Remember how everyone laughed when Steve Jobs introduced the original iPod as a "breakthrough media device"? Its titanic $400 price tag, Mac-exclusive compatibility and adequate 5 gig hard drive were roundly assumed to spell doom. Such innocent days.
My reaction on Sept. 12 was a lot like those thrown around at the introduction of the iPod: Nice interface, preposterously high price, good design. Oh, and I'd take one if you're giving it away free. But, as ever, the first introduction and feature-set is just for planting the seeds for a whole-sale living room play to come.
And reading a recent column from Robert X. Cringely, I realized why I felt like I'd been played – this box is about way more than playing standard definition iTunes TV shows and movies in the living room.
As Cringely notes, the inclusion of an HDMI port on the back of the iTV makes absolutely no sense unless Apple has plans to offer HD video through iTunes. So that's next on the road map.
But the biggest insight he's gleaned is all about communication, not one-way entertainment:
He's right. It might not be in the next year, it might not be in three years, but Apple will eventually offer video-conferencing via HDTV through the iTV. It makes perfect sense. It's a totally unexploited opportunity for Apple to grow and really stake a claim againt a variety of smaller players that have yet to offer a compelling end-to-end solution that meet the majority of people's needs.
It's absolutely brilliant, and there's no reason it can't work. And that will be worth the exorbitant price Apple wants us all to pay for the box.
