According to those ever-quotable "people familiar with the matter," Steve Jobs is still "closely involved" in "key aspects" of running Apple, reports the
Wall Street Journal. While
Tina Fey's favorite keynote-giver has remained incognito ever since
he took a medical leave in January, the
WSJ has learned that he's been working hard from home, involved in strategy and key products -- including some nitty gritty of the new interface elements in iPhone 3.0. The article also makes mention of a jumbo-sized iPod touch of sorts (an iTablet, if you will), but it's hard to tell if that word is from these same people familiar with the matter, or if the
WSJ is just picking up that
perennial rumor from less reputable sources. Apple's of course remaining tight-lipped, merely stating that "Steve continues to look forward to returning to Apple at the end of June." All we know is that we're looking forward to putting all this rampant speculation behind us, and an Apple-involved Steve seems like a great step in that direction.
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
posted Apr 11th 2009 12:58PM
steve is god
If he's God, why's he following Microsoft. I mean they were the first ones to make a Tablet PC :).
Then, after it comes out, all the iFanboys will say existing tables are ripping off Apple.
Then, after it comes out, all the iFanboys will say existing tablets are ripping off Apple.
Microsoft did the first tablet? What's it called?
No. But Bill Gates is.
Who cares what the emaciating Syrian is up to? He's just another CEO of a high margin corporation.
Steve Jobs did start Pixar, after buying George Lucas's computer special effects division from Industrial Light and Magic. So Steve was practically invented computer animated films, and along with Woz made the first personal computer with a keyboard and monitor. He was behind the Mac, which had a GUI which was copied by Microsoft. He was also behind the iPod, iTunes and the iPhone and the App Store, which he called the biggest launch of his career.
He's had an impressive life. No surprise he's still in the background pulling strings.
Steve Jobs DID NOT INVENT animated films, are you crazy? He invested in a CG firm that's all, and they didn't even invent it. Steve Jobs a regular man with a talented team of thinkers, from whom he takes all the credit for.
Law 7
Get others to do the Work for you, but Always Take the Credit
Use the wisdom, knowledge, and legwork of other people to further your own cause. Not only will such assistance save you valuable time and energy, it will give you a godlike aura of efficiency and speed. In the end your helpers will be forgotten and you will be remembered. Never do yourself what others can do for you.
@Gerardo Calixto
By your rational, Bill Gates didn't invent Windows. If you read any biography of Bill Gates you will know that the only thing that Gates ever coded was BASIC on the Altair. DOS was bought outright and Windows was coded by programmers paid by Gates. Of course, I think he deserves credit because he had the vision for Windows (after seeing it on the LISA of course).
If you read any biography of Steve Jobs, it will tell you that before Steve Jobs bought the company, which was called Graphic Groups at Industrial Light and Magic, Pixar did special effects for movies like Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan. When Steve Jobs bought the company, he tasked them with making the first fully computer animated feature. I think he deserves the credit for the result, which was Toy Story almost a decade later.
I almost forgot to mention that Steve Jobs was also indirectly responsible for the World Wide Web.
The world wide web was created on a NeXT computer, the company that Steve Jobs created after he left Apple in 1985. Tim Berners-Lee was able to invent the World Wide Web because of a hypertext program and a text editor used in NeXTStep.
I also have Tim Berners-Lee's book "Weaving the Web," which states on page 28-29, "The NeXT interface was beautiful, smooth, and consistent. It had great flexibility, and other features that would not be seen on PCs til later, such as voice e-mail, and a built-in synthesizer. It also had software to create a hypertext program... I still had to find a way to turn text into hypertext, though. This required being able to distinguish text that was a link from test that wasn't.
I delved into the files that defined the internal workings of the text editor, and happily found a spare thirty-two-bit piece of memory, which the developers of NeXT had graciously left open for future use by tinkerers like me. I was able to use the spare space as a pointer from each span of text to the address for any hypertext link. With this, hypertext was easy. I was then able to rapidly write the code for the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), the language computers would use to communicate over the Internet, and the Universal Resource Indentifier (URI), the scheme for document addresses. By mid-November I had a client program---a point-and-click browser/editor---which I just called WorldWideWeb.... Like the first client, the server actually ran on my desktop NeXT machine."
I think Paul A Chapel man should just shut up.
Guys, Steve Jobs deserves credits on everything that came after his decisions. Being a leader of even a small group and making sure that this group will work hard, respect each other then accept a distant vision from a man that had no university degree is by far the hardest thing anyone could ever accomplish in such world and time. Jobs did it and still doing it right, as well as Gates. Both are great in their own ways, both screwed up a little and both have done more than any of us have done or will do.
