(Remote) observations of Apple's WWDC 2006: You have everything when you have your health

© B Y ..S T E V E ..W E L S H
Oregon MacPioneers User Group (Omug)

I wasn't the only one who noticed subtle changes on stage that day.

I wasn't there, but even on-screen, in a large clear QuickTime Player window as I watched the keynote archive off Apple's website, these subtle changes on stage at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco (Aug. 7-11) caught my eye and made me raise a cautious eyebrow.

Among the anticipation, buzz, applause, laughter and theater of another keynote performance led by Apple CEO Steve Jobs on Monday, the first day of WWDC, the subtleties were layered in with the showtime preview of Apple's next cool cat Mac OS, Leopard (10.5), and the announcement of the PowerMac G5 tower replacement, the Mac Pro.

First, there was the stage sharing duties by Apple brass Phil Schiller and Scott Forstall. Nothing alarming here, Steve Jobs has shared the stage before with others, but it felt a little strange to have Jobs leave the stage that fast after the keynote opened and hand the baton off to Schiller, who gave us our introduction to the Mac Pro. When Schiller was done, Jobs briefly appeared and then handed the baton to Forstall, who gave us a demo of Leopard's Time Machine feature.

Both handled their demos relatively well before the crowd of developers and press; both had their moments of "oooohs" and "aaaahs" and cheers when they unveiled another Apple-cool feature. Jobs DID return to give a couple of demos himself later, but for some reason it seemed Steve deliberately trimmed down his stage time. Again, just a feeling. Many of us Apple believers willfully gulp down the PR Kool-Aid of these keynotes, gleefully stepping into the "reality distortion field" that Jobs emits from the stage when talking about Apple's innovation or unveiling new products. It's part of Apple's personality -- and Steve's personality is Apple's personality. And because Apple PRODUCES, because Steve produces, we cheer loud and hard.

So we notice when there is less of Steve.

But, oddly, even when he was on stage there seemed to be less of Steve.

Steve and Apple's health

Jobs looked a bit thin, like he had lost some weight. He was sporting some nice beard growth, but it looked like he wasn't filling out his normal uniform of black turtleneck long-sleeve shirt and jeans. Now, before we jump to conclusions, there can be so many reasons for this that it's rightfully uncalled for to turn an assumption into a rumor or a claim -- I'm not doing either; I'm just stating my observations and feelings, however remote they are. But I wasn't the only one seeing things.

In Ric Ford's Macintouch.com news site (posted 8-11-06) he had 2 blurbs pointing to 2 other writer's WWDC keynote observations; to save you a little surfing, I've copied and pasted both here -- one by Joshua Scott Emmons, the other by Paul Thurrott:

[Joshua Scott Emmons writes about "warning signs from Steve" in an O'Reilly weblog:

Sure, Phil Schiller did a keynote by himself, once, when Steve was recovering from surgery. And Steve has always welcomed various Apple VPs to the stage to expound upon the virtues of the products he's touting. But to bring on three VPs and, in effect, announce their importance at the beginning of the show... it's like suddenly seeing a part-time character in your favorite sitcom promoted to the show's opening credits. It's as though the producers are expecting a contract dispute with Mr. Jobs next season and want to be sure the viewers know there are other good characters to carry the show should Steve have to leave.

Even more eerie is that Steve, himself, did not announce any new products this keynote. The Mac Pro was announced by Phil Schiller. The only Leopard features Steve talked up were the ones that already existed (Voice Over, Mail, iChat, Photo Booth, Front Row, etc.) and the "top secret" ones that he refused to say anything about at all. Scott Forstall (awkwardly) bounced back and forth with Steve to break the word on all the new stuff like Time Machine, Dash Code, Web Clip and Core Animation.

I think Steve's telling us something. He thinks things are going to get ugly, and he's going to be in the middle of it. Is the WWDC Keynote just the first example of how CEO Jobs is trying to insulate Apple from whatever it is he sees coming down the road? I hope not. But until we learn more, that's the way I see it.]

[Windows writer Paul Thurrott offers his take on WWDC:

Sometimes I wonder how Apple CEO Steve Jobs can sleep at night. He appears to spend half his waking hours ridiculing Microsoft's admittedly behind-schedule operating system, Windows Vista, for copying Mac OS X features. But this week at Apple's annual Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), he announced ten new features for Leopard, the next version of OS X, most of which will seem more than vaguely familiar to Windows users. I'm not dim: Microsoft does copy Apple on a fairly regular basis. But seriously, Steve. Apple's just as bad.

