macworld

No Jobs means no Macworld splash

Without Steve Jobs attending next month's Macworld keynote, it's safe to say Apple won't be making a huge splash in January.

Before Tuesday's announcement that Jobs would skip the annual Macworld keynote, the usual rumor mill was in full swing, with speculation about Apple Netbooks, iPhone Nanos, and the like. The news that Phil Schiller, senior vice president of worldwide marketing, will be giving the keynote (the Philnote?) brought all that speculation to a halt.

Apple made it pretty clear yesterday that it is not expecting this Macworld to pack a punch. "It doesn't … Read more

Novell cancels its 2009 BrainShare conference

Novell just announced that it is canceling its annual BrainShare conference, a place for customers and partners to gather for training and discussion around Novell technology. Citing the desire to cater to attendee cost considerations, Novell's vice president of marketing, John Dragoon, is shuttering a 20-year tradition, at least for 2009:

As many of you know, Novell has held BrainShare for more than 20 years, and it is a tradition we are proud of. I also know that our customers and partners always look forward to this conference.

Despite this, many of you have indicated that because of the … Read more

Without Macworld, how will Apple create the buzz?

With its decision to end its relationship with the Macworld Expo, Apple is cutting one of its last ties to an era in which it wasn't a technology powerhouse.

The shocking news that January's Macworld would be the last with Apple's participation--and that CEO Steve Jobs will not appear--reveals an Apple that has decided it no longer needs to make an appearance at the event that has come to define the company in recent years. In doing so, it's also preparing for a future when its iconic founder no longer dominates the stage the way … Read more

How does Apple's Macworld decision affect the faithful?

Apple's decision to make January's Macworld its last offers fodder for endless speculation. But another big question is how this will go down with the Mac faithful who have flocked to this annual event through good times and bad.

To be sure, there will be official Apple events in the future, like the Worldwide Developers Conference. But most fans--the civilians--likely won't be able to gain access to such events, which are usually reserved for press, analysts, VIPs, and developers.

So, as one colleague of mine put it, Macworld has long been the public carnival for Mac fans, … Read more

Jobs to skip Macworld keynote as Apple backs out

This post was updated at 2:30 p.m. PST with more details, and at 6:15 p.m. with IDG's reaction.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs has given his last keynote address at Macworld in San Francisco.

The company announced on Tuesday afternoon that January's Macworld would mark its last year participating at the show, which is run by publishing company IDG. In addition, Apple said Phil Schiller, senior vice president of worldwide marketing, will deliver the keynote, usually handled by Jobs.

Apple representative Steve Dowling declined to comment on Jobs' health, a prominent topic of discussion this year. Jobs' keynote addresses at Macworld have become almost legendary events, launch pads for some of the company's most important products and strategies. His absence from what many in the Apple community consider their Super Bowl will once again revive rumors that Jobs is ill.

"Phil is giving the keynote because this will be Apple's last year at the show," Dowling said. "It doesn't make sense for us to make a major investment in a trade show we will no longer be attending."

Apple seems to be declaring that it no longer needs industry events like Macworld to get its message out. The company has 250 retail stores around the world that draw millions of people a week, and its Web site is among the top 10 sites, in terms of traffic, on the Internet.… Read more

Mac OS X Snow Leopard coming early?

Apple's OS X Snow Leopard may be on tap for the start of the new year, slightly earlier than expected.

The update appears to be slated for debut in the first quarter of 2009, according to a slide presented by Jordan Hubbard, Apple's director of engineering for Unix technologies, at a conference last week.

Snow Leopard, or version 10.6 of the operating system, is expected to be optimized for multicore processors, include QuickTime X, and offer built-in support for Microsoft's Exchange 2007 software.

Apple previewed Snow Leopard in June. At that time, Apple said that Snow … Read more

New 'MacHeads' trailer surfaces

If Tuesday's news of new, more-powerful, Mac laptops wasn't enough to stoke the fires of the Apple faithful, I've got even more to offer.

Tuesday afternoon, the producers of the forthcoming film, MacHeads, released a new trailer. The film is scheduled for a fall release. No word yet on how it will be distributed.

The film, as noted here in January, will take a close look at what Wired writer Leander Kahney has termed the "cult of Mac."

The new trailer doesn't shed much more light on the contents of the film, but for … Read more

Where blazers, T-shirts, and flip-flops are great

EPISODE 81

Natali Del Conte, star of CNET's hit show Loaded, joins the boys of the 404 to talk about Jeff's visit to see Shigeru Miyamoto, digital copy of Juno, and movies coming up this weekend.

Listen now: Download today's podcast

Apple and the rest of us...a different view

Tim Leberecht, in a Matter/Anti-Matter blog post, asks whether Apple's "shock and awe" approach to product announcements is a dinosaur in a Web 2.0 world. I think there are a couple of other points worth making for perspective on this.

First, Apple has shifted dramatically from purely relying on big announcements at big events. It used to be, until just a few years ago, that Apple really only had two times each year that it made major hardware announcements: Macworld expos in San Francisco and New York. The developers conference was used for software announcements. … Read more