone Center as Apple Senior Vice President of Worldwide Marketing Phil Schiller gives the show's keynote address. That should kick off at 9 a.m. PST. You can get to the live blog here (link will be live as soon as the blog is live). Bowing to popular demand, we'll post those in order as they come in, rather than the reverse chronological order we've used on past live blogs.
Tuesday's Macworld should still be an interesting event even without CEO Steve Jobs making his usual address to the Macworld crowd. A new MacBook Pro, new Mac Minis, and a thorough discussion of the upcoming release of Mac OS X Snow Leopard are expected.
Later in the day we'll have tons of photos, lots of video, and the initial reactions of CNET Reviews staff--before they jet off to the desert for CES--to whatever new products Apple has on tap. So stick around all day; it's not like anybody's getting much work done the first week back from the holiday break anyway, right?
CNET will be live-blogging the event from Apple HQ in Cupertino, Calif.
(Credit: Apple)It's that time again: Apple has invited reporters down to its Cupertino, Calif., headquarters for a special notebooks event, which means CNET News will be there to live-blog the whole thing.
The fun starts at 10 a.m. PDT Tuesday at this link.
Apple says the focus of the event will be on notebooks. A redesigned MacBook and MacBook Pro are all but assured, but there are likely to be some other surprises too. Will Apple opt for Nvidia chipsets? Will there finally be a Mac sold for less than $1,000?
Come back here Tuesday morning to find out. Plus, later in the day, we'll have some analysis on what Apple does announce, and CNET's laptop experts, Dan Ackerman and Michelle Thatcher, will have a First Look and hands-on video.
Steve Jobs unveils the new 3G iPhone at Apple's WWDC.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)SAN FRANCISCO--At Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference here, CEO Steve Jobs took the stage just after 10 a.m. PDT. This is a live blog of news from his keynote speech as it happened. For a summary of highlights written after the fact, go here.
9:53 a.m.: Welcome once again to Moscone West, site of so many Apple events over the past few years. The members of the press are mostly seated, and all seem to have managed to make it to the stage without being trampled, although I guarantee that's the fastest some of them have moved in 20 years. Warm-up music so far is skewing old-school, with a Bo Diddley song to kick things off.
10:06 a.m.: We've been revisiting the '50s and '60s this morning with the warm-up music, running through Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, and the like. No Green Day or U2 yet, which either means something totally profound, or it doesn't. Spotted up front: Apple board member Al Gore; Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook; marketing chief Phil Schiller; and Greg Joswiak, head of iPhone and iPod marketing. Lights are dimming on "Great Ball of Fire," and WWDC 2008 is under way.
A bustling crowd waits for Steve Jobs' keynote to start.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)10:07 a.m.: Apple CEO Steve Jobs takes the stage to widespread applause. Standard outfit. "We've been working real hard on some great stuff that we can't wait to share with you." A record 5,200 attendees are attending the conference this year. 147 sessions are planned for developers, 85 or so for the Mac, and 61 or so for the iPhone. The numbers flew by quickly.
10:09 a.m.: "So, let's get started." Jobs revisits the three parts of Apple: the Mac, the music business, and the iPhone. "I'm going to take this morning to talk about the iPhone." Recently promoted executive Scott Forstall and Phil Schiller will help Jobs out. He confirms that 10.6 will be on the agenda for the week, and Snow Leopard is confirmed as the new code name.
10:10 a.m.: But first, the iPhone. In the first 95 days, 250,000 people downloaded the iPhone SDK. 25,000 developers applied, and 4,000 were admitted. He goes into the various parts of the iPhone 2.0 software, including the enterprise features, the SDK, and some other new features.
10:12 a.m.: Customers told Apple they wanted to hook the iPhone up to Exchange, and they did that with 2.0, Jobs says. The new software uses Cisco's VPN software. Thirty-five percent of the Fortune 500 participated in the beta program, including the top 5 commercial banks and securities firms. Higher education has also jumped on board, such as Duke, Stanford, and the University of Texas. A demo video is being shown about some of those enterprise customers, such as Disney, where Jobs resides on the board, and an international law firm.
10:15 a.m.: Apple doesn't usually do these kinds of enterprise-oriented videos at its events, with marketing and IT folks from large organizations singing the praises of the iPhone over a pleasing generic elevator-music-style backdrop. These things are a staple of most IT industry events, though.
10:17 a.m.: The video ends, and Jobs retakes the stage to talk about the SDK, before deferring to Scott Forstall. Forstall goes into a discussion of the APIs in the SDK, which are the same APIs that Apple uses internally to develop applications. Some of this is a repeat from March, where Forstall explained the similarities between the iPhone's operating system and Mac OS X. The bottom layers of the OS are essentially the same, but the Cocoa programming environment has been tweaked for a touchscreen.
