Hypercritical
MWSF 2008 keynote bingo
I can’t be too late to say that I was so wrong.
Ah, winter in San Francisco: the time of year when a young man’s fancy lightly turns to keynote bingo. What’s that, you ask? You haven’t played? Oh, but you must. Peruse last year’s edition to learn the rules and internalize the philosophy.
So, what kind of squares can we expect in this post-Leopard world? iPhone software updates? Booooring. Might as well add a square for Mac OS X 10.5.2 while we’re at it. But since this is Macworld, let’s trot out some of the few remaining Mac-related hardware fantasies.
The xMac is taking the year off, but in its place we’ve got two other longtime fantasies to fill squares: a subnotebook and a tablet. And yeah, I guess we can throw in a few squares for the phone weenies.
I’m taking a bit of a risk posting the card this early. I usually wait until the last minute so I can include as many late-breaking leaks as possible. If some new development comes across the tubes in the next few days and makes this card quaintly irrelevant, well, then I guess I’ll have learned my lesson for next year.
The official card is in its traditional PDF format:
Macworld San Francisco 2008 Keynote Bingo Card PDF
The requirements for each square are listed below. Good luck!
Bingo card created by John McCoy
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New Mac Pro - A new Mac Pro. I’m going to buy one of these (assuming they contain 45nm CPUs), so they damn well better be introduced.
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New displays - New Apple external displays. I have grave doubts about this one (see later square), but the existing line desperately needs updating.
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HD video somewhere - High-definition video appears on some piece of Apple hardware or software. It must be explicitly described as “HD” or “high-definition.” HD video for sale in the iTunes store counts.
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MacBook Thin - A new subnotebook from Apple, regardless of its actual branding or product name. What’s a subnotebook? Use your own judgement. The only restriction I’ll add is that it must have a hardware keyboard.
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New MacBook Pro - Any revision to the MacBook Pro product line.
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Multi-touch Mac - Any Mac that includes a feature described as “multi-touch” or even just “touch.” It can be a screen, trackpad, whatever.
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“Wouldn’t it be great…?” - Steve Jobs begins his favorite rhetorical question.
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MacBook Thin has flash - The subnotebook (described in the “MacBook Thin” square above) contains some nontrivial amount of flash RAM.
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“One more thing…” - Steve Jobs says there’s “one more thing.” A slide containing the phrase is also acceptable, even if Jobs does not actually say it.
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New Apple TV - The moribund Apple TV is revised or replaced with a new product that does the same sort of things.
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Movie Rentals - Apple rents downloadable movies from the iTunes store.
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“Boom” - Steve Jobs says the word “boom” while demonstrating something.
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Existence of Xserve acknowledged - The Xserve or Xserve RAID is mentioned by a presenter, listed on a slide, or even just appears in a photo, illustration, or screenshot.
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Blu-ray - Sony’s Blu-ray disc format is mentioned by a presenter. (Text or a logo on a slide does not count.)
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iPhone SDK details - Significant new information about the iPhone SDK.
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iPhone SDK - The announcement of a full-fledged iPhone SDK. As with the iPhone Widgets square, it’s only the announcement that matters, not the date that it will actually be available.
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New displays have cameras - New Apple displays with built-in or otherwise attached cameras.
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New iPhone - New iPhone hardware. Even minor revisions count.
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Mac market share touted - Good news about the market share of Macintosh computers is presented.
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Optical drive sold separately - An Apple-branded external optical drive is introduced and is available for individual sale.
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Schiller - Phil Schiller appears on stage or in live video. (Pre-recorded segments do not count.)
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Leopard vs. Vista - Mac OS X 10.5 is compared to Vista in some way. Showing one of the Mac/PC TV ads does not count. The comparison must be part of the live presentation.
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Dockable Mac - Some hardware product that runs Mac OS X docks to some other piece of hardware.
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Native third-party iPhone app demo - A demonstration of an OS X application written by a third-party, or written by Apple as an example of what could be written using the new iPhone SDK.
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No new displays - No new Apple external display products are introduced. (Rioting optional.)
This article originally appeared at Ars Technica. It is reproduced here with permission.