News that Steve Jobs was definitely going to release a
tablet PC this afternoon was greeted with horror and sadness by Mac fan boys
who treated the news as if it was reading the last page of a murder mystery.
Macworld
slammed Gizmodo for running a yarn which said publisher
McGraw-Hill's Harold Terry McGraw claimed that Apple will take the wraps off a
tablet this afternoon McGraw said his outfit had been working on a tablet with
Apple for quite a while. He added that the tablet's operating system will be
based on the iPhone OS, implying that all work done on developing apps for the
iPhone OS will be easily transferable to the tablet. There will also be a
"consortium of e-books" available, and 95 percent of McGraw-Hill's
library will be available in that format.
All usual stuff that has been running for weeks but,
forgetting that not conforming to a manufacturer's marketing campaign is what
news is all about MacWorld whined “So much for the element of surprise”.
This is like that dark day when Apple's new iMac was to
appear on the cover of Time the day Steve Jobs unveiled that desktop at that
year's Macworld Expo. But the night before that keynote, someone at Time Canada
pulled the trigger on the story too quickly, posting images and details of the
iMac well before Steve Jobs took the stage. Oh dear and the world stopped turning because some
magazine did not do what Steve Jobs said.
“It's unclear what Apple's reaction will be to
McGraw-Hill's premature declaration. But I'm sure there's a former Time Canada
employee who could probably tell Harold McGraw III just how cold the winters
can get up north,” the rag imperiously says.
It is nice to be assured that you will not get any scoops
from Macworld as that will be spoiling Steve Jobs's surprise. Sheeh are they
journalists or press officers? For the record there is going to be little surprising
about today's event. Apple has been leaking news about the tablet for months.
The only thing surprising will be if the gizmo works, the date Apple will
release it and how much cash and mark-up Jobs is going to screw the fanboys
dumb enough to buy one.