10:19 a.m.: He goes into the development tools that those in attendance will be using to build applications, such as Xcode and Interface Builder. He also discusses a tool called Instruments, which is a performance optimization tool. Forstall moves into a demo of how to build a user interface for the iPhone using Interface Builder.
iPhone developer tools
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)10:23 a.m.: His mock application is going to merge the contacts databases and location-aware services. He's taking us through the actual development experience, dragging and dropping icons that represent things like the iPhone's search bar around the development environment. Once the application is done, the developer can test it right on a Mac for bugs or to make different aesthetic choices, such as whether to put things in the toolbar or within the regular fields.
10:26 a.m.: The application finds your friends within a certain radius, but Forstall says nothing about whether the application was designed for the current iPhone, which uses a Wi-Fi/cell tower type of location-aware application, or the new iPhone, which is expected to have GPS. Forstall reads off a few quotes from corporate developer partners like Disney--once again--and Fox Interactive.
10:29 a.m.: Forstall is bringing third-party developers onstage to talk about their application, and Sega revisits the stage. They demoed a game called Super Monkey Ball in March, and they've refined it. Ethan Einhorn of Sega comes up onstage to talk about the app. The initial game had four stages developed in two weeks, now they've got 110 stages, with all four classic monkeys.
10:30 a.m.: This demo is showing off the capabilities of the accelerometer, where the iPhone can be tilted back and forth to accelerate or brake. The tester gets a nice hand from the audience for hurling Baby Monkey through the goal. Super Monkey Ball will be available at the launch of the App Store for $9.99.
Showing tilt control on Sega games.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)10:33 a.m.: eBay is the next developer to show off an application, and Ken Sun of eBay comes onstage to show off Auctions on the iPhone. The iPhone is already the primary mobile device used on eBay's Web site, he says. The app has a basic front door with options to track auctions you've bid on, see whether you've been outbid, and to place new bids. You can also pick up the photos from the auction listings, and blow them up to full screen. eBay is making this app available for free.
eBay application on iPhone.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)10:36 a.m.: Loopt is the third company to demo, and it's talking about a location-based application. Again, no distinction is made whether this is an application using GPS or the current location-based service on the iPhone. Loopt blends your social networks with the Maps application, so you can see where your friends are. You can also go to their journal to see what they've been doing today, what pictures they've added, and so on. This app will also be free.
10:39 a.m.: TypePad is next up, for the mobile bloggers in the audience. Michael Sippey of TypePad shows off what they've put together, with a simple interface that lets you create a post, take a photo, or add a photo. You can take photos with the iPhone's camera and add them to a post, as well as add photos from your library on your iPhone. This will be yet another free application.
10:41 a.m.: Our good friends at the Associated Press also have an application to show off. Benjamin Mosse of the AP is showing off the application, which is essentially a reader-style app that focuses on local news. This is another location-aware application that sends you local news based on where you are. You can customize the feeds for your favorite sports teams, and browse AP photos and video. Those stores can be shared via text or e-mail, and civilians can upload their own stories and pictures to the AP from the iPhone, and continuing with the trend, it will be free.
10:45 a.m.: More applications! Brian Greenstone of Pangea Software comes up to show off two games the company ported from Mac OS X to the iPhone, Enigmo, a 3D puzzle game, is very CPU-intensive, says Greenstone, and it doesn't miss a beat in the demo. Cro-Mag Rally, which is apparently a caveman racing game, is the other game shown off. Driving looks hard, but he is racing on snow, and people from California don't know how to drive in the snow. Both games will cost $9.99.
10:48 a.m.: It's a parade of developers. An app called Band was made by a solo developer named Mark Terry, whereas all the other apps so far have been corporate-developed. Band lets you create music on the iPhone, with a touch-screen piano, and the demo guy cranks out a passable version of John Lennon's "Imagine." There are also drums and a 12-bar blues creation app, which lays down a bass line while you play guitar over the track, and a bass guitar, which is used to play the slinky bass line from Pink Floyd's "Money." There's other stuff, but time is limited. Terry says Band will appear on the App Store in a few weeks' time.
Developer shows off music application on the iPhone.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)10:50 a.m.: MLB.com is getting in on the action, so we can watch the tortured season of the New York Mets on our iPhones. Jeremy Schoenherr shows off At-Bat, as we check out the Royals-Yankees game. You can see who's at bat, who's pitching, the count, and the score: Mussina's off to a decent start this morning. You can get real-time video highlights of the Yankees turning a double play. They aren't really "real-time" since the highlights arrive after the fact, but still.
MLB on the iPhone
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)10:53 a.m.: Modality is the next company that Apple is showing off. These folks, represented by Dr. S. Mark Williams, have developed an application that helps medical students ditch their flash cards and use an iPhone to view anatomical images of the body that are very detailed, down to the arteries and veins, and can quiz students on the various parts of the heart, for example. Within weeks of the App Store launching, the company will have about a dozen applications available for various health-care needs.
10:57 a.m.: Mimvista has another medical application that builds on their niche, medical-imaging software. Mark Cain is representing Mimvista, and he says developing one of their types of applications before the iPhone wasn't going to work. The idea is to connect doctors with their workstations, so they can evaluate medical imaging from the golf course. The application, like Modality's, can show extremely detailed pictures of the human system, as well as moving images. "The iPhone has created a new direction for our company."
