Apple Liveblog Reminder & Rumor Round-Up
Apple's annual iPod event is 24 hours away, and we're counting off the minutes before the traditional SlashGear liveblog. We'll be firing up the servers over at http://live.slashgear.com/ in time for the event to begin at 10am Pacific, but if you believe the rumors it's not just iPods that we can expect. In addition to talk of a new, much smaller iPod nano, plus a camera-toting iPod touch, we've also heard about a possible new online iTunes service.
The exact nature of the online iTunes system is unknown, with predictions ranging from a straightforward, linkable web presence for iTunes media to a full blown streaming media service that might allow users to offload their content to the cloud. A new version of iTunes seems likely as well, to accommodate whatever changes have been made.
As for the iPod nano, from various leaked accessories and components we've built up a pretty reasonable picture of what the new, square PMP might look like. It seems Apple may have decided to junk the click-wheel in their sixth-generation, moving instead to a touchscreen UI. The fourth-gen iPod touch, meanwhile, is most likely to see one or more cameras: a front-facing camera – allowing it to make FaceTime calls with the iPhone 4 over WiFi – seems inevitable, and there have been rumors for over 12 months now that Apple would add a rear-facing camera too.
Perhaps not quite fitting in with Apple's guitar illustration for the event invitation, but rumored all the same, is a new Apple TV freshly dubbed the iTV. That, claim insiders, will be smaller, run a version of iOS and focus on streamed rather than downloaded content; they're also predicting a $99 price tag and a far smaller chassis. Running iOS would allow Apple to push an App Store for the iTV, while there's also the suggestion that they'll allow iAd-monetized video content and use the iPad as a huge remote control.
We'll be kicking off the liveblog tomorrow morning, Wednesday September 1st, with the Apple keynote scheduled to begin at 10am in San Francisco (1pm New York or 6pm London). Join us at http://live.slashgear.com/ and make your voice heard in our live commenting system!