Apple Is Up To Something

Their stock is skyrocketing. They somehow seem bigger than Microsoft (even though Microsoft way out distances them in computer software). Analysts say another big holiday season -- another -- of selling iPods is underway. But some experts say that Apple is getting ready to launch an iPhone. CEO Steve Jobs has been mum as usual and anything is possible -- including no iPhone. But think about it. Every time Apple burps consumers get excited. The only thing close to it is the gaming market where a lot of burping is going on right now. Yet few get excited over clunky HD radios that don't have content much different than what you can get on a regular radio. Nothing a record label has done has caused such a stir except maybe suing its customers. Nothing. The labels have all the rock stars but Apple's Steve Jobs is the biggest rock star of all. Year after year he teaches those of us who work in music media how we need to change to be successful. Make it beautiful. Make it colorful. Make it simple. Make it matter to the target consumer. Then we go nuts. We pay higher prices. We let Jobs hijack the record industry and set de facto standardized prices for legal music. What is it that we don't understand? Why are we trying to reinvent the CD -- I mean, the wheel? Can those awful looking HD radios get any uglier? And they don't do anything really different or desirable. Have we gone nuts or has Jobs? If Apple does announce an iPhone soon what I know is that it won't be ugly, won't be like other phones, it will be colorful, will allow us to do something we want to do (that we can't easily do now) and we'll support it. Jobs is so transparent but for some reason we're not paying attention.