11:00 a.m.: Forstall promises that Digital Legends Entertainment is the last demo for this morning. These guys built a game in two weeks, and Xavier Carrillo Costa shows off his game. Their game is called Kroll, and it's another caveman adventure game where you battle enemies, swing across rope bridges, and solve problems. They expect to have the game ready by September.
Push notification service on the iPhone.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)11:02 a.m.: Forstall's back. He thanks all the developers who demonstrated their applications. He mentions one feature request from developers: instant-messaging developers want to deliver notifications even when the application isn't running. This is the background-running issue that arrived after the March event. Forstall says background processes are bad for a number of reasons, such as battery life and performance. He uses the opportunity to ding Windows Mobile's task manager for handling background processes the way desktop Windows does, to widespread laughter and applause.
11:04 a.m.: "We have come up with a far better solution." Apple is going to provide a push notification service to all developers, which doesn't quite go as far as background processes. When users quit an application, they disconnect from the server, but Apple is going have its own application server that maintains a connection to the iPhone. You can push badges such as "how many e-mail messages do I have," custom alert sounds, and custom text alerts. Forstall claims the design scales, but this puts an awful lot of dependence on Apple's own Web services.
E-mail messages can be deleted in bulk, and you can save e-mailed photos to your photo library. The calculator now works in landscape mode, adding scientific calculator buttons. Parental controls and language support have also been added, including two forms of Japanese and Chinese entry. The Chinese language characters can be drawn with your finger.
Jobs shows off iPhone's scientific calculator.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)11:07 a.m.: This will be available in September, but developers will get a chance to start playing with it soon. Forstall leaves the stage saying Apple has updated the SDK, but doesn't say much else about it. Jobs retakes the stage to talk about a few new features in the software: contact search, full support for iWork documents, and support for Microsoft documents, adding PowerPoint to the already supported Word and Excel.
11:09 a.m.: The software will be released in early July, a slip from March's expectations. iPod Touch users will have to pay $9.99 for the iPhone 2.0 software, which is a price reduction.
11:10 a.m.: Jobs runs through the capabilities of the App Store, which is the only way to get third-party applications onto the iPhone. The App Store has been expanded to 63 countries that will have access, up from 20-something countries. A 10MB app or less can be downloaded over the air, but you can only use Wi-Fi or iTunes for applications larger than that.
11:11 a.m.: Enterprises, however, wanted their own App Stores unique to their phones. Enterprises can authorize iPhones in their company and create apps that only run on those phones, Jobs says. Those applications can be distributed through a corporate intranet, and synced through iTunes.
11:12 a.m.: However, there will now be a third way: Ad Hoc. The example Jobs uses is a professor who wants to use iPhone applications within a classroom. The developer certification program can now be expanded to 100 iPhones, so apps can be shared within a development house or university environment.
11:13 a.m.: "Now, we've got something entirely new, and we're very excited about this. It's called MobileMe."
11:15 a.m.: Phil Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide marketing, takes the stage to discuss MobileMe. He says it's "Exchange for the rest of us." Schiller "slips," referring to ActiveSync as ActiveStink. MobileMe delivers push e-mail, contacts, and calendars to iPhones. This sounds very much like the revamp of .Mac that has been discussed for months, where information is stored in the "cloud" from Macs, iPhones, or Windows PC. E-mail automatically gets pushed all devices that you register with the service, and pulls calendar updates from one device to another.
11:18 a.m.: Schiller shows how e-mail and calendar info can go back and forth from the device to the Internet. Apple has also built AJAX applications as part of the service. The Web e-mail application looks like iTunes in a way, sorting your e-mail where your songs would normally be. The idea is you can access contacts and calendars from any Mac, PC, or iPhone. There will be an option in the 2.0 software that lets you send photos right to the MobileMe service, in addition.
11:20 a.m.: It's time for the formal demo. Schiller fires up the service, logs in, and arrives at his e-mail inbox. There are icons at the top that let you scroll between e-mail, contacts, and calendars. You can drag and drop e-mails in the Web interface, send off quick replies to e-mails without opening the entire message, and move through your contacts and calendars.
E-mail in MobileMe.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)11:24 a.m.: The application, like .Mac, ties into your iLife applications, where you can share photo galleries with others. iDisk is still around, allowing you to store files online. Schiller shows how the iPhone accesses the same MobileMe account, where you can check your e-mail, and save a new contact to your contacts database.
11:28 a.m.: Schiller's now showing how you can access your photo galleries stored in MobileMe through the iPhone, switching back and forth between the iPhone and the Mac to show how quickly photos can be uploaded and accessed from either device. Apple's keeping the price the same as .Mac: $99 a year, but upping the storage to 20GB. It will be available with the iPhone 2.0 software, and Schiller confirms that MobileMe will replace .Mac. All the .Mac stuff will still work, but .Mac users will be automatically upgraded to the new service.