How the hell can you people be so fanatical in your support of companies like Apple, Microsoft? You seem blind to the flaws in your operating system of choice and instead to worship them as if they were Gods. Personally I don’t think any of the three major consumer operating systems, or the companies behind them, are particularly great:
-Apple sell high priced products based largely on image rather than substance. I don’t know if OSX is any good since I’d pay the prices required to try it.
-Microsoft have single-handledly destroyed the computer industry, stiffing competition and innovation while producing bloated, inefficient and often poorly designed software.
-Linux is too hard for most people to use and many aspects of the various distributions don’t work well. If you don’t know what you’re doing you can easily destroy your system and have to reinstall everything.
The blind fanaticism towards operating systems is absurd. Can’t you simply use the one you like best and shut up about it instead of trying to tell everyone how great it is?
"Microsoft did the first tablet? What's it called?"
Microsoft invented the concept and marketed it to various OEMs. Windows XP Tablet Edition was the first OS to implement this concept.
@P.A.C Man
Bible says God created the world...If steve jobs called you personally and told you his life story, by all means go ahead and talks about it like concrete cuz it came from his mouth. If not, STFU and don't beleive everything you read.
@ P.A.C Man
Thank you for proving your point. You, unlike 99.999% of the Engadget readers, provided hard facts that can't be denied. The only little extra thing you could have done was add a link to your sources, and if you did that, it'd be good enough for a college paper (a little sarcasm to the morons who I KNOW would say something about how my college must suck if that was a college worthy paper)
@ comments4cheap
You are an idiot. P.A.C Man obviously did his research. You just posted a comment that you illegibly typed out in about 10 seconds. Go on Google, search up both Steve Job's and Bill Gate's biographies...and to ensure you have FACTS and not a laid out story, look for multiple biographies...until you do that, I believe YOU should be the one shutting the fuck up.
GRiD computing marketed and sold the first commercial pen top computer in 1989 called the Grid Pad. It ran on MS DOS, but Microsoft had nothing to do with it's development.
The Palm Pilot also predates the "Tablet PC", but of course, a Palm Pilot IS a small tablet PC, albeit with a limiter set of functionality as compared to something like Windows.
All Microsoft did was add some APIs to Windows to make it work a little better on a touch screen.
I'm not saying it was bad, (although using an early table, i found it to be painful for anything other than casual web surfing) but saying that Microsoft invented the first Tablet PC is like saying Apple invented the touch screen smart phone.
@Jon Graft
I DON'T CARE WHO WROTE WHAT, YOU DUMMY. You believe everything you read then fine, that's your business. Next time read the Bible and kill your parents as revenge for making you dumb.
Paul, just because the world believes FUD doesn't mean people who know better will. If you want to tell CNN that Jobs invented the world, they would probably believe you. There are on the other hand plenty of people who know there were people who know that while just like other great men, Jobs did a lot, he did not do everything.
The man behind the creation of Toy Story was not Jobs, but rather John Lasseter. Toy Story was his vision, as was PIXAR as an animation studio. Jobs saw it as a hardware company, in the same way that Apple is today. Very similar business model, bad timing. In fact Jobs was considering selling the company UNTIL Disney agreed to publish Lasseter's idea. So sorry, Jobs did not create the first fully animated feature film. Let's also not forget the fact that there is controversy to this day as whether it was Toy Story or Cassiopéia that was first full CGI film. Pixar made clay models and scanned them into CGI. Cassiopéia was made from purely Virtual Models, but did come out after Toy Story.
The web is not just HTTP, in fact there is a lot out there that isn't just HTTP. If you want to say he was indirectly responsible for HTTP because he owned a company that happened to leave something open for another tinker to sort through and convert into HIS idea. Then yes, he indirectly invented HTTP. But, by that standard, Bill Gates invented the modern computer and the Web, both of which he played larger role in shaping then Jobs did. In fact, by that standard, I would agree that Al Gore invented the Internet. Funny how you think it should only apply to one person huh? Why not go further back, Tesla invented the 21'st Century. After inventing Wireless transmission, he had the grand idea of a global power and information network. He invented WiFi, Bluetooth, the Cellphone, Satellites, oh, and don't forget, your iPhone. Sorry Jobs, it was really Tesla.
