Keynote Live Blog – Live For Me, Not You!

8:56 AM – We’re in! Music playing. What is that? Hole? Who cares? People taking pictures. Tension building.

I’m actually sitting next to Gruber. And the universe has not exploded. Weird. Sometimes physics surprises you.

I was apparently the last person to pull out their iPhone and try to get on so I have no EDGE connection. Everyone around me surfing and I just have a little blue box with no E in it. I am the saddest Macworld attendee.

OK, not really. The dude on the other side of me is using a Dell. He’s the saddest Macworld attendee.

9:10 AM – No Jobs. I’m starting to wonder if they were able to make it through the robot blockade.

9:12 AM – Large explosions. Feist song playing. Robot parts flying everywhere! This is it! The lights dim! The Cyber Apocalyse ends now!

With an “I’m a Mac” ad.

Ah. So not with a bang but with a whimper. Well, except for all the banging.

But they did it! Apple won the Cyber Apocalypse! The robot forces have been defeated!

9:14 AM – Jobs takes the stage! He’s got a robot head in his hands! It’s Kent’s head! He rips out the Central Plexor and throws it to the ground! He stomps on it! The crowd goes wild! Outside we can hear a whirring sound as thousands of robots power down!

STEVE JOBS AND APPLE ARE TRIUMPHANT!

YAY!

OK, now Steve will tell us about 2007’s results.

He says he has 4 things to talk about today.

5 million copies of Leopard. Fabulous response. “Larry, for example,” Jobs says, “bought a Family Pack. Thanks, Larry.”

Huh? Who the hell is Larry?

All big apps native on Intel with Office release. Microsoft is this year’s Adobe.

9:18 AM – Companion product for Time Machine – Time Capsule. But is it a tiny Time Capsule? Mmm, sort of medium-sized. Server grade hard drive. Full Airport BS. You can back up all your Macs to it. If you’re into that kind of thing. Hot backup action.

Jobs says it’ll have a 500 MB drive? What? That doesn’t seem very good.

9:21 AM – iPhone! Sold 4 million iPhones to date. In the first quarter of shipment, iPhone market share was second at 19.5%. BUT, market share is like 99% among the highly coveted poser demographic.

SDK coming, but new features available today. Maps with location. Web clips, customizable home screens. SMS multiple people at once, chapters, subtitles, languages in video. Lyrics for songs. Can now get hot enough to make toast. Comes with a fruit cup. Makes its own gravy.

Steve demos. Steve says “zschoom.” We have a new sound effect! Repeat, we have a new sound effect! “Boom” is out, “zschoom” is in! Please update your Jobs references accordingly!

Steve’s SMSing Schiller, Scott Forstall, Tony Faddell and some other dude. This presentation needs more Schiller.

Steve demoes the ability to add a web clip as a link to iPhone home screen. I think his choice of using a site called “Lusty Plumpers” is a little questionable.

Oh, crap, you can move icons around on the home screen. That means my son is totally going to screw up my phone.

9:34 AM – The iPhone’s Google maps now show you where you are by triangulating your position using WiFi hot spots and cell towers. Also, Apple has someone following you. Sure. Didn’t you know that? Apple’s had someone following you for years. I know you’re shocked, but secretly, inside, it explains a lot, doesn’t it? How they know so much about you… your hopes… your fears…

You know it to be true. Search your feelings.

iPod touch owners pay $20 for these features as a software upgrade.

Start bitching…. NOW!

9:36 AM – iTunes. Sold 4 billionth song last week. 7 million movies. 1 copy of “Yahoo Serious”.

Really? Wow. There’s a call back.

Hmm.

Movies.

A better way to deliver movie content: iTunes movie rentals. They have an astounding FIFTEEN MOVIES AVAILABLE!

Steve says “Blades of Glory” was a particular favorite of his. Funny. I would have thought he’d be more of a “Superbad” kind of guy.

Oh, no wait. Lots of movies. 11 studios total – every major studio.

1000 films by February. Can watch them anywhere. Macs, iPhone, PC, iPod. In your pants.

Technology! Whisky! Sexy!

30 days to start, 24 hours to watch. 48 hours to watch any movie with Ben Afleck. Because he’s that bad. $2.99 for older releases, $3.99 for new release.

Apple TV? He didn’t say Apple TV. I’m going to ask. I’m raising my hand.

Steve?! Oh, STEVE?! Sheesh. He can hear me. I know he can. Why won’t he answer? He’s ignoring me. That is so like Jobs.

OK, he’s getting to it. It’s OK. It’s OK, everyone. He’s getting to my question.

Apple TV Take 2. No computer required. Rent movies directly. DVD quality or HD. Applause.

NERDS!

Download podcasts directly. Photos from Flickr and .Mac. $1.00 more in HD. For $1,000,000.00 more, the actors come to your house and act it out. That’s very reasonable.