11:28 a.m.: Jobs retakes the stage. "Now I'd like to talk about something that's near and dear to my heart, the iPhone."
11:30 a.m.: They're showing pictures of the iPhone launch day, almost one year ago. "It's widely believed that this is the phone that has changed phones forever." But the thing Jobs really likes is that users love their iPhones, quoting 90 percent customer satisfaction numbers. Ninety-eight percent of iPhone users are browsing, and 80 percent are using 10 or more features. Steve says they have sold 6 million iPhones to date, since they ran out a few weeks ago.
11:31 a.m.: "We did figure out what our next challenges are." 3G networking, as you might have heard, is that first challenge. Enterprise support is the second, third is third-party application support, fourth is international support--as Jobs jokes about the unlocked iPhones all over the world--and fifth, everybody wants an iPhone, but we need to make it more affordable.
11:32 a.m.: "Today we're introducing the iPhone 3G."
The new 3G iPhone, which is thinner at the edges, has a black plastic back and metal buttons on the side, has a flush-headphone jack, and comes in white.
(Credit: Apple)11:33 a.m.: "We've learned so much with the first iPhone." Jobs shows off the pictures; it's thinner at the edges, and has a black plastic back and metal buttons on the side. It's the same screen, with a camera, a flush-headphone jack (which gets wild applause), and improved audio.
3G iPhone speed test.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)11:35 a.m.: Jobs goes over the 3G support first. Faster downloads are a no-brainer, he says. He does a side-by-side comparison of a Web page loading on EDGE vs. one on 3G. The National Geographic's home page downloads in 21 seconds on the 3G network, and the EDGE one is taking forever. Twenty-one seconds is a lot, but this is a pretty photo-heavy Web page. It took 59 seconds on EDGE. The 3G speeds are close to Wi-Fi, Jobs said.
11:38 a.m.: Jobs compares the 3G iPhone to the Nokia N95 and Treo 750, two other 3G phones, and says the 3G iPhone is 36 percent faster to download the same Web page. In an iPhone 1.0 to iPhone 2.0 comparison, an e-mail attachment downloads in 5 seconds on the 3G model, and 18 seconds on EDGE. Jobs says the 3G iPhone will allow 300 hours of standby time, improved from 8 to 10 hours of talk time on the 2G iPhone, and he's quoting 5 hours of 3G talk time. Browsing should give you 5-6 hours, video 7 hours, and audio 24 hours of continuous operation.
Jobs confirms the new iPhone will have GPS.
Jobs announced the new iPhone will offer GPS.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)11:39 a.m.: "Location services is going to be a really big deal on the iPhone." GPS data allows you to do tracking. Apple recorded an iPhone traveling in a car going down San Francisco's famously crooked Lombard Street, showing how precisely the iPhone can be tracked as it navigates the curves.
11:43 a.m.: Jobs moves into enterprise support, which was covered in detail earlier today, as well as third-party applications. When it comes to more countries, the 3G iPhone will be available in dozens of them, as a video with "A Small World After All" plays with the iPhone working its way through South America and Europe. No love for Venezuela or China, but India and Australia are added for a total of 70 countries. It will roll out to those places over the next several months.
11:44 a.m.: On to the price. The first iPhone was $599 and now sells for $399. The new, 3G iPhone will sell for $199 for 8GB of storage.
11:45 a.m.: The 16GB model will cost $299, and that model will also be available in white.
The 8G iPhone will go for $199, Jobs says.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)11:46 a.m.: Twenty-two countries will get the 3G iPhone first, and they'll all get it at the same time. And it's not coming until July 11. The "late" rumors win.
11:48 a.m.: Jobs moves into the new ad for the 3G iPhone, which pokes fun at Apple's secretive nature. The demo gods finally make their presence felt as the audio skips on the replay of the video.
11:50 a.m.: Jobs asks Tony Fadell, Scott Forstall, and their employees to stand up and take a bow, which they do to thunderous applause. It appears we're winding down here, as Steve revisits the sessions that are planned for the week's worth of conference events. And we close, to Chuck Berry's "Maybelline."
11:52 a.m.: A quick recap: the 3G iPhone is here, but it's late. It's not clear the slip will mean too much to Apple's goal of shipping 10 million phones in 2008, but the price cuts will probably more than offset any two-week delay in iPhone sales. Still, this means there will have been no iPhones available for about six weeks, from the middle/end of May to early July.
That's going to be it from the show floor, but stay with us all day as we take a look at iPhone applications, ponder the 3G model, and post tons of pictures and videos. Thanks for letting us bring you WWDC 2008.
Wearing his standard attire, Steve Jobs takes the stage to kick off Apple's 2008 Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco.
(Credit: James Martin/CNET News.com)
We'll be covering Apple's annual WWDC conference live on Monday, starting at 10 a.m. PDT.
(Credit: Apple)If you want blow-by-blow coverage of Apple CEO Steve Jobs' keynote address on Monday, make sure to pay us a visit before 10 a.m. PDT for our live report.