Honestly, Jobs is good, not a god. Apple is a company that makes a good product, not the only product, and definitely not the perfect product or everyone would only own Apple products. Quit being such a suck up douche bag.
To you Anti-Apple Fan boys, you stfu as well.
Richard,
Your trifecta reminds me of another which also collects fanbois and blind faith:
Judaism
Christianity
Islam
Funny that. :)
Steve is jesus
P.A.C. Man is just an Apple troll. The other day he was telling about how Steve Jobs was indirectly responsible for creating Oxygen.
@ CraigJ:
"The Palm Pilot also predates the "Tablet PC", but of course, a Palm Pilot IS a small tablet PC, albeit with a limiter set of functionality as compared to something like Windows."
True about the Palm Pilot, but also consider that the Apple invented the PDA when they came up with the Newton. The Pilot followed and MS turned on the photocopy machine again and came out with a joke called WinCE.
Rumors say Steve is stuffing fried chicken and pasta down his gullet while fine-tuning the tablet. He's not only hungry for food, but hungry for dominating the tablet market while the rest of the industry has their pants down trying to copy the iPhone and open on-line stores.
Microsoft may have been the first to make a tablet PC, but they were also the first to screw it up by probably using some stylus-based interface. What'd they sell, about a couple of dozen of those things. When the Apple tablet hits the streets, there'll be lines around the block just to get to touch one. They'll sell a million of them in a month. Since it'll run the same OS as the iPhone and iPod Touch, people will be downloading apps from day one. Sorry, this is not going to be like your typical Windows tablet. The Apple logo says it all.
LOL, PAC, nice job.
Shock news just in: Pope is a Catholic.
News just in: Mr. Anderson took the blue pill.
Jesus kills Pope, makes Snowball leader of Catholic Church.
THANKS CAPTAIN OBVIOUS!!
he will definitely drive innovation.
http://img73.imageshack.us/img73/9940/touchu.jpg
That makes me wonder if the iTablet will get relegated as a me-too device after the CrunchPad. Probably not, as inconvenient facts that get in the way of praise are simply disregarded.
iTablet, the iPhone scaled by 300% with OS X
What are the chances of him coming back and being close to 200lbs? Or is it going to be a return of Bone Jobs?
Bone Jobs? That sounds dirty.
Let me guess. A 7" or so capacitive touchscreen iTablet. That sounds likely considering it's not going to be much different from the iPhone interface only w/ a shrinked down OSX designed for a tablet version.
Would Engadget have headlines if the question mark had not been invented?
Just back in time for the new iphone release.
way to provoke it, engadget.
If I were Steve Jobs, I'd be reading engadget right now... maybe even these comments. In light of that, I begin.
..OS X, despite having the best default user interface of any desktop OS, doesn't have hardware support worth a darn.
The vast majority of people still use Windows. OS X is not supposed to be used, according to the EULA, in 'mission critical' applications. Hospitals, places where life is constantly on the line, rely almost entirely upon Microsoft products. People are sick of these games.
So tell us, Steve-- Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or are you going to change the world?
So long ago when Apple tried to license OS X, it was their only asset. Now they have hardware design that is without competition. Having taken apart a powermac G3, G4, my Inspiron 1420n, and many a non-Apple desktop machine, I know that 'thin and shiny' takes some design skills, and Apple has those skills. Times have changed. License OS X.
Because Apple hasn't heard those comments before.
And clearly they must be idiots for not following them, judging from Apple's performance the last couple years.
What is great about os x is that it doesn't have to worry about being compatible with a zillion machines.
That means Apple can innovate in a rapid pace.
Most people think OSX would evolve just as quickly even if it was licensed to third parties. That is wrong.
They don't have to do it the way MS does it. They can set standards-- for ACPI implementations, for firmware, so on. It could be that only a small number of non-Apple computers are 'OS X capable' machines. That's fine. If that's a feature people want, and it is, hardware manufacturers can get their butts in gear and meet those technical standards. They don't have to settle just 'cause they license.
What makes Apple so profitable is their hardware. People buy their computers for OS X (and some for the design), however selling operating systems on a wider, yet still limited scale (to allow for stability), would hurt their business. Their is a reason Apple is strongly fighting companies like Psystar, although that company legally bought the operating system.
I don't doubt that the way Apple runs their business now is the best way to suck as much money out of people as possible.
I'm saying that if that's Steve Jobs' version of 'changing the world', it's not good enough.
He changed the world with the original mac in 1984.
The pc wars are over. He said it himself.
Now it's about delivering a superior product.