More important, perhaps, is that the new OS X features that Jobs and company announced this week aren't, by and large, all that impressive. Two of the new features--Time Machine and Spaces--are valuable additions to OS X and worth discussing, though both, interestingly, have been done before in other OSes. The other Leopard features Apple announced, alas, are almost all a complete waste of time. They're the types of things one might expect of a minor, interim update, or from free Web downloads. They are certainly not major features as Jobs claimed.

OK, enough Jobs bashing. The guy's a visionary and truly important presence in the industry, and it will be a sad, sad day when he steps down from his post at Apple and fades into the sunset. (The reality of this possibility seemed all the more real this week. Am I the only one that though Jobs looked oddly gaunt and sickly during the WWDC keynote?) But as I've often said of Apple and Jobs: They do good work. It's too bad they feel the need to exaggerate so much.]

So, what do you or I read into this? What do we WANT to read into this? Well, here are a few possibilities:

• As he gets older, Jobs is finally sharing the spotlight and credit with other key Apple staffers (he has asked development team members to stand and take a bow at previous keynotes, something that rarely happened in the early years of his stage shows)
• Jobs may be ill (let's pray not a relapse of the cancer he fought off a couple of years ago)
• Jobs may have overused the new Nike-iPod shoes in testing and lost more weight than he should have
• He may have lost some weight worrying about the internal analysis of Apple's stock option handling/reporting (Apple's 4th quarter financial report is on hold until that is completed) -- stress will do that
• Finally, there might have been a few days straight of all-nighters, lack of sleep and stress, getting all the bugs out of the Leopard preview version he was going to show on stage -- that's not unusual by any means when millions of users are waiting for the typically slick, usually flawless Jobs presentation
  
  And then again it may not be any of the above.
  
  Let's pray that Steve is fine and Apple will overcome any accountant "mistakes", if any. Still, when we are given less Steve, we longtime Apple fans start to worry a little. We don't even want to start to think of what Apple will be like when he is no longer running the show. Pulling our heads out of the sand, we know that day will come. But let's hope it is still several years down the road.*
  
  *(Read our Aug. 16 update/addendum to this story below)
  
  The Mac family has an orphan?
  
  One final observation from WWDC. When the Mac Pro tower was unveiled as the replacement for the PowerMac G5 tower, Steve said the family transition from PowerPC to Intel-processor based Macs was now complete (in just 210 days no less!). But I ask ...
  
  What about the eMac?
  
  Is the eMac the orphan of the Mac family now? We're not sure. At the keynote, Jobs touted that the Mac transition is complete but made no mention of the eMac, the primarily education targeted, only-CRT-left all-in-one Mac.
  
  Perhaps, just perhaps, the eMac will still live on in the education-only online Apple Store, hidden from the public eye so as not to distract from the new Intel-chipped models and what was announced or previewed at WWDC?
  
  I think this is the probable scenario. At least for the near future. Why? Well, the eMac is still a very capable and durable CRT Mac for young kids to pound on (CRT screens take much more abuse than flat-panel screens do, and cost less), and schools typically are a generation behind in much of their software version use (so having a Mac that can still boot in OS 9 is valuable).
  
  But apparently Apple gave the eMac the boot about a month ago when it introduced a lower-priced, stripped-down version of the Intel-based 17-inch iMac. The new $900 model, priced $300 below the education cost of the existing 17-inch model, boasts many of the same features.
  
  TidBITS issue #837 reported in mid-July:
  "Apple says the new iMac model, which was shown at the National Educational Computing Conference in San Diego, is available immediately to education customers (and only education customers at this point). The all-in-one eMac, with its PowerPC chip and Apple's last remaining CRT monitor, will remain available as long as supplies last, alongside remaining stock of the G4-based iBook."
  
  Hmmm. If not an orphan, the eMac seems to be on the side of the milk carton for now -- if you find it alive and well, would you let me know? Thanks.
  
  END
  
  Aug. 16, 2006 update on Jobs health:
  
  This followup from Thomas Claburn's Aug. 11th blog on the InformationWeek.com site; Claburn speaking:
  
  In the days following Steve Jobs' keynote at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco this week, a number of online publications (source 1 and source 2) and expressed concern that Steve Jobs was sick. This isn't simply wild speculation brought on by lack of a world-shaking product announcement: Two years ago, Jobs underwent a successful operation to treat a rare form of pancreatic cancer. And having attended the keynote, it did seem odd to me that a showman as accomplished as Jobs would delegate so much of the presentation time to capable but less compelling Apple speakers.
  
  So I e-mailed Katie Cotton, Apple's VP of worldwide corporate communications, to inquire about Jobs' health. Her response: "Steve's health is robust and we have no idea where these rumors are coming from."
  
  (I'm just guessing here, but perhaps the Zune marketing group?)
  
  END
  
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