I'll be inside Moscone West on Monday morning, where we expect Apple to unveil a new iPhone and talk more about the next version of Mac OS X at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference. We'll be posting live updates every few minutes from the conference hall, and will have photos of the new iPhone and anything else that gets introduced Monday morning as soon as humanly (or networkly) possible.
After the keynote, make sure to come back to CNET later in the day for complete coverage of WWDC, including initial impressions of any new products and video of the keynote address.
CUPERTINO, Calif.--We're here at Apple's headquarters for the company's announcement of its iPhone software development kit. The event started just after 10 a.m. PT. What follows is a live blog of CEO Steve Jobs' speech, with updates as they come. (Editor's note: To make this blog more readable for posterity, we have since reordered this blog so that updates appear in the order in which they happened.)
The crowd awaits Steve Jobs' keynote address at the iPhone software event.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)10 a.m. PST: Apple's special event today in Cupertino is about to get started, as a couple hundred people are gathered inside Apple's Town Hall auditorium at its Cupertino, Calif., headquarters. We're waiting to hear how Apple plans to handle third-party application development for the iPhone, as well as to learn about new business-friendly features. Props to Apple this time around for the power strips, but come on guys, it's 2008. Wi-Fi is a proven technology.
10:01 a.m.: Steve Jobs enters--standard outfit. "We're really excited to share some great news with you about the iPhone software road map." He rattles off a few iPhone stats from the early days of the product, quoting the Canalys numbers for smartphone share in the United States, which puts the iPhone in second place, behind Research In Motion.
Steve Jobs addresses the crowd.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze, CNET Networks)10:03 a.m.: Jobs is going to be joined on stage by Phil Schiller, senior vice president of marketing, and Scott Forstall, vice president of iPhone software. Schiller comes on stage to handle the enterprise portion of the conference.
10:04 a.m.: Schiller starts talking about the companies that have inquired about working with the iPhone, mentioning Genentech, where Apple board member Art Levinson is CEO. It's also been a university play, according to Schiller, bringing up Stanford University's deployment of the iPhone. He avoids mentioning Duke, which initially blamed the iPhone for a widespread network outage last year.
10:07 a.m.: So, what do businesses want? "Great e-mail integration," says Schiller. That also extends to calendars, contacts, and the global address lists of corporations--having that technology instantly accessible and pushed to the device. They also want security policies, like VPNs and remote wiping of a stolen iPhone, and configuration help. "I'm really excited to be the one to tell you today that we're doing all these things in the next release of the iPhone software."
The iPhone opens up for business
10:07 a.m.: What do they really want? Microsoft Exchange. And they're getting it: Schiller announces that Apple has licensed the Microsoft ActiveSync protocol, which will make it much easier to do push e-mail and contacts with Exchange servers.
10:08 a.m.: Schiller starts ripping on the BlackBerry, without actually mentioning it, of course. He's referring to the use of a NOC, or network network operations center, "which adds to risk and reliability, as we've seen from time to time." The crowd of CrackBerry enthusiasts chuckles.
10:10 a.m.: You'll soon get push e-mail, calendaring, contacts, and a global contacts list, as well as the remote-wipe security feature. The iPhone's Mail application will have this functionality; you won't have to have a new user interface for e-mail and calendars. This will ship with every iPhone.
10:13 a.m.: Schiller starts demoing the new features. He's using a virgin iPhone, demonstrating how you would activate the functionality with Exchange. You can do the whole thing over the air, which is very helpful for IT administrators: you won't have to go collect every iPhone that needs that feature. E-mail, contacts, and calendar are automatically pushed from your desktop to your iPhone upon setup. As far as I understand, many devices, such as my Treo and BlackBerrys, also offer over-the-air setup; it's almost a requirement in the IT world.
Phil Schiller takes the stage.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze)10:14 a.m.: Apple appears to have packed the auditorium with employees, who are very enthusiastically applauding every successful demonstration of a new feature. Either that, or the press corps is really, really excited.
10:16 a.m.: Schiller demonstrates the remote-wiping feature, which appears to disable the iPhone. That part went really quickly. I'll try to figure out later what, exactly, happens when you "remote-wipe" an iPhone.
10:18 a.m.: "These are the features customers have asked for to make the iPhone a big hit in businesses, universities," and other places around the world, Schiller said. "Now it's addressing the needs of the enterprise as well. That's it for the enterprise features; now Scott Forstall will address the SDK.
10:20 a.m.: "I'm here to tell you about how developers can build great applications for the iPhone," Forstall said. He starts off, however, with the Web applications, which Apple initially said presented the best way to build applications for the iPhone back at its developer conference last June. Developers were less than enthused, but it's true that these days, you can build lots of interesting Web applications that don't require native access to the computer. Scott singles out Facebook and Bank of America, saying the iPhone accounts for 25 percent of all mobile online banking for BofA.
