“Apple’s plans to hold a special event next week have sent analysts into a flutter of prognostication, casting their cards for the future,” Jonny Evans reports for Macworld UK. “American Technology Research analyst Shaw Wu expects Intel-related news from Apple’s ‘fun’-focused event. He advises investors to build their holdings in the company. The analyst expects Apple will use the event to launch a world-first – a movie download service through iTunes. He said: ‘We believe there is a greater-than-50 per cent chance that Apple will announce its first, full-length feature films available for download on iTunes.’ He doesn’t yet believe the company will release the so-called ‘true video iPod’, a device that’s mooted to have a 3.5-inch colour screen and digital controls… Wu states: ‘There is a chance that Steve Jobs will make an announcement that no one anticipated. We will not attempt to guess what it is and let Steve surprise us.'”
Full article here.
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Very Interesting. I would like to see that.
I hope these movies will be in HIGH DEFINITION or else I don’t see the point when we already have “movies on demand” on cable.
I’m sure there are people who will buy them but I’m just saying that I won’t be one of them.
“We will not attempt to guess what it is….”
And then he does….
^Rick.
That would be a bit of a problem, considering the size of a high def full length movie.
A movie download service via iTunes would be the cat’s meow.
Never, NEVER underestimate the killing potential of a paraplegic kitten.
Research analyst don’t know crap.
He is reading rumor sites and guessing.
He is like a weatherman. When he is right, he is great. When he is wrong, oh well, it is hard to predect the weather.
I wish I had his job.
please please please tell me there will some kind of video content for the UK, we’re feeling forgotton 🙁
feature length films on iTunes?
We still haven’t got the TV series over here in Belgium…
hello Apple… listening??? anyone??? please please give us the TV series here in Belgium, so that we don’t have to wait untill our TV stations finally decide to skip the 47th rerun of some old stupid series
And, the AAPL stock is moving up yesterday and today very nicely.
Rick,
I don’t know about your cable provider, but I have all the premium on demand channels and there are maybe four movies I’d like to watch at any one time. I pay my fee, and it’s expired in 24 hours.
Best case: Apple lets you buy movies (in Hi-def).
Worst case: Apple lets you rent movies in the ipod resolution. Most likely with a constant and growing selection.
Of course, there are several other cases including transferring to ipod, requiring a special media center, standard definition (SD), subscription, etc.
An iPod shuffle you CAN eat!
Cable’s on-demand SUCKS. I agree ‘Hmmm’ – the selection is pathetic and I’m cancelling that whole part of my cable service.
The announcement specifically mentioned “fun”.
Apple has also completely revamped their games webpages…
http://www.apple.com/games/
…are they going after this market sector, the final excuse to stay with Windows?
Imagine an online immersive game experience for everyone. Using the imagination and graphics from Pixar, it would be like entering an extreme virtual 3D Disneyland, and you can go anywhere from Fantasyland for preteens to an Adventureland for adults that would make World of Warcraft look like Pacman. Powered by an Apple XGrid supercomputer, it would be free to the user as it gets its revenue from strategic product placement. Mac users get the advantage of video chatting with other players or mapping their face onto their player. Points are rewarded with Apple and Disney products, as well as from other advertisers. “Main Street” could even be online stores operated by the advertisers. THIS WOULD BE HUGE!!
…or maybe the announcement is for adding Donkey Kong to the iPods as a free upgrade.
And as an added bonus, Wu is allowed his own favorite picks on ITMS with features like:
Rush Hour
Rush hour 2
Ya Ya Sister Club
Enter the Fist
all i want is 24 over her in the uk.
thats it.
People with amnesia still remember Jack Bauer.
Jack Bauer once won a game of Connect 4 in 3 moves.
Jack Bauer has been to Mars. That’s why theres no life on Mars.
When the boogie man goes to sleep, he checks his closet for Jack Bauer
I’m surprised noone has noted the possible significance of the iCal icon in the announcement. Apple has always given clues to what they are presenting with the imagery they use in their invitations. Maybe it’s a revamped iCal or other iApps that do some insanely cool thing.
carlo: Us in the USA would like 24 also.
A refreshed MacMini with a full size 7200rpm drive and FrontRow would be awesome. I love my current mini but the dog slow internal drive sucks and my wife won’t allow any extra (drive) boxes sitting atop our 53″ Sony. The wireless Apple keyboard and mouse sitting on the coffee table draws her ire too.
DOA=LOL
can we establish a unit of energy, like ergs or something?
PPK/m2 perhaps? Call it “mittens?”
Anybody?
Oh, and I EFFING *DEMAND* HD MOVIES ON ITMS!!!!
Wall Street loves ‘Brand Extension’. Apple is going to jump in the fray shortly by the launch of a QuickTime Movie Store on a new version of QuickTime. Why would this make sense?
iTunes, by name and history has long been associated with audio content and QuickTime with video. Splitting video off to a separate app under the QuickTime banner for video content would allow both Apple and end-users to win.
Apple could streamline the increasingly cluttered iTunes navigation by removing video content. Likewise, the creation of a store interface for QuickTime will allow for a clean and easy to navigate interface for those interested in video content. It will also draw from and add to the QuickTime brand.
iTunes and QuickTime are downloaded in a bundle for Windows and are already installed on Macs. By launching a QuickTime/iTunes upgrade and installing them again as a bundle, Apple pushes it’s brands and technologies even further into the Windows PC universe.
Don’t react out of the pocket. Think on it awhile. It makes very good sense.
On Feb 28, Disney is releasing Lady and the Tramp on DVD.
Could their be a connection?
Hmmm.
I wish Apple did something like iTMS for software purchases. Esp. if it would work together with VersionTracker.Actually, Linotype “borrowed” Apple’s iTMS browser for their FontExplorer+Shop. Very smart idea.
50% of a movie download service. How do they come up with these numbers?
Sorry. I meant “50% chance of a movie download service.”
MS: Ground, as in “ground-breaking.”