The x86 war is over.
The OS war is just getting started.
"So long ago when Apple tried to license OS X, it was their only asset"
I think it was OS8 they licensed out.
I'm surprised Apple hasn't developed a Tablet Mac yet. It seems like a natural fit. I use to use my way underpowered TabletPC for video editing, and it was great for it. It's so much more fluid and natural to tap the screen with a pen than it is to use a mouse or, worse, a trackpad.
It bemuses me to see Mac owners ask, "why would I want that?" when it is obviously a much better interface for your portable computer.
The way tablets are now isn't good enough. That's why they haven't been successful.
There shouldn't be a stylus. The os should be optimized for touch gestures and that creates problems with maintaining multiple os variations. If Apple wants to make a tablet, and they use the iphone os, they should release an ilife/iwork suit built just for that, plus allow compatibility with existing iphone os apps, and unlock background processes. Otherwise it is a big ipod touch with a larger screen and a better processor, and no one will buy that.
I think iPad makes the most sense.
Too close to iPod.
How about Maxi Pad?
iSlate?
Tablet PC? O,wait...
Interesting news but whats with all those stupid commas. Do you not know how to construct sentences at Engadget. It drives me nuts! When there are only two parts to a sentence you use an 'and'. For a website thats been running for ages you really need to work on you English writing skills! lol
wow, You are a loser, your life has amounted to being a critic in a gadget blog!!!
"Do you not know how to contruct sentences at Engadget."
I think you need a question mark at the end of that sentence,
"I think you need a question mark at the end of that sentence,"
I think you need a question mark at the end of that sentence.
I think I needed to put 'full stop' instead of 'question mark' in that sentence.
If anything comes of this patent, my bet is that it will be called the Macbook Touch.
Nah Mac touch. It won't have a physical keyboard.
Steve Jobs, dont worry about comments. I already kept some money separately in my wallet to buy that iTablet or iPad. I say thank you for being a perfectionist and for selling quality products. I also thank Bill Gates for bringing computer, even World to each nook and corner of this planet. I also thank unsung heros, the developers of Linux, for their dedication to the welfare of the community they belong. We should learn 'perfectionism' from Steve Jobs, 'dedicated work' from Bill Gates and 'humanity' from Linux people. Jai Ho!!!!
How dare you be rational and give everyone their due credit on Engadget?
*ERROR*
*ERROR*
*ERROR*
Even if he is still involved in some decisions, I seriously wonder if chemotherapy has taken a toll on his mind as it can do to some people. The release of the latest Shuffle is what makes me wonder so.
Dear 'god' , please give us a new iphone with processor of a asus smartphone , build quality of a nokia e71 , screen of a omnia hd , camera of a n86 , flexibility of a windows smartphone , form factor of a nokia n97 , keep your awesome OS And just name it iphone. i'll die happily then .
Now that'll be a jesus phone.
why would i desire this? I have no need for even a laptop! LoLz. I have a good feeling that its gonna be another nettop low power low performance POS. How else would you contain heat dissipation without burning your hand while holding it?
Well, since YOU have no need for "even a laptop" then I suppose Apple shouldn't make one of these.
BTW, I have one of the new MacBooks. I upgraded the drive to a 7200 RPM drive that runs hotter, and even after being in use for 3 hours, is is not even close to being hot enough to burn, or really even be uncomfortable.
The dude in the picture should have a turtleneck.
...its actually a tablet calculator...
...the guy in the picture is adding up how many months he has to give up eating to purchase it...
...
...the answer is 9...
Hmmmm.. I wonder will it be under $2,000 bucks? Not likely I know.
@ P.A.C.-Man
Before you say something like Steve Jobs created Pixar... you might want to get your facts straight first. Pixar has been around for a while, before the acquisition by Apple, working on The Wrath of Khan and another film (I forget at the moment). It was really John Lasseter who made Pixar what it is today. Jobs only purchased them as a form of selling their "machines" aka "pixars", outsourcing them to Lucas still for Howard the Duck and Return of the Jedi.
John Lasseter was the mind behind the CG. By your rational, it would be him to credit, and not Jobs.
Moses, lay off the glue. Huffing that stuff will leave you dumber than you already are.
Oh and BTW, Apple doesn't own Pixar. Disney acquired them a couple of years ago.
Ed T, maybe you should follow your own advice. Jobs bought Pixar and used it as a hardware company. Pixar made Toy Story and only after plans for Toy Story 2 were finalized did Disney buy Pixar from Jobs.