10:21 a.m.: "Starting today, we're opening up the same native APIs and tools that we use internally to build all our iPhone applications." It's the same SDK used by Apple to build iPhone applications, especially the APIs. APIs, or application-programming interfaces, enable applications to talk to the underlying hardware and operating system.
10:22 a.m.: The iPhone's OS uses the bottom three layers of the Mac OS X software stack, the core OS, the core services, and the media layer. That's what was included in the first releases. But Cocoa, the application-programming framework, required a little tweaking to work with the touch-screen interface. Hence Cocoa Touch, the unique programming interface for the iPhone.
10:24 a.m.: The iPhone's OS X uses the same OS X kernel as Mac OS X, optimized for a mobile experience. The networking layer is also the same, as well as the power management techniques used for Apple's notebooks. It's a little more sophisticated, however, as OS X uses something called "automatic power management" to regulate the power demanded by the iPhone's software.
Apple's Scott Forstall talks about the iPhone's Core OS.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)10:26 a.m.: Software development is a little outside my normal comfort zone (I've been more of a hardware guy) but we're getting a deep dive into the iPhone's OS X, which Apple has never done before in public. The Core Services layer is next on Forstall's list. It also uses several of the regular Mac OS X features, which you can also get from the Media Layer. We're talking about things like Core Audio, but Apple also built things like OpenAL, designed to deliver "three-dimensional" sound for games.
10:28 a.m.: Cocoa Touch is totally unique. Apple built unique multitouch controls and also needed to program a way to access the accelerometer. Developers will have access to the accelerometer, which will be a delight for game developers. "We think we're years ahead of any other platform for mobile devices," Forstall said.
10:30 a.m.: So how exactly is this development going to work? Forstall starts talking about Xcode, the development environment for Mac OS X. That works here too, giving developers tools to write and manage code developed for the iPhone. It seems, at least at this point, that iPhone development will be very familiar to anyone who has developed applications for the Mac.
The iPhone simulator.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)10:32 a.m.: You'll have to have a user interface for your application, and Apple has created something called Interface Builder. A drag-and-drop feature for the development environment can help you build the application's look and feel. It supports language localization, as well.
10:33 a.m.: The next feature of the SDK is Instruments. This allows you to record the performance of an iPhone application on a Mac, when the iPhone is physically connected to the Mac. This would give developers the ability to "visually compare" the performance of different parts of an application, looking for weak spots or overpowering segments.
10:34 a.m.: Xcode, Interface Builder, and Instruments are all Mac development tools enhanced for the iPhone. But Apple has also created an iPhone simulator, which means that you can run the iPhone application on a Mac in the simulator, so you can get a sense for how the application will perform, as well as catch coding errors.
10:37 a.m.: Forstall demos the native application development process on a Mac. It's basically like an iPhone superimposed on the desktop, so you can mimic the iPhone experience on the Mac. Scott starts building a new project from scratch, a simple program called "Hello, World," a common Programming 101 exercise.
10:41 a.m.: Another more complicated application called Touch FX is being demonstrated. It's sort of like adding Photo Booth-style effects to a photo using your finger on the iPhone touch screen. Pinch or tap to introduce fun house mirror-style effects. Want to erase your doodlings? Shake the phone. Developers can treat the accelerometer like a button.
An application made so that you can use the touch screen to manipulate people's faces. You can erase the manipulations by shaking the phone.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)10:43 a.m.: Touch Fighter is the first official game for the iPhone, developed by Apple engineers. It uses OpenGL. You're flying a Star Wars X-Fighter through space, steering by using the iPhone like a pretend control wheel, with both hands on the side. Drop your left hand to turn left, like you're driving a car. This is pretty slick stuff. The accelerometer opens up all kinds of development possibilities, which is a necessity because there are no physical buttons on the iPhone.
A gaming application that is motion-sensitive. Your iPhone is the controller.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)10:44 a.m.: You can record a test of the application on your Mac, allowing you to reproduce application behavior to make sure that it works. This took Apple two weeks and fewer than 10,000 lines of code, Forstall says.
10:46 a.m.: Apple invited in some third-party developers a few weeks ago to start playing with the iPhone SDK, to see what other developers could do with the technology in two weeks. Electronic Arts' Travis Boatman, vice president of worldwide studios at EA Mobile, gets on stage to demonstrate the game developer's application, which, believe it or not, is a mobile version of Spore.
Travis Boatman, VP of worldwide studios at EA Mobile.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)10:49 a.m.: Spore is a game in which you basically try to make it from a molecule at the bottom of the ocean to an organism on top of the water. Check out my colleague Daniel Terdiman's coverage of Spore for more details. You can sort of create your own organism, moving eyes and other features around with the touch-screen interface. EA says it could have done a lot more with more time, but I have to admit, that's a pretty impressive feat.
10:50 a.m.: I guess we're not totally done with the business stuff: Salesforce.com is next. Chuck Dietrich of Salesforce comes on stage to demonstrate what his company did.