Steve loves the old Star Trek movies?

NERD!

I mean, I love the old Star Trek movies. That’s fine for me to love them. But I don’t want Steve to love them. Steve should be better than that. Higher. And immutable force.

Not some pimply faced Trekkie. Trekker. Whatever.

NERD!

Steve waits until Will Farrell does his crotch grab before cutting away from Blades of Glory. Oh, Steve. You don’t need to be such a prude with us. Our hard drive are full of porn! Ha-ha!

Steve’s searching for Linkin Park. Right. First Star Trek and now Linkin Park? Can these demoes have at least some basis in reality?

Steve demoes looking at pictures on .Mac. You can see your own pictures or other peoples’ pictures. And if you click “Rent” you can rent the family!

Beautiful movie of a family scuba diving vacation on a coral reef. Where’s the movie of the drunken, bitter recriminations at Christmas dinner?

Oops. First glitch. He’s able to blame it on Flickr, though, so it’s cool. A stagehand breaths a sigh of relief as he will live another day.

Free software upgrade. THANK YOU, STEVE! I was so sure he just made my Apple TV a useless piece of crap. Not that that’s what it was. Price drop to $229. Shipping in two weeks.

First studio to sign up was 20th Century Fox. And here comes the chairman! Jim Gianopulos. Will he be this year’s Stan Sigman?

Nah. He’s a Hollywood player. He can talk, baby. Oh, yes, he can talk.

He’s no Stan Sigman. Sir, I listened to Stan Sigman. For three long hours. You sir, are no Stan Sigman.

I kid Stan, but in his defense I’m sure he’s a terrific golfer. Definitely a handicap under 10. Gotta be.

10:07 AM – THING NUMBER 4!!!!

“There’s something in the air”.

Yeah. What the hell is that? That thing in the air? Phew.

Oh, laptops. The MacBook Air. The world’s thinnest notebook. Other so-called “thin” laptops you may have heard of weigh 3 lbs, are up to 1.2 inches thick but have 11 or 12 inch screens and are only 1.2 Ghz. The MacBook Air is .76 inches at its thickest. The thickest part is thinner than the thinnest Sony. Thinny thin thin. Es muy thin. Sehr thin. Steve takes it out of an internal company routing folder. On the outside it says “TO: STEVE. FROM: DOES THIS APPEASE YOU? PLEASE DON’T FIRE US.”

13.3 inch display. iSight camera. Full size keyboard. Backlit. Each key is a delicious Chicklet. Mutlitouch gesture support. Demoing those gestures, oddly all with pictures of fabulous babes. OK, not oddly.

“How did we fit a Mac in here?” We didn’t! We left the Mac out! It’s just a mockup! 80 GB standard – 64 GB SSD. Intel Core 2 Duo 1.6 GHz standard up to 1.8 Ghz. A 60% smaller chip. So those of you who like big party-sized chips, you’re out of luck. No dip, either. Dip is a USB optional add-on. Comes in Zesty Salsa and Cool Ranch.

Paul Otellini comes up and gives Steve a chip. Mmmm. “This is awesome technology. And delicious!” USB 2, Micro DVI, headphone jack. No optical drive. Powered optional optical drive for $99.

Scott McNulty behind me is now oohing and ahhing for great effect. What a card.

Battery life – 5 hours. Probably because it’s a piece of cardboard with a printout of a Leopard screen taped to it. That’s probably why the battery life is so good.

$1799. Shipping in two weeks.

Steve’s starting to lose his voice a little. Someone get him a lozenge. STAT!

“We have an ad. Would you like to see it?”

Uh, I dunno. What about you, Gruber? McNulty? David Morgenstern? Do you want to see it? Glenn Fleishman?

Nah. We don’t need to see it Steve. That’s cool. We’re good.

Addressing the environmental concerns, Steve notes that the entire MacBook Air is edible.

That’s thing number 4.

“NOW GET OUT!”

Musical performer this year: Randy Newman.

Randy performs a politically incendiary piece which the crowd seems uncomfortably approving of. Last year John Meyer did “Waiting On The World To Change” and now this. Pretty soon Steve is just going to have people come up and harangue the crowd for 20 minutes.

“I’ll always root against corporations because that’s just the way I am. But not this one.”

9 out of 10 communists agree: Apple rocks!

35 thoughts on “Keynote Live Blog – Live For Me, Not You!”

  1. I am stuck less then a mile from Mac World and I can’t go! I have my floor pass and everything! I am just waiting for work to be approved. AGGGGGHHHHH!

  2. pants hah. And the rest…

    Much better than the reality – although I think that the idea that you have to pay an extra $99 to be able to install your system software is a bit of a hassle…

  3. I can’t wait for Apple TV Take 5. That will be the one where they finally realize that people want a DVR device to record TV. Because sometimes we just don’t want to pay for EVERYTHING we watch, even though we still have to pay for cable. Maybe if you hook a “Time Capsule” to “Apple TV” you get some sort of device that will allow you to record. What if you McGyver your Macbook Air to an Apple TV, can you use it’s optical drive ???????

