In an odd move for a company usually so laser-focused on 100% secrecy, Apple today issued a press release to tell the world that Steve Jobs would be announcing a slew of new products at the firm’s upcoming Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) event next week in San Francisco.
Apple, who usually leaves the product announcements to CEO Jobs in his now-legendary keynote addresses, announced that “Apple will unveil its next generation software – Lion, the eighth major release of Mac OS® X; iOS 5, the next version of Apple’s advanced mobile operating system which powers the iPad®, iPhone® and iPod touch®; and iCloud®, Apple’s upcoming cloud services offering.”
The announcement of the announcement is strange enough in itself, but the inclusion of Steve Jobs in the event will be heartening for long-time Apple fans – the enigmatic co-founder is currently away on medical leave. The announcement also helped Apple’s stock, which is up around 2.3% at the time of writing.
The iCloud service is purported to be Apple’s long-rumoured music locker service, that would compete with the likes of Amazon’s Cloud Player and Google Music. The key difference is that Apple, who has made friends with many in the music industry since finding a way to make them money in the digital age through iTunes, has the proper licensing agreements to in place. This will supposedly allow iTunes to scan your music library and provide a streamable copy of any music you already own in the cloud.
With Google’s service, all your music must be uploaded manually, and Amazon can only provide cloud-based copies of music you purchase through them.
There are also rumours that iOS 5 will include an overhaul of the iOS notification system and home screen widgets, two historically weak points in comparison to Apple’s main competitor, Google’s Android. Only one thing is for sure – the always-white-hot Apple rumour mill will only continue to churn between now and next Monday when Jobs takes the stage.
