“The half-life of excitement levels surrounding Apple events is now measured in minutes,” Gary Cutlack writes for TechRadar. “People go from joyous sobbing to complete disinterest in the time it takes to compose and edit a cynical tweet.”
“The latest Apple launch followed the format we’ve come to know and expect of big technology showcases, with months of leaks telling us exactly what to expect, before, about three minutes after the event, the world shrugs and gets on with its business,” Cutlack writes. “This week saw Apple use its latest gathering to reveal the new, slightly thinner iPad Air, about which Apple seemed most keen to talk about the reduction in bezel size. Men in shirts also droned on about Haswell-powered MacBook Pros, plus, in a pretty brave move for the money-loving tech giant, it announced plans to take its Garageband music software into the ‘freemium’ world and release the actually-really-free OS X Mavericks update.”
Cutlack writes, “But, after the usual bit of teatime live-tweeting excitement, everyone soon got back to discussing more important matters, like when Kyle and Gavin’s GarageBand album will be released. Apple hardware may still sell like the clappers to the mainstream buyer, but the cynical internet population seems to be over its Apple keynote obsession.”
Cutlack writes, “And as tends to happen when people dissect Apple’s present-day performances, the workmanlike nature of the streamed presentation naturally had many yearning for some hot Steve action. DavGreg summarised the Jobs-for-sainthood feeling with his comment: ‘The millionaires we saw on stage the other day are all smart guys with many talents, but I think not one has the fire in the belly and clarity of vision of Steve Jobs.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Let’s face it, Tim Cook has all the stage presence of a cardboard cutout.
As we’ve written many times before:
Tim Cook should seriously consider trying to convincing Jony Ive do Apple’s keynote presentations or, at the very least, participate in a significant fashion (live, not via video).
We know Jony can perform live and he’s mesmerizing when he does.
Have Jony onstage during Apple events and all of these silly “Where’s the excitement?”, “Should Tim Cook remain as Apple CEO?” and “Where are Apple’s innovations?” questions will evaporate immediately. Cook would be Apple CEO for as long as he wished. Where Apple is currently missing Steve Jobs the most is in the charisma department on-stage.
Failing that, pile on the Federighi; at least we can have a few laughs instead of just constantly missing Steve.