    And why rent movies when you can watch the best parts in small segments on YouTube?

    Too many questions ….. too many secrets.

  4. Hey, Moltz,

    Were people able to tell you and Gruber apart? Were you wearing a Darling Furball shirt?

    And what’s with being drunk and at the keynote at the same time? Hell, man, 9am is waaaay too early to be drunk. You should have waited until at least noon.

    Hmm. It was noon on the east coast. Guess it’s OK, then.

    /Bill

  5. I paid enough to have Steve at home tonight, doing the keynote for me and my family.
    We just threw some peanuts at the iPhone moment. No bitching, just, we didn’t want them any more.
    But I had to pay some more NOT to have Mr Newman : ain’t that a shame ?

    Surely I won’t pay the iPhone fee.
    Probably because I have no iPhone, but that’s not the point.

    And top 14.

  6. Mutlitouch? Is that where you pet the trackpad with your whole hand and the laptop sniggers like Mutley? Doesn’t seem appropriate somehow — Mutley never seemed like a lap dog to me — or laptop dog, for that matter.

    John you didn’t mention if Dick Dastardly was in the audience to celebrate the licensing and adoption of this, er, “exciting” new technology. If so, did Steve give him a shout-out? Man, it would have been worth going to MW just to see that alone!

    I wonder if they’ll ever bring Mutlitouch to my iPhone? Well, no matter — soon as that SDK hits the streets, man, that’ll be my first project outta the box!

  7. Was this article written on your iPhone? Because there were a couple of minor typos, and I thought the iPhone wouldn’t allow them under any circumstances, especially if you are drunk.

    I’m glad the Cyber-Apocalypse is over now. It was getting tedious.

  8. Geez, I’m surprised people weren’t stomping the floor, fists in air, chanting “One More Thing! One More Thing!” That’s what I would’ve done.

    And that’s why I’m banned from all Apple expos. Seriously, security guards are given a picture of me and everything.

    I can’t believe you booked two whole seats just for your split personality disorder, John. Tensions must be running pretty high in the Gruber/Moltz household (whichever one you really are) right now.

    Did anyone else look at the MacBook Air and think, “Just one more waffer?” And actually think it with two Fs like that, too. You can’t just think “wafer”, you have to give it the full delivery.

    Yeah, like that.

    Anyone?

  9. I wouldnt mind an Air. All of a sudden my 12 inch powerbook seems huge and bulky, and out of date.

    The only thing that makes me groan is the influx of calls here at “applecare center” thats gonna happen when its finally released. I can hear it now. How are you supposed to reinstall the OS if it doesnt have a FREAKIN optical drive. sheesh!

  10. Would the decapitated robot Kent be the same Kent from Real Genius? That would explain a little.

    What does it cost to have a real actor sub in for Ben Affleck? Could I get the duck from the Aflac commercials instead? Aflac, Affleck. Close enough.

    But… where’s my frickin’ pudding?!? What’s that? Homemade pound cake with homemade buttercream icing? Gotta love the missus. Time for cake.

    Zschoom!

  11. Ok, 1: I’ll bet anything that Huh? does NOT know Larry, and 2: sign me up for some of that USB cool ranch.

  12. True. I do not know Larry, but my Pantsâ„¢ are quite happy about being able to rent movies.

    I’m surprised Moltz hasn’t spotted me yet. I shall try harder.

  13. > Oh, crap, you can move icons around on the home screen. That means my son is totally going to screw up my phone.

    Wait one minute now! Has everyone except me missed the fact that Moltz claims he has reproduced? Talk about signs of the Cyber Apocalypse. there is just something really wrong with a universe where people like Moltz can mate. No wonder the robots wanted to take over and destroy everything. Talk about defying logic.

  14. Yes, Garnack, I had to wonder about that too. Are we sure that John Gruber-Moltz is not also Jack Miller? J.J. Gruber-Moltz-Miller?

  15. I would hope that Jack had the geek street smarts to avoid
    such a fatal absorption. He would raise the wit and wisdom
    level though

  16. i like the hot babes much more than the ugly kids on most of their presentations … i mean … why apple use the same ugly kids over and over again? someone actually … likes them? Really? Who? Show me one person that likes the ugly children on a MacBook site, or on a iMac site, or on iPhoto site. Really.

  17. “How are you supposed to reinstall the OS if it doesnt have a FREAKIN optical drive. sheesh!”

    I can’t believe I’m providing tech support on CARS, but Remote Disc lets a MacBook Air do a Net Install boot where you boot from a network-based disc.

    Now, no, I don’t know how in that mode you get the Air on the network. There must be a stub Wi-Fi stack and a stub Bonjour stack. Very stubby. Just one inches long.

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