Apple “Let’s Rock” Keynote Live!
by Eric March on September 9, 2008 at 2:00 pm
It’s that time of the year again. Apple’s called a town hall and The Steve is giving his keynote announcing this year’s newest lineup of iPods, and as we have done for the last two Stevenotes, we’re here with a window on the events, but I’m going to try something new this year. I’m going to try a bit of armchair liveblogging, following the events as they happen on other blogs who are also following the events as they happen, so you can all get the news more or less as it happens.
Sit down, strap in, and enjoy the ride! Keep refreshing this article periodically for new events.
Note: Events will be displayed in top-down format, with the newest events shown first. All times are EST.
1:58PM: Looks like that’s it folks — the musical act usually rounds out the show, so it appears that we’re done here. Not too many surprises this time around, and the biggest rumours also turned out to be true. I feel kinda cheated that the leaks were real — odd as that may sound. Oh well. We’ll be back later with a brief recap and the video, once it hits Apple’s corner of the interweb. Thanks for tuning in!
1:56PM: Time for the musical number. No, it’s not John Mayer. It’s Jack Johnson.
1:54PM: Firmware 2.1 time. Lots of bug fixes, fewer dropped calls, “big” battery life improvement, supposedly fixes the crashing apps problem, faster backups, general performance increases. Let’s hope. Available this Friday.
1:51PM: Price drop! $399 for 32 gigs. Sweet. I guess that means $299 for 16GB. Awesome.
1:49PM: Battery specs time. The new 2G Touch will have 36 hours of music, 6 hours of video.
1:48PM: Need for Speed: Undercover. Now this looks freakin’ sweet. Gorgeous graphics.
1:46PM: He really likes Spore. Can’t blame him. Now it’s on to Real Soccer 2009. Not much of a sports nut myself, but this thing looks pretty sweet — a lot like *ahem* FIFA *ahem*. Finally, some on-screen soft buttons instead of accelerometer control where it doesn’t belong. Gesture control for some functions, too. Nice.
1:45:PM: Spore Origins, which was just released the other day, but we know all about that.
1:45PM: Phil Schiller is out now to demo some stuff…
1:41PM: Nike+ software built-in of course.
1:40PM: Built-in speaker! About damn time. Now we know where the extra thickness is coming from: Nike+ and the speaker.
1:37PM: The new model will be thinner, and rounded like the iPhone 3G, but with contoured stainless steel design (no plastic? Interesting), new volume controls on the side (as rumoured), genius playlist integration. Improved UI for music and videos, integrated Nike+ receiver(!), you just need the shoe-based transmitter. That was unexpected.
1:36PM: iPod Touch is next — woohoo!
1:33PM: New optional in-ear headphones. Dual drivers (woofer and tweeter), 3 sizes of sleeves, inline single-button remote (click to play, double-click for next, triple-click for previous, plus a microphone for voice recording. $79 for these suckers. Meh. New armband accessory, too — also optional.
1:30PM: $149 8GB, $199 16GB. New “Nano-chromatic” colours. Purple, blue, green, yellow, orange, red, pink.
1:29PM: Jobs is pushing the green angle, with the Nano being made from environmentally-friendly materials.
1:27PM: New landscape mode photo browsing. Full-size album art when playing music. Nice. 24 hours of battery life with music, 4 hours video. Not bad for such a little device.
1:26PM: New voice recording feature when it detects a mic attached.
1:25PM: New “Shake to Shuffle” feature — they’re really getting mileage out of the Nano’s new accelerometer.
1:23PM: Nano is next. Looks like the spy shots were right: Rounded sides and edges, tall, portrait screen which can also be viewed in landscape mode via accelerometer control just like the Touch/iPhone. New Genius feature — press and hold center button for a pop-up Genius menu. Music browsing in list view (portrait) or coverflow (landscape).
1:22PM: 80GB Classic model is being upgraded to 120MB, remaining the same thickness. $249. Thick (160GB) model is being discontinued.
1:21PM: More statistics. 73.4% market share, 160 million sold.
1:20PM: iPod next — here we go!
1:18PM: iTunes 8 is available now, but we figured as much.
1:17PM: As it learns about what you like, you can make one-click Genius playlists that will group like music with like music — kind of like a Pandora-esque playlist. Interesting.
1:15PM: The Genius bar will gather information about your musical tastes, playing habits, etc. and send the data anonymously to iTunes, which will in turn make for smarter browsing of the iTunes store based on your preferences and such.
1:12PM: Genius bar, as was rumoured, voiceover accessibility feature, and the album cover browsing will scale to movies, TV shows, podcasts, etc…
1:11PM: New feature: Browse the music store by album cover, see album cover details…
1:09PM: iTunes 8 — cool.
1:06PM: Various stats about iTunes and iTMS, #1 music distributor in any format, yadda yadda. WE knew all that. NBC has returned to the fold after throwing its hissy fit some time back. HD TV shows becoming available for $2.99 a piece (nice).
1:04PM: Steve is on stage, mentions exciting things to come. First item of business: iTunes
13:02PM: Lights are dimming…
12:57PM: It begins. Announcer is telling everyone to turn off their cell phones.
12:54PM: Apparently they weren’t kidding when they wanted you to rock. Stones, Hendrix — definitely not John Mayer.
12:43PM: Waiting patiently for the event to begin at 1:00PM EST/10:00AM PST. The App Store is down, surprise, surprise…
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Posted in Apple Event, iPhone/iPod Touch Events, iPod Touch Related, iTunes Related
September 11th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
Nice to see what a great soccer fan the guy was when he said about the World Cup in 200*7*…
The Real Soccer game feels a lot more like Winning Eleven to me than that piece of crap Fifa pinball franchise.:)