With continued rumors of Apple looking to hit CES next year after its confirmed withdrawal from Macworld had dealt the long-standing Mac expo a massive body blow, things may have just gotten worse. The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) has just poured a huge bag of salt in IDG’s open wound by announcing that next year’s CES will have a dedicated area for companies showcasing Mac-related products. In an email sent to CNET News over the weekend, CEA’s Jason Oxman stated:

[CEA] dedicated a special area at the 2010 CES to Apple-related CE manufacturers… We decided to create this special area based on discussions we’ve had with companies regarding 2010 show participation. We are pleased with the feedback we’ve received regarding this space.

Given that CES is the much larger show and Macworld in 2010 will draw far less interest considering Apple’s lack of presence, expect plenty of companies to jump ship following this offer. We would also expect CEA to offer a healthy discount to first-time exhibitors coming over from Macworld. With IDG’s Expo already in jeopardy, CEA may have just tied it to a tree out back.

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Behold what could very well be the sexiest piece of kit introduced at Macworld. Axiotron took the wraps off its latest OS X tablet endeavor yesterday at Macworld and caused inner conflict in nearly everyone who passed its booth. I can spend $5,000 on a tablet, right? NO, I need to pay rent! But the weather is great in California, can’t I make it on the streets? No, I’ll miss the premier of Lost! Wait, I can just watch it on the Modbook Pro… If you can swing it, Axiotron’s first Pro version based on the 15-inch MacBook Pro most definitely has the juice every Mac fan has been hoping for. 15.4-inch WXGA touchscreen display with finger and pen support, 2.8GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor (2.4GHz base), NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT graphics processor, 320GB 7200 rpm hard drive or 128GB SSD, integrated GPS, handwriting recognition and plenty more – all wrapped in a 0.93-inch thick case. Basically, it’s 6.6 pounds of hot. Axiotron is currently offering a $400 discount for Macworld but we have to image if $5,000 is too much, so is $4,600. If you were already on board however, the discount is nothing but gravy.

[Via Macworld]

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There you have it Apple fans, Apple’s final Macworld keynote has come and gone. As expected, Steve Jobs was nowhere to be found – indeed due to health reasons as many had dismissed as false until Jobs’ recent letter was issued on Monday. Phill Schiller had some pretty big shoes to fill but he did a great job and even threw in a joke or two. As for the announcements, the only surprise was iLife ’09 and we think it was a pretty good surprise in fact. Apple looks to have made some great updates to its suite and we can’t wait to upgrade and start playing with all the new features. As far as the three other big announcements – iWork ’09, the new 17″ MacBook Pro and DRM-free iTunes – leaks did an ok job of covering each one to some extent. In terms of the massive list of rumors that weren’t made a reality today, this year’s Macworld had more rumors surrounding it than ever before so most were obviously destined to be squashed. We would have liked to have seen a refreshed iMac and Mac Mini, case manufacturers would have liked to have seen an iPhone nano and Apple’s board would have liked to have seen a more sustained and significant spike in Apple shares today. Hey, you can’t win ‘em all…

Ok, Philly Schilly has finally gotten around to the new MacBook Pro now so we’ve got all the new details for you: How does Intel Core 2 Duo 2.93GHz Dual Core, 6MB L2 Cache, up to 8GB of DDR3 RAM at 1066 MHz sound to you? Oh yeah, good stuff indeed – and all wrapped in a gorgeous unibody aluminum case. The new rig is Apple Cinema display-ready and uses both NVIDIA 9400M and 9600M GT graphics chips just like the 15″ model. The glass trackpad is 39% larger and the battery supposedly lasts for a whopping eight hours with a 1,000-charge life cycle! The eight hour rating is on the 9400M chip, with the 9600M GT dropping it down to seven hours (still phenomenal) but we’ll believe it when we see it. Judging by the current MacBook performance, eight hours of juice on a single charge would be a thing of beauty. There will only be one base purchase option for the new 17″ Pro – ringing up at $2,799 for the glossy screen, 2.66 GHz processor, 4GB of RAM, 320GB 5400 rpm hard drive, glass trackpad, backlit keyboard and so on – and options such as the 2.93GHz processor, 8GB of RAM, 320GB 7200 rpm HD/128GB SSD/256GB SSD, anti-glare screen, etc will all be add-ons.

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Apple announced a new version of iWork ’09. Changes in Keynote ’09 include magic move, a feature that will automatically move and resize objects between slides, slick new transitions including text transitions, chart animations, and themes. Keynote will also communicate wirelessly with your Mac and allow you to view and control your presentation via your iPhone or iPod touch. Apple also announced changes to Pages, Apple’s word editing application. The latest version of Pages will include fullscreen view, dynamic outlines, and mail merge with Numbers which will connect your Page document with tables and lists in Numbers. Also, 40 themes for your creative pleasure. Numbers ’09 gets a refresh as well with new Table categories, 250 functions with a convenient function view, and advanced chart options (mixed chart types, multiple axis charts, trend lines, and error bars, etc.) Numbers ’09 also integrates with Pages ’09, charts or graphs pasted in Pages will link to the corresponding Numbers document and can be updated dynamically. Sweet! New templates for Numbers as well, the theme for the day it seems. i Work is available today and will set you back $79 for single user, $99 for the family pack, and $49 with a new Mac. If you don’t have Leopard, you can purchase the Mac Box Set which includes Leopard, iLife, and iWork for $169. If you prefer the cloud for your computing, Apple also announced the beta of iWork.com. Think Google Docs for Apple with online document sharing and collaboration. The Beta will be free but iWork will transition to a paid service when it launches. Available online today.

