PC Free Cuts The iOS 5 Cable

One of the items you may have missed from the first big keynote of WWDC 2011 was the re-announcement by Apple that we are now in the Post PC world. While I'm sure that many of you are disputing the idea that there's such a thing as a PC Era in the first place, not many of you will argue that you need more cords lying around your house. Scott Forstall, SVP of iOS software noted the following to keep the ball rolling: "We know we're selling to a lot of places where the households just don't have computers," noting that when you take an Apple mobile device out of the box today you're no longer prompted to tether it to a larger devices, you're simply greeted with the word "Welcome".

"You can now setup and activate your device right on the device and you are ready to go. It's that easy" noted Forstall, noting also that all software updates in the future will be over the air. These updates will and are what's called Delta updates – for those of you that don't know, this means you'll be getting only the bits that have changed rather than a whole gigantic download of your entire system to replace the older version. Very pleasing for those of you with capped data plans, mentions one of our men in the field, Vincent. Very pleasing indeed.

This put the cap on the idea that iOS 5 is the most independent version of Apple's mobile operating system yet. This came on top of a Notifications revamp, a bit of the ol' Twitter, Safari Reader, and Reading List news, some fabulous updates for those of you hoping to keep things straight in Newsstand and Reminders, some Mail improvements, and the rebirth and birth of Game Center and iMessage. Get mobile and stay there!

Forstall drives this idea home with a simple note:

"If you want to cut the cord, you can."

We're ready!