@ Shyam D:
Lay off the crack and the sorry attempts at trying to discredit Steve Jobs for the incredible direction and success he achieved with Pixar. You have ZERO clue about what you're talking about. Here, maybe you could try learning something (I suggest you read all the years in between too):
Steve Jobs CREATED "Pixar" in 1986:
http://www.pixar.com/companyinfo/history/1986.html
Toy Story 2 came out in 1999:
http://www.pixar.com/companyinfo/history/1999.html
Disney bought Pixar in 2006:
http://www.pixar.com/companyinfo/history/2006.html
So what are you going to say now? Try to discredit this info by saying Pixar's on website is spreading false information? Your post must be the stupidest thing I've seen in Engadget today; "used it as a hardware company." Get the F outta here.
@FoxKenji
Taken From their wikipedia page and sourced in the bibliography
"Initially, Pixar was a high-end computer hardware company whose core product was the Pixar Image Computer, a system primarily sold to government agencies and the medical community. One of the leading buyers of Pixar Image Computers was Disney Studios, which was using the device as part of their secretive CAPS project, using the machine and custom software to migrate the laborious Ink and Paint part of the 2-D animation process to a more automated and thus efficient method. The Image Computer never sold well.[8] In a bid to drive sales of the system, Pixar employee John Lasseter—who had long been creating short demonstration animations, such as Luxo Jr., to show off the device's capabilities—premiered his creations at SIGGRAPH, the computer graphics industry's largest convention, to great fanfare."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixar
"If I knew in 1986 how much it was going to cost to keep Pixar going, I doubt if I would have bought the company," admits Jobs. "The problem was, for many years the cost of the computers required to make animation we could sell was tremendously high. Only in the past few years has the price come down to the point that it makes business sense."
Since Jobs didn't buy Pixar intending to subsidize it forever, he insisted that Catmull and crew put off their ultimate goal--to make cartoons and movies--and develop salable technical products. The first was a piece of software called RenderMan, which enables computer-graphics artists to apply textures and colors to surfaces of 3-D objects onscreen. The Silicon Graphics workstations that generated the frighteningly realistic dinosaurs for Jurassic Park relied on RenderMan to create the creatures' scaly skin and ivory teeth. Pixar has sold about 100,000 copies of RenderMan, which was for many years the company's main source of revenue.
Disney was the second source of sales. Pixar created a software system called CAPS (short for computer animation production system) that helped Disney animators streamline the conventional animation process and juice up their special effects. IN TIME, it became clear that RenderMan, CAPS, and other ventures--like manufacturing computer-graphics hardware --were never going to pay Pixar's bills. Jobs decided that the company should concentrate on developing content...
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1995/09/18/206099/index.htm
@FoxKenji
No doubt did Steve Jobs help produce some amazing software (I've used renderman at work), I was merely stating that it wasn't him that made Pixar the animation giant it is.John Lasseter was the mind behind Luxo Jr. (their trademark now) and Toy Story. Don't get me wrong, Jobs "helped" but even in your source:
"...he insisted that Catmull and crew put off their ultimate goal--to make cartoons and movies--and develop salable technical products."
He bought the company as a hardware company, saw how it wasn't doing so great, then shifted towards software. In all aspects of this discussion, we are both right. I was pointing out how P.A.C. Man was pouring credit for computer generated animated films on Jobs when ultimately, Jobs didn't really have that goal in mind. Hell, Pixar weren't the creators of CG Animated films. 3D has been used in movies for a long time, before Toy Story came out. They did however mange to produce the first CGI "feature-length" animation, something that goes without saying.
Interesting article though. I'm going to thumb it up.
Nice, Fox, way to show these Apple/Steve Jobs haters.
TapBook!!!
...Apple, I'm expecting some royalties.
Where's my iNewton?
Time To Newton (TTN)~2:20
I still have to hand it to the billionaire CEOs; they get into the "grit" of their companies and stay involved. I guess once your done having fun with all that money life gets boring so you return to "normal" life. I don't know if I'd ever stop playing in a billionaires lifestyle, seems too fun!
http://www.sprootz.com
Sitting here with my girlfriend we still both get a horrible laugh out of all these rabid Appleboy comments on here.
If I bought something (Iphone HTC touch Palm Pre) why on earth would I want to TOUCH the screen. Last person who touched my screen is no longer able to fire a gun.
Tablets need to be cheap, due to the extra stress that will no doubt be put on them. That's where things like the Crunch come in. This is clearly going to cost the same as a CAR offering little more then web capabilities and a fruity logo.
