Live at 10am PST Today, Apple Showtime, live blogging galore |
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Can you feel the earth starting to shake in anticipation of Apple king Steve Jobs to make his appearance on stage to announce one of the worst kept secrets ever? Movies in the iTunes store, we know that’s coming, in fact there are already leaking images on the German version of the Quicktime store.
You can follow the streaming live event here on the official Apple website. I’ll be watching (even was not streamed live) and updating this post as the live action unfolds, so be sure to refresh this post.
Also liveblogging (will add to this list as I find others)
- Hmm reader Gerald at GWh!z
- Engadget is actually at the event but I’m getting 404 on their site at the moment. Might want to try one of the others
- TUAW, also having loading problems
- CNET
Live Blogging Showtime
Appears as is there won’t be a live stream at the location mentioned above. Steve is on the stage per Engadget, but their site keeps crashing.
- games on the iPod including Pac-Man! These games will sell for $4.99 and are available in the iTunes store.
- lowered price on iPod to $249 for 60GB and $349 for 80GB and 75% longer battery life
- aluminum Nano casing to be available ($79, taking orders now for October ship date)
- iTunes has a market share of 88% for legal US downloads! Wow. Take that, all other music stores. iTunes is now officially the fifth largest music reseller in the US behind Walmart (#1), Best Buy, Target and Amazon.
- iTunes 7 will soon be available (keep checking Software Update or iTunes.com) and include: missing album art (freely downloaded), a new cover flow view which Engadget describes as like flipping through your CD rack
- over 45 million TV shows have been downloaded, over 220 TV shows from over 40 networks
- Bringing on the NFL Network: NFL season highlights on iTunes. $1.99 for each game, $24.99 for a season pass. Bummer, no full games?
- Video resolution to increase to 640×480 and iTunes can now play “seamless video” using H.264
- iTunes Movies include Disney studios as expected: Pixar, Touchstone, Miramax and of course Disney. Over 70 films available today including Pirates of the Carribean at a price of $12.99 for new films and $9.99 for older titles. 640×480 and same usage rights at TV shows.
- US only, international availability in 2007.
- new titles will be available the same day as DVD (at $12.99)
- Disney CEO Bob Iger: “We’re confident that movies are going to work as well as TV on iTunes.”
- sneak peek of product available first quarter in 2007: iTV that will wirelessly communicate with the computer to connect to your flat screen TV (HDMI). Will sell for $299 and work with PCs and Mac
Summary
less expensive iPods, more battery life, new Nano options, Disney movies available in US only at 640×480 and same day as DVDs hits stores, iTunes 7 with some new functionality.
- iPod with video ships next week, iTunes 6.0 ready for download now
- Videos via iPod at $1.99 by September?
- iTunes adds more TV shows, including some NBC and vintage programs
- Today we find out if movies are Apple’s announcement
- Apple iTunes sells 25 million downloads in 8 months
- iTunes 4.9 with podcast support released
TDavid… THAT was some fun ride today. Already bought Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Not too shabby despite what should have been a faster download! Wifey’s excited about the iTV or whatever it’s going to morph into. No rewinding, no scratched or cracked DVDs (and no returns to the store). Yeah, she’s drinking the koolaid (finally).
Everyone’s chatting up iT7 and I’m thinking one of the more interesting sidebars is QuickTime can now play Flash content. THAT’s kind of interesting in a subtle but oddly important way. For instance PDF is at the core of Apple’s rendering engines. Now that Flash is part of the Adobe family and formally a cousin to PDF… I’m just thinking that maybe Macromedia’s goodness is creeping into the Apple OS stack at some really interesting depths… ie. consoles, tablets, mobile, kiosks, etc. Oh, and I do see the black helicopters occassionally. Gotta get my tinfoil hat back on, too.
Say hi to the family and thanks for the link love today!
Gerald in Tulsa
Comment by Gerald Buckley — September 12, 2006 @ 10:30 pm PST
Back atcha, Gerald. I missed the Flash part. Is that in QT now? (running off to check the site). I like the new iTunes 7 look. Kinda odd that it is a blue motiff.
Comment by TDavid — September 12, 2006 @ 10:37 pm PST
What exactly is the $24.99 NFL season pass? I would like to watch every single game during the season, and Sunday NFL Ticket doesn’t work because you can’t Tivo 8 games at once. I don’t know why the NFL is hesitant to offer complete games. People will always watch sporting events live so they wouldn’t be out of anything. They could make a lot of money on a New York Giants fan who lives in San Francisco and wants to every game of his favorite team.
Comment by Fast Eddie — September 12, 2006 @ 11:50 pm PST
Yep, it’s in the 7.1.3 release of QuickTime as of yesterday. The home Mac had the immediately previous version and Flash playback wasn’t available.
Why anyone would need two playback methods is beyond me as the Macromedia/Adobe embedded player/plugin does a fantastic job. I’m thinking OS level functionality still.
Comment by Gerald Buckley — September 13, 2006 @ 7:14 am PST
Guess why Flash is available as a QuickTime playback? Go ahead… I’ll wait.
If you guessed for game play on the iPod you’d be right.
So, nothing nefarious about it. But, just imagine what else you could do. Flash on an iPod makes a whole new experience possible.
Comment by Gerald Buckley — September 13, 2006 @ 10:14 am PST
There are some really neat Flash games out there. I wonder if all Flash games will be able to run in the iPod with no changes? That would open up a huge library of games…
Comment by TDavid — September 13, 2006 @ 10:29 am PST