10:53 a.m.: Salesforce created an application for the iPhone that does more than you can do with its Web-based business management application. For instance, it can talk to Maps to plot directions to your next appointment, figure out how many more widgets you need to sell to make your quota, and lots of other stuff. Salesforce did this with one person in fewer than two weeks.
10:54 a.m.: AOL is next. Rizwan Sattar will demonstrate what AOL has done in two weeks: AIM for iPhone.
10:56 a.m.: Fire up AIM for iPhone, and you get a buddy list. This was Sattar's first experience developing for a Mac, and he built the buddy list interface in five days. A simple conversation is easy enough, but most of us maintain multiple IM conversations. You can switch between conversations with a swipe of the finger, as if you're scrolling through photos on the iPhone. You can also upload photos from your iPhone to serve as your buddy icon.
AIM for iPhone.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)10:59 a.m.: Epocrates is the next showcase developer, making software for medical professionals. Glenn Keighley shows off what it's created. Keighley's been a mobile developer for a while, but he says the iPhone development was almost like developing for a desktop. The company was able to build a native application that can access an SQL database for accessing medical information, pictures of pills, and checking whether a new prescription will have an adverse effect on a patient who is already taking a bunch of other drugs.
11:02 a.m.: Sega is the last developer brought in early to play with the SDK. Ethan Einhorn is Sega's representative, and he shows off Super Monkey Ball. It's sort of like a skiing game, where you hurtle down a ramp trying to get bananas and such. It uses the accelerometer for control, just like the Apple-designed game. Sega actually found that it had to upgrade the graphics from the console version so the application would look better on the iPhone.
11:03 a.m.: So, how do those applications get on the iPhone? Jobs is going to handle that one.
11:05 a.m.: Developers want to get their applications in front of every iPhone user, Jobs says. He says that's a difficult task, but Apple's got a solution: the App Store. This is an Apple-developed application designed for the iPhone to distribute applications directly to the iPhone. This is not what previous reports suggested--that iTunes would be the one-stop shopping mall for iPhone applications.
11:05 a.m.: The App Store is built into the iPhone, so you can search applications by popularity, title, or genre of application, sort of like in the Wi-Fi Music Store. The applications are wirelessly downloaded to the iPhone over either EDGE or Wi-Fi. That's much, much easier than was rumored.
The App Store is built into the iPhone.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze)11:07 a.m.: Of course, this will also be in iTunes. "But we think most people are probably going to use their iPhone and just do it over the air to their iPhone," Jobs says. The App Store will prompt iPhone users if a new version of the application is released, and it will wirelessly download the application. This, however, will be the exclusive way to distribute iPhone applications.
11:08 a.m.: The developer picks the price of his or her application. The developer gets 70 percent of the revenue off the top; Apple gets 30 percent. No credit card, hosting, or marketing fees. The revenues are paid monthly, and Jobs calls it "the best deal going." There is no charge to the developer if you want to make a free application.
11:09 a.m.: "Will there be limitations?" Jobs asked. "Of course." Sorry, pervs. Jobs says no iPhone porn. He doesn't bring up any other limitations, however, leaving a little bit of wiggle room on what will be approved.
11:10 a.m.: You'll get all this stuff through the 2.0 software update. That delivers the SDK and the enterprise capabilities, and a beta test version is going to be released today. It will ship officially in late June, and it's a free software update.
11:11 a.m.: The same software release will run on the iPod Touch. All the games and applications will run on that, and the enterprise features are different. Jobs confirms that the accounting policies for the iPod Touch are different, and so Apple plans to charge for that software update. In January, Apple charged $19.99 for an iPod Touch software update.
11:11 a.m.: Want to be a developer? Download the iPhone SDK for free. Macs only. There's also going to be an iPhone developer program, which allows you to test your code, get tech support, and distribute your applications. That costs $99.
11:12 a.m.: And the fabled "One more thing..." makes an appearance.
11:14 a.m.: Jobs introduces Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers' John Doerr. Doerr says he really loves "Apple entrepreneurs." Doerr starts talking about Jobs' entrepreneurial arc--from Apple to Pixar to Next--calling Jobs "the world's greatest entrepreneur," to a round of applause.
11:15 a.m.: Today, KPCB is announcing the iFund for the iPhone platform. Presumably, the investment firm cleared that name with Apple's legal department. Doerr is going to put $100 million into the iFund, which should be enough to start "about four Googles," he jokes.
KPCB has created the $100 million iFund for the iPhone platform.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)11:17 a.m.: "Today, we're witnessing history--the creation of the third great platform," Doerr says, referring to Apple's other businesses, the Mac and iPod. "It's bigger than the personal computer." Matt Murphy and Bill Joy, among others, will be involved in the iFund. "If you want to invent the future, the iFund wants to help you build it."
11:18 a.m.: Jobs closes the official event. The press is being invited to stick around for a few minutes to ask some questions, so we'll hang out a while longer.
11:23 a.m.
Q: What does the $100 million do for the iFund community?
A: Jobs says you should go ask them, referring to the iFund's financial backers. "We're not sending them a message; we're sending customers and developers a message. The iPhone has been out for less than a year. This stuff is going to be shipping right around a year."