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Phil Schiller might not be wearing a black turtle neck but he’s still got some goods to dish this morning at the Macorld keynote. To kick things off, Schiller introduced a new version of iLife – iLife ’09. He showed off a newly updated version of iPhoto, featuring new “Faces” technology that will organize your photos of people, by name, using facial recognition! Select a photo and name a person once, then Faces will identify that person each time you add a new photo of him or her. Then there’s “Places”, which sorts photos according to where they were taken according to geotags. The UI features a map (street or satellite views) with pins representing the location of each photo in an album. Don’t worry if your camera doesn’t support geotagging of course, as you’ll be able to add locations manually within the UI.

iPhoto ’09 also has built in support for album syncing with both Facebook and Flickr. In fact, if people tag photos you upload in Facebook, that data will be synced back to your Mac so the info can be viewed locally! Very smooth Apple, very smooth. Other new features include themes, which allow you to add visual themes to slide shows that include backgrounds and even custom transitions. Slide shows can also be added to iTunes and synced to your iPhone or iPod. Another interesting addition is Travel Books, which allow you to create a cool-looking scrap book out of a series of photos.

Next up is iMovie ’09 which definitely offers some cool new features. Image stabilization for one – because not everyone has Hollywood-worthy filming skills. There is also a new precision editor interface, a bunch of cool video effects and a user friendly drag and drop update that allows you to simply drop a clip on a specific point and have the video inserted instantly. Apple also added video themes with some very nifty 3D effects that will be very fun to play with. The new ’09 version of iMovie is definitely more advanced than the ’08 version but it also seems well-designed to the point where even novice users will be able to take full advantage of its functionality.

Now we come to GarageBand ’09 – with a noteworthy new feature called “Learn to Play”. Think of it as a private music instructor that provides personal lessons, at your pace, in an effort to teach you how to play your instrument of choice. Did they include the bassoon in there? There is also an “Artist Lessons” feature which showcases various artists, such as John Fogerty and Sting, who help teach you how to play their songs.

The complete package will still ship for free on new Macs starting in late January and an upgrade can be purchased by existing customers for $79, or $99 for an upgrade good on five computers. Nice start Apple, we definitely didn’t see that one coming. Let’s see what Cupertino has lined up next…

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Oops! We’re minutes away from Apple’s keynote featuring Phil “I am not Steve Jobs” Schiller and we’ve already got our second major bungle. The team back in Cupertino apparently got a little trigger happy and let the 17″ MacBook Pro page go live a tad ahead of schedule. Woo! 4GB of RAM out of the box, 320GB+ hard drive, up to 2.93GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor… This baby is a killer! You’ve also got a Firewire-400 and a Firewire-800 port so none of those MacBook complaints are an issue for Pro users. Hit the read link for the live page and get ready for more Apple goodness coming any minute now.

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As is customary when Apple prepare to toss some fresh new goodies our way, the Apple Store has been kaput since about 10:00am EST. Last minute rumors continue to swirl but none of the big ones can be confirmed at this point – we’ll just have to wait a bit longer for Apple’s Macworld keynote, which kicks off at 9:00am PST / 12:00pm EST, to see exactly what Apple has in store. There is one safe bet however, likely inadvertantly revealed a bit early. iWork, Apple’s productiviy suite, will be updated to iWork ’09. It remains to be seen whether or not Apple will announce a Web-based tie in but as you can see in the screen clip above, iWork ’09 made a brief appearance on Apple’s download page before a quick correction reverted the entry back to iWork ’08. No information about the update was found anywhere else on the site. With Apple’s keynote kicking off in just under a half hour, we’re now on the home stretch. As always, keep it here for breaking news covering all of Apple’s Macworld announcements – you never know, Apple might still have a trick or two up its sleeve.

Thanks, Mel!

Just about the only Apple rumor that hasn’t been touched upon in the blogopshere leading up to Tuesday’s Macworld keynote has been an iPhone tethering plan for AT&T. The lack of tethering has been an issue for many iPhone power-users since its launch back in 2007 and its addition would surely help boost the iPhone’s ARPU considering the plan has long been rumored to be somewhere in the region of $30/5GB (which is of course the same deal AT&T currently offers its BlackBerry users). Whether or not this rumor pans out is anyone’s guess but only one thing is certain: With this many rumors flying around, the Macword keynote is definitely going to let just about everyone down because there’s no way Apple will hit all of the bases that have been covered.

