It’s the end of an era as Apple has announced that the upcoming Macworld San Francisco 2009 will be their last one. Why? Apple says:
Apple is reaching more people in more ways than ever before, so like many companies, trade shows have become a very minor part of how Apple reaches its customers. The increasing popularity of Apple’s Retail Stores, which more than 3.5 million people visit every week, and the Apple.com website enable Apple to directly reach more than a hundred million customers around the world in innovative new ways.In another break with tradition the last Macworld keynote will be delivered by Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, rather than Steve Jobs.
I can’t say this wasn’t totally expected. Macworld has diminished in importance in recent years as Apple shifted much of it’s Mac related announcements to their own annual WorldWide Developers Conference and scheduled iPod and other consumer device related announcements as stand-alone events.
It’s been a few years since Macworld’s heyday, when the keynote was an event worthy of a few missed hours of work (right Jason?) But I’ll still miss the weeks of frenzied pre-show anticipation as the rumors get more and more outlandish and the “leaked” product photos test the limits of their PhotoShop-wielding authors. Ah, memories.
So enjoy The Last Apple Macworld in a few weeks, and start getting ready for WWDC 2009 in June!
And in related but purely fictional news:
Comments & Trackbacks
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Well put… I think the other issue is that Apple no longer wants to be burdened with the pressure of having major new announcements on someone elses schedule. The “Apple Events” of the past few years have garnered almost as much media attention as the MW and WWDC keynotes have over the past few years. These are events Apple can schedule on their terms.
This also moves Steve Jobs further into the “cloud” if you will. Macworld Expo was the ONLY event in you could actually see Jobs speak LIVE. I saw a couple of these in the late 90s and its quite the event that has only grown over the years.
I don’t read as much into Schiller for Jobs as an indication Jobs tends to leave anytime soon as others do. What it indicates to me is a more routine product refresh keynote rather than anything earth shattering. Apple’s ENTIRE desktop line is due for an update and there could also be memory upgrades to both the iPhone and iPod Touch as well. Just don’t expect the mythical XMac/tablet/netMac/iPhone nano that everyone has been talking about (Sorry Dennis!).
Should be plenty to talk about in January even if Apple’s own announcements come up short.