According to sources at Apple, the company is rife with discord over what the “next big thing” will be.
“After the iPod became such a success, author Leander Kahney said, “People at Apple started asking, OK, where do we go from here?”
It turns out where the company goes from here is to a lot of meetings featuring heated arguments between rival factions.
Highly placed sources indicate that the company has narrowed it down to two potential products: an entertainment hub that downloads DVD-quality movies and acts as an household conduit streaming both video and music throughout the user’s home, and a re-envisioning of “soap-on-a-rope”.
Each faction has its own adherents and each group vehemently believes that its product will steer Apple into a glorious new age of high market share and profitability.
“Home entertainment is hot and the Apple hub would greatest swell of the wave of the future,” said an engineer associated with the device’s development. “The ability to purchase movies online and then watch them in any – and every – room in the house would create a revolution in the industry.
“This would be the must-have home accessory for a the decade.”
As tantalizing as the entertainment hub concept sounds, soap-on-a-rope boosters are equally ebullient.
“The Apple soap-on-a-rope is the ultimate in personal bathing technology,” said an engineer from the hub’s rival project.
Holding up a prototype, he noted that “It’s shaped like the Apple logo and it comes in different colors and… um… it gets all lathery… and stuff…
“It… really does make a big lather.”
The engineer was unable to point to any trends that would indicate the Apple soap-on-a-rope would be a success. He did note that he was assigned to the project immediately after coming off a grueling 18-month stint developing the iPod socks.
Sources indicate that CEO Steve Jobs will be the eventual decision maker as to which product gets the nod as the heir to the iPod throne. Jobs has reportedly taken home three of the hub devices, as well as a crate full of soap-on-a-ropes and is even reported to have enjoyed both at the same time, while bathing in his tub.