Phil Schiller keynote live from WWDC 2009
9:44AM Radiohead... again. ‘15 Step’ — 9:39AM And we're in! We've just gotten ourselves a sweet aisle seat, and hey... power! Thanks Apple, you sure know how to treat the livebloggers right. — Some thumping techno / rock on the soundsystem here — mood is nuts.
Context & Ripple Effects
Engadget's Apple-event liveblogs have been Steve Jobs shows since Macworld 2006 and through WWDC 2008, including January's Macworld 2009 keynote — so the confirmed handoff to marketing chief Phil Schiller at WWDC 2009 is itself the story: the first break in that four-year streak of founder-delivered keynotes.
The substance on deck matches the rumor trail leading in: Snow Leopard, a refreshed MacBook family, Safari 4 pushed via press release as 'the world's fastest' browser, and an App Store that has already cleared one billion downloads in nine months against an estimated $20–45 million in revenue — all while unconfirmed talk of a media-pad tablet hovers over the show.
First-order effects
- Developers in the room get Snow Leopard and Safari 4 on keynote day, while shoppers get a cheaper MacBook family whose batteries are now sealed inside the chassis rather than removable.
- Schiller carries the burden of proving the keynote format works without Jobs, with the entire tech press — Gizmodo, gdgt and others running parallel live coverage — watching that transition in real time.
Second-order effects
- AT&T absorbs fresh criticism as the sole US iPhone carrier, with syndicated coverage framing the carrier experience as the weak link in Apple's otherwise tightly controlled product stack.
- Windows PC makers face Apple cutting notebook prices mid-recession while simultaneously funding remodels of 100 stores for training and display space — a simultaneous price and footprint offensive.
Third-order effects
- If the Schiller keynote lands well, it de-risks Apple's dependence on a single presenter and shows the launch-event machinery can run on executives rather than the founder's stagecraft.
- With one billion apps downloaded in nine months, Apple's center of gravity is visibly shifting from Mac hardware toward the iPhone platform economy — and the unconfirmed ARM hiring and tablet chatter suggest the hardware roadmap bends the same way.
The trend: Apple's product-launch apparatus is institutionalizing beyond its founder-presenter just as the App Store economy becomes the company's growth engine.