Will MacBook evolution lead to the iTablet?

We’ve ruminated at length about the rumoured Apple tablet computer, from the iPhone “dock” that is our Apple Annex, to the Macbook sibling that is our iTablet Excelsior. And with recent clues shoved down our digital throat across the blogosphere suggesting that an Apple tablet will indeed be announced sometime next year, we find ourselves once again justifying its impending existence.

The truth’s in the Air.

It began with the MacBook Air and may indeed end with it. Almost two years ago, we complained that the MacBook Air was overpriced for a poorly performing machine with so little to offer other than a reduced physical footprint. To be fair, that same complaint holds even truer today, with even the basic 13″ MacBook Pro beating the MacBook Air out on all specs to include price, with the Air merely coming in at 1.5 lbs lighter. How many real-world applications is that 1.5 lbs going to make a real difference for?

But the Air, as we stated back in January, 2008, is a great proof-of-concept. And that proof-of-concept has gotten slight buffs during its two generational updates. One could almost say that the Air is Apple’s notebook AppleTV, in the sense that it’s more of a hobby to set the future stage than to sell based purely on its present merits. That’s not to say that the Air isn’t decent; we’re even considering picking up a used Air if the price is right, just so we have a very portable, no-frills writing device that runs OS X (we’ve seen first-gen models go for what amounts to the price of a netbook hackintosh). But if money is indeed a consideration, the Air today is a poor purchase when the 13″ MacBook Pro offers so much more for less money.

Back to the Air as a proof-of-concept, the makings of an Apple tablet were all thrown in front of us in 2007. The iPhone had the touch technology, and the Air had an ultra-portable form factor. Apple explored SSD hard drives with the Air, and in a sense, teased the niche market for expensive-but-polished notebooks. The unibody design was touted as an end to user-replaceable batteries, offering solid battery life that trickled into the MacBook Pro lineup. And with all that, Apple proved that there was a market for the Air, and one that could likely grow with cheaper hardware costs.

So what’s left? Take the Air, throw away the keyboard, and tablet nirvana is just around the corner. While we wouldn’t expect Apple to revive the Newton or Air names for a future tablet, one has to admit that the latter name is catchy and far more apt for a tablet than for what the Air is today.

Apple Tablet as the new king of media.

Looking at iTunes LP and iTunes Extra content, we see a pretty exciting, open technology for developers to exploit. These technologies add even more reason to go all-digital, as consumers won’t have to feel like they’re missing out on bonus content if they don’t buy a CD with art and lyrics on the pull-out jewel case pamphlet, or the extra content on DVD menus. The best thing about iTunes Extra, though, is that it’s flexible enough to be used with other media, like print. That is to say, books, newspapers, and magazines, in digital format, could have a degree of interaction that typical e-publications don’t. Instead of simply reading a PDF or ePub document, consumers will be able to interact with their digital downloads in a way we expect one to interact with web sites, only in this case, an online connection would only be leveraged sporadically.

For example, newspapers could have polls. When a user submits their response to the poll, the information is transmitted the next time the Tablet has an internet connection. Thereafter, the newspaper poll will show results to date, without the user having to manually reload the poll data. Local weather information could be dynamically generated upon purchase, while old issues of the publication would have static records based on the actual weather histories. Users could enable/disable audible readings of articles, and magazines could include video clips of product reviews, better leverage advertising, and generally include more media that would otherwise have been cut in a print magazine because of limited space. And books could leverage interactive media in another way: imagine reading through Lord of the Rings, and having an easy-to-access map of Middle-earth, where the Fellowship’s location is marked, and corresponds to where you are in the book’s reading. With enough foresight, one could even cross-reference terms from Lord of the Rings to Tolkien’s other works, assuming they too were purchased. In other words, digital publications could link to one another in a sort of quasi-wiki method.

Ultimately, these are things that will add value to a digital download, thereby making them more attractive for consumers. Considering Apple’s success with music, and to a more limited degree television and film, it would not be surprising if Apple took on the e-publishing mission with a zest yet unseen by the eBook industry. And why shouldn’t Apple carve out this rather important niche, especially since it won’t be competing head-on with today’s eBooks: the type of interaction we’re talking about isn’t suitable for an e-ink display. Apple will want colour (lots of colour!), and the quick, reactive display that one would expect to see on the iPhone or, in this case, an Apple tablet. Sure, the battery life won’t be as good as an eBook reader, but the experience will be better.

There have already been plenty of rumours suggesting that Apple has met with print-industry big-wigs, and other rumours indicating that print-industry execs are meeting with one another to address their future digital distribution plans. (Supposedly, Apple has even offered a 30/70 split to publishing houses as financial incentive.) It should be obvious to anyone that standardizing this distribution, to a firm degree, will be beneficial to all companies involved. And with Apple leading the charge, would it really surprise anyone if iTunes was rebranded as something more like “iMedia?”

The Apple Tablet as a MacBook.

With the type of interactive content we’re talking about, Apple won’t release a dedicated device. Anyone with iTunes will be able to download the latest music, movies, and magazines, and be able to sync them across all their iTunes-capable devices. What better way to showcase the multimedia prowess of the music/movie/magazine conglomeration flipping through virtual pages of the latest New York Times bestseller with an actual flick of one’s finger, using similar gestures to control music and movie playback? The processing power we’re talking about, particularly for the multimedia elements, will be greater than what most eBook readers have today.

Apple is about totality of experience. That’s where the iPhone trumps every other smartphone on the market, and why Apple was able to beat out competitors in 2007 when the iPhone, to much initial criticism, was unleashed upon the masses. Apple’s only going to duplicate this effort with a tablet: a perfect machine to showcase its multimedia initiative, but still capable of tackling most average computing needs. So yes, the tablet will support a wireless keyboard/mouse, and run the regular version of OS X. Its specs will likely be similar to that of the MacBook, or maybe even the 13″ MacBook Pro. But the market for a tablet is clearly different than the market for these more traditional laptops, so it won’t cannibalize sales of other Apple products any more than the Mac Mini cannibalizes sales of the iMac. Users who need a traditional notebook experience for class or work will still get a MacBook: it’s the desktop baseline for getting work done with mobility in mind. But those who can spare not having a physical keyboard will love the tablet, because it offers extra mobility at the expense of easy desktop integration. Some tablet owners may cart around a wireless keyboard in their tote bags, but they will likely be the exception. Everyone else will treat their tablets like an eReader that can do so much more; the tablet will be the perfect, portable entertainment tool aimed at those who consume information rather than games. It won’t be a one-trick pony like the CrunchPad Joo Joo, because as Steve Jobs said, an Apple tablet will be expected to do more than simply serve as a web-reading tool for toilet-surfers.

The assumed $1,000 price-point seems entirely realistic at this point, especially when one realizes that the tablet will be little more than a MacBook Air whose keyboard was replaced with a capacitive touchscreen. That price doesn’t make us gawk at all. In fact, we’re ready to jump at a tablet purchase under these conditions, and we wouldn’t be surprised if the device is ready in time for CES 2010.

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