"O but graphics design" Ya if you are a true designer (Getting a fkking pay check) you would have a proper TABLET and a 64bit version of Photoshop and even maybe a blu-ray burner reader.
Roommate with 3000 XPS laptop 1st year of university:
"I hate this laptop I keep getting viruses, I just talked to my mom I'm getting a mac"
Me: "Maybe you should stop downloading 'dirty porn' "
Apple: For people to stupid to use windows and to ignorant to use linux.
"If I bought something (Iphone HTC touch Palm Pre) why on earth would I want to TOUCH the screen."
Because that's how you well.. use it?
/Facepalm
"Ya if you are a true designer (Getting a fkking pay check)"
I am. I do not use a tablet or the 64bit Photoshop. I use a Mac, as I have for the last decade & a half, as do all the other Graphic Designers I know.
I also have used Windows for the last 15 years (not for anything productive beyond writing), and have used Ubuntu. Never liked Windows, Ubuntu is cool though.
By your comments, I'm pretty convinced you are the stupid one.
Bet that "girlfriend" is even two timing you.
@Bryant "Microsoft invented the concept and marketed it to various OEMs."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynabook
The whole idea of "invention" is romanticized as a unique creative event. In reality, most of what we call invention really involves the successful synthesis of concepts contributed by multiple people that evolve over time until they reach a point where they can be built. Even then the concepts continue to evolve and cross-pollinate each other. The classic example from the computer world is the interaction between Xerox PARC, Apple, and Microsoft on windowed interfaces and then subsequent expansion into other implementations.
You can call it copying or you can call it building on foundations.
Tagbert you are wright, even Apple contributed to the Tablet thingy with Newton, and Knowledge Navigator;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Navigator
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5144094928842683632
I am a PC fan but I am happy that Steve Jobs is around doing things despite his illness.
Go Steve !
mermermer + rcarm = lame gayness
Shouldn't they be pulling attention away from Steve Jobs for the time being? It's obvious that in the past, and at the moment, Steve Jobs has essentially been Apple. So now that it's looking more and more like he's pretty much done at Apple, wouldn't it be wise for them to show that he isn't necessary for their survival, so when the time comes that he actually leaves, the company doesn't immediately take a nose dive?
I think Jobs himself said something to the effect that he made sure Apple can continue without him. Some say Jonathan Ives might be the next successor.
Has Apple confirmed they are working on a tablet? If so I may just hold off on buying a PMP/MID. But I really need something now.
With the exception of the iPhone, Apple doesn't usually confirm anything till the day of product launch. Sometimes they don't even announce anything, the new product just shows up at Apple's website (like the last iPod Shuffle).
But tablet, Mac or not, I don't see why people want one so bad. What for?
I typically loathe Apple, however I am cautiously excited about the prospect of a tablet based on their touch IP...
It may be the product (providing they don't screw it up like they did their phone) that makes my pull out my wallet.
I think a nice sized screen multi touch based interface and less crippling than their ipod touch or ipod phone would be fantastic.
that drawing ACTUALLY looks like a really accurate depiction of jobs testing that damn thing.
tomo
I am sitting here staring at my aluminum MacBook, wondering why Apple doesn't just cut the notebook in half, and use the screen part as the computer! It would be super thin, would still have the iSight and gorgeous display, then stuff MacBook Air innards into it! Alternatively, it would be cool to be able to dual boot between OSX Leopard and iPhone 3.0. They could make it work with AT&T just like other 3G netbooks, except put a microphone on it and use the iSight for video chat. The 13" screen would be best because you wouldn't have to dumb down the OS and everything in Leopard is basically large enough to be touched. Come on Steve, do it!!
Also they could implement their multi-touch gestures that you make on the new no-button trackpad to the screen (2 finger scrolling, Expose, 3-finger back and forward on Safari, etc.) into Snow Leopard and put it into their MacBook Touch on the screen, and the non-touch notebooks, keep it on the trackpad.
Running iPhone OS 3.0 (because it will most certainly launch at the same time or before this MacBook touch) and including an accelerometer would allow it to launch a whole new kind of gaming, like an iPod touch on steroids, with better sound, and more screen real estate for the developers to make the games with. And with the 1280x800 resolution, it could produce images that almost look as good as the console game systems, ensuring Apple will steal sales from the DS and PSP with the iPhone/iPod touch and the PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii with the MacBook Touch. Think of the possibilities!