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Letter From Apple CEO Steve Jobs

Dear Apple Community,

For the first time in a decade, I’m getting to spend the holiday season with my family, rather than intensely preparing for a Macworld keynote.

Unfortunately, my decision to have Phil deliver the Macworld keynote set off another flurry of rumors about my health, with some even publishing stories of me on my deathbed.

I’ve decided to share something very personal with the Apple community so that we can all relax and enjoy the show tomorrow.

As many of you know, I have been losing weight throughout 2008. The reason has been a mystery to me and my doctors. A few weeks ago, I decided that getting to the root cause of this and reversing it needed to become my #1 priority.

Fortunately, after further testing, my doctors think they have found the cause — a hormone imbalance that has been “robbing” me of the proteins my body needs to be healthy. Sophisticated blood tests have confirmed this diagnosis.

The remedy for this nutritional problem is relatively simple and straightforward, and I’ve already begun treatment. But, just like I didn’t lose this much weight and body mass in a week or a month, my doctors expect it will take me until late this Spring to regain it. I will continue as Apple’s CEO during my recovery.

I have given more than my all to Apple for the past 11 years now. I will be the first one to step up and tell our Board of Directors if I can no longer continue to fulfill my duties as Apple’s CEO. I hope the Apple community will support me in my recovery and know that I will always put what is best for Apple first.

So now I’ve said more than I wanted to say, and all that I am going to say, about this.

Steve

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So Macenstein received an image from an anonymous tipster that supposedly depicts Apple’s upcoming Mac mini refresh. Presumably, the image is of an on-screen ad or a slide that would, in theory, be displayed during the Mac mini announcement many still expect to come next month. Macenstein posted it with skepticism, the blogosphere immediately dismissed it as fake and it probably is. That being said however, the reasoning most blogs are using to dismiss it isn’t exactly firm – at all. Firstly, the marketing blurb, “The world’s smallest desktop computer.” Many dismissed the phrase as missing Apple’s common word play but in reality, Apple uses simple bold statements quite often in its marcom. In fact, this slide lines up pretty well with early MacBook Air slides. The second item of contention is the groove around the perimeter of the mini, above the CD slot. While many jump to the conclusion that this is a fold up display, that’s not what we’re getting. To us, it looks like a venting system. Anyone who has used a new MacBook or MacBook Pro knows that these things can get hot – fast. As the new Mac mini will be made of aluminum, whether or not the image above is real, it stands to reason that Apple would need to cool a device that stuffs all of its guts into a package so small. Sure the image above could be fake, but if you think it’s because of the blurb or the groove you might want to think again. On the other hand, if you think it’s because some anonymous guy sent it to Macenstein, well, you’re probably right. If it is fake however, don’t expect it to be far off from the real deal.

[Via Boing Boing]

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Yesterday Apple threw the world a curveball by announcing this would be its last year at Macworld, and Señor Jobs would not be making his standard keynote speech. Speculation immediately ensued, obviously, as the announcement offered nothing in the way of an explanation. Jobs’ health, longevity with the company and motives were all called into question and Apple refrained from issuing any further elaboration. The most likely of all the speculation however, can be found in a report from Jim Goldman of CNBC where he postulates that Apple’s move is in fact politically motivated. First addressing the rumors of health-related motivation, Goldman asserts:

I can tell you that sources inside the company tell me that Jobs’ decision was more about politics than his pancreas. Sources tell me that if Jobs for some reason was unable to perform any of his responsibilities as CEO because of health reasons, which would include the Macworld keynote, I should “rest assured that the board would let me know.”

He goes on to state, in essence, that Apple would simply rather do its own thing. Apple’s special events undoubtedly garner just as much attention from media as Macworld, so why wouldn’t the company keep 100% of the of the focus on itself? As for IDG, organizer of the annual Macworld event, this remains a massive body blow. Apple’s annual announcements account for a huge portion of the fanfare Macworld sees and Apple’s decision will likely affect the event tremendously. Regardless, Apple don’t need no stinking expos is Apple’s attitude and the fact of the matter is – it’s true.

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[Image Credit]

Perhaps it’s a sign of things to come, but Apple has announced that its presence will no longer grace the Macworld Expo after January 2009. What was speculated earlier about Steve Jobs’ keynote is also true — he will not be delivering his usual keynote speech. Instead, Philip Schiller, SVP of Apple’s Worldwide Product Marketing, will be giving the opening keynote. This is going to be rather interesting since Steve has quite a presence when addressing the crowd and announcing new products (one of the new rumored products is a refresh of the Mac Mini line and possibly an Apple “netbook”). We’re not quite sure why there has been a sudden change in plans. It could be health-related or that Mr. Jobs will be slowly handing the reigns over to equally capable hands as he has mentioned several times before. With the recession going on, other companies, such as Adobe, are shrinking their presence at Macworld. Regardless of the direction the famous expo heads, we’re going to miss the exciting announcements and speech from our favorite turtle-necked CEO and we wish he would have at least finished the tradition by delivering the final keynote.

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