11:26 a.m.
Q: What sort of safeguards did you use to make sure the applications will be secure?
A: This is a big concern, Jobs says. "We've tried to strike a really good path here. On one side, you've got a closed device like the iPhone, and on the other side, you've got a Windows PC, where people spend a lot of time just getting it up to speed." Apple has done that through a developer registration program, which is mandatory. Apple is using the electronic-certificate method, in which developers can be tracked when they release an application. If it's a malicious one, Apple can "shut off the spigot," if need be, turning off the App Store.
11:28 a.m.
Q: How likely do you think it is that a VoIP application will be developed?
A: "The initial take is that we will only limit VoIP over the cellular net, but not over the Wi-Fi network." That might change, Jobs says. But for now, no VoIP over AT&T's EDGE, which makes sense.
11:30 a.m.
Q: Doesn't the fact that Apple is going to be the exclusive distributor for the applications raise questions of monopoly? What if developers don't want to work with Apple?
A: "Then they won't get their application on the iPhone." Jobs thinks people will want to do it their way at first, and developers will be happy to piggyback on Apple's brand and distribution method. "We don't intend to make money off the App Store," Jobs says, comparing it to the iTunes Music Store.
Scott Forstall, Steve Jobs and Phil Schiller take questions from the press following the address.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET Networks)11:32 a.m.
Q: Will SIM or carrier-unlocking software that makes the iPhone usable on carriers other than the one it's released with be excluded from the App Store?
A: Yes.
11:34 a.m.
Q: How much will the upgrade cost for the iPod Touch, and will you have to change the accounting treatment?
A: Jobs goes through the accounting treatment again. Apple recognizes the iPhone revenue over two years, but the iPod Touch revenue is all recognized up front. That means that Apple has to assign a value to major upgrades, such as the 2.0 software. Jobs says the cost of the iPod Touch upgrade won't be revealed until the update is ready to ship in June, but "we're not trying to make money off this."
11:37 a.m.: A question about IT policies sets off some more RIM bashing, with respect to the NOC and the outages that have crept up in the past. Jobs notes that this is "a single point of failure" but also that there are security implications of having the e-mail go through a central space.
11:37 a.m.
Q: Is this an international rollout?
A: Yes.
11:40 a.m.: Forstall brings up that parental controls will be released with the 2.0 software update, so parents can prevent YouTube or Safari from being used.
11:41 a.m.
Q: What made you change your mind from last year, and how are the apps going to be managed in the store? Will there be a waiting period?
A: "Well, we all at Apple change our minds from time to time, but I don't know what you're talking about." He's reminded of the Web app decision presented last June, and he notes that "developers gave us feedback that they wanted to do a lot more. Creating an SDK is a lot of work; once you give it to developers, you want to (be able to) live with it for the next 20 years."
11:44 a.m.
Q: What is the relationship with the carrier? Up until now, applications have been released through the carrier.
A: "We have great relationships with our carriers, and we struck a new relationship with our carriers, where Apple is responsible for the software on the phone," Jobs says. It doesn't sound as if the carriers will get a piece of the revenue from iPhone applications.
News.com Poll
11:45 a.m.
Q: Do you have any plans for letting developers interface with dock-connected accessories?
A: Forstall fields this one. "In iPhone 2.0, there will not be APIs for developers to talk to dock-connected devices." It's basically going to be the same as the Made for iPod program.
11:47 a.m.: That's it. Apple has unveiled its plan for iPhone applications, and it's actually a bit more permissible than some might have thought earlier this week. As expected, the company will control distribution and use an electronic-signature method, but it sounds as if far more types of applications than thought will be permitted. The devil, of course, is in those details, and that will become more apparent as developers get a chance to play with the SDK. Thanks for reading our live coverage. We'll follow up later in the day with more on the iPhone SDK, which is due out in late June, and the new enterprise features.
LIVE NOW: coverage of Steve Jobs Macworld Keynote
I've already started doing the dexterity exercises, with less than 24 hours to go before Macworld.
Once again, I'll be providing live blow-by-blow coverage of Apple CEO Steve Jobs' keynote at Macworld on Tuesday, starting at 9 a.m. PST. We expect to see some combination of new laptops, an iTunes movie rental service, iPhone details, and whatever else is trickling out of Cupertino this week.
Live blogs are fun, if a bit demanding on the old fingers. It's always interesting to bring news to people as it happens, I sort of think of it as trying to provide both the play-by-play and the color roles on a football game. I swear I won't morph into Dan Dierdorf ("That was a great Macworld keynote there, Steve is really a great Macworld player, Macworld players know how to make great Macworld plays, and that was a great Macworld play right there).
Apple and IDG World Expo have scheduled the keynote speech for 9 a.m. to 10:30 a.m., but I'd expect it to run a little longer. Set your browsers here for the news as it happens, and check back with us all day Tuesday as we cover everything there is to cover from San Francisco's Moscone Center.
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