Apple Announces Event on October 4th: Let's Talk iPhone

[timanglade]

Seriously, look at the design of the invite. Calendar says Tuesday (October) 4th. Clock says 10am. Map app says this will take place at 1 Infinite Loop. And the Phone icon makes it clear this will be an iPhone event (rather than an iPod Touch / iOS event), with one unread notification alerting you that there is something you must pay attention to. They say everything in 4 icons. So awesome.

[achompas]

To be fair, the GMaps icon always displays 1 Infinite Loop. Still, great catch.

[0xABADC0DA]

I bet the 1 on the phone is for "one more thing"; they're going to call up Steve Jobs and talk with him since he can't be there live on stage.

[executive]

Since it's on October 4th and there are 4 icons on the invite, looks like we're not getting an iPhone 5.

[cryptoz]

So many puns. "Let's talk iPhone" -> "Let's talk, iPhone" (new speech functionality). It's a phone, you talk to people, you also talk to it, etc.

I would expect this to be a very speech technology-heavy event.

[dave1619]

Nice catch. Can't wait for Assistant.

[stevenp]

I've never personally been able to get any use out of the voice control feature of iOS. In fact, after trying it a few times, the only time I invoke it now is by accident. I hope that Apple kicks some major ass on this feature and creates another "how did I ever live without this" moment.

[notatoad]

wow, that's just evil. TELUS (phone company here) has been running ads in really heavy rotation pushing the tagline "there's never been a better time to buy an iphone 4", and stating "offer ends october 4th".

[simonsarris]

Is the iPhone 4 still the same price that it was when it came out?

This reminds me of April 2010 when I wrote a couple articles about how Apple is fairly unique among computer manufacturers for charging enormous prices for old hardware and going so long without update or a price drop. In April 2010, depending on the week, you bought a Macbook Pro that was miserably outdated or a Macbook Pro that was very modern for precisely the same price.

(If you're interested: http://simonsarris.com/blog/22-mac-envy-2 )

[moe]

Same here (different country, different phone companies).

Everyone is obviously pushing hard to sell their iphone4-stock now, before Joe Sixpack gets told by the news-anchor to delay his purchase for the iphone5.

[sneak]

I just got excited, then deeply sad when I remembered that this is going to be without Steve.

Best of luck to Mr. Cook, but I will always miss Stevenotes no matter how great a CEO he turns out to be.

[culturestate]

I wonder if Steve'll be in the audience?

[egiva]

Nobody thinks that having four icons indicates that they finally made the smaller iPod Shuffle-based iPhone? There was speculation last year that they were looking at a smaller lower-priced entry iPhone with limited features based on the Shuffle. I would wear it running, so I'm hoping the four-icon picture isn't just a coincidence.

[ctdonath]

[Insert Stimpy "JOY!" here]

That would, indeed, be awesome. I take the iPad almost everywhere, so I have no need for an iPhone which is little more than an iPad Nano. Thing is, I need that "little more" - the phone part - as well, and want it as a separate device which I _can_ have everywhere. It's back to the "just a phone" desire, a device focused on making phone calls with Apple design sensibilities. Take an iPod Nano, insert a bigger battery & cellular chip, support Bluetooth headsets, sell millions.

Methinks coincidence though. Four icons is just enough to get the invite info across in a cute way, and there just isn't another suitable way to arrange them (a 4x1 line? not for advertising).

[prawn]

Would that kill existing apps for iPhone and force them to be redesigned? That's the reason I don't think that they will change the screen shape.

[philwelch]

I don't know why everyone's assuming Tim Cook will actually deliver the keynote when execs like Schiller and Forstall have been doing the keynotes with Steve and Tim Cook never has.

[dave1619]

It's about exerting leadership and taking the realm publicly. Tim Cook needs to do the keynote for Apple, Apple's fans and the public.

[gto16108]

I really can't wait to see how Tim Cook brings the new iPhone to the market. There's a lot of pressure on him to perform in the same way that Steve Jobs has in the past. He has, to his advantage, been more chatty with Apple employees via corporate webmail so I'm excited to see what he says and how he brings his team around a much awaited iOS 5 and iPhone.

[guywithabike]

No need to wait. Tim Cook has already hosted some events, like the Back to the Mac event.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxWSIDoE8Hk

(I can't find better videos at the moment, but they're around.)

[thehodge]

Wonder if the 1 notification on the phone is a hint that they are only announcing one phone not two as rumoured..

[technoslut]

It's probably an indication of the announcement. I wouldn't read much more into it.

[baddox]

The article is still speculating about the "iPhone 5" part, right? Last I checked, we still don't know if it will be a hardware upgrade (perhaps "4S"), a low-cost version, a world phone, a complete form factor upgrade ("5"), or some combination of these and other things.

[heynk]

Might be too much speculation, but the first thing I thought when I saw the maps icon was a hint that they'd reveal their own non-google maps system.

[shinratdr]

Pretty unlikely, we probably would have seen some slip-ups in the iOS 5 beta if that was the case. As it stands they are still steadily improving the existing Maps with Google services, adding alternate routes and whatnot.

[r00fus]

That would indeed be huge, but I'd be a bit worried, as Google Maps has been the market leader for some time.

More likely, they've made improvements that distinguish the iPhone in an Apple-esque way, and probably increased the likelyhood that iOS maps could be switched to say, Bing in a more direct fashion.

[matthew-wegner]

Probably just turn-by-turn spoken directions or voice command input, if anything.

[timjahn]

Next time somebody asks you why you prefer Apple products to competitors, show them this invite. Explains everything.

So beautiful.

[untog]

Then they might justifiably reply "So, you don't care about the product at all, and just care about the way the company presents itself?"

[Wazzup12]

What could the badge on the phone icon indicate? That's the biggest puzzle...

[wmeredith]

In the context of the actual iOS, it indicates one missed call. (Which is pretty sly considering they're announcing the phone everyone was expecting in June)

[beerglass]

Mayb be a reference to the one iPhone 5 model reported to have lost in a bar ;)

[cpr]

Gruber says it means 1 iPhone model only.

[Wazzup12]

Okay, my take is that it means 1 common iPhone for CDMA and GSM

[sjwright]

You missed a call.

[john2x]

Not 9:42 AM?

[caiusdurling]

Wonder what they're going to announce in the iPhone 5. Better battery life and perhaps a better GPS is all I really want over my iPhone 4.

[Nemisis7654]

I'm pretty sure they're going dual-core processor as well (like the iPad 2).

[weaksauce]

Improved camera would be nice.

[thematt]

I don't expect it to be announced here, but a full touchscreen would be nice... one without a physical button.

[espressodude]

Can't wait to see that new iPhone also if Tim Cook could match the level of how Steve Jobs presents Apple products on his keynotes.

[drivebyacct2]

Wow. We're debating the presence of "one notification" to be a response to extremely speculative rumors of a "cloud iPhone" (in the day of poor batteries and data-caps?) Or that Assistant, even in this thread, is being touted as revolutionary? Or that people seem to attribute webOS with Android-style notifications despite being later to the game? The iPhone 4 is gorgeous and iOS is in a class of it's own, but I can not understand the blinders that come on around announcement time.

[revscat]

Your entire message is a strawman; there is nothing in this thread which supports your claims.

[athoma]

No Steve Jobs :(