Monday morning marks the start of Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) 2013, with the tech giant poised to unveil multiple updates to current products, perhaps even showcasing some new devices and services. The Diplomat has rounded up the three most talked-about rumors surrounding the event:
iOS 7
Jonathan Ive, legendary brainchild of Apple’s minimalist hardware approach, was tapped to redesign iOS after Scott Forstall’s firing last year. Many saw this as the end of Apple’s inclusion of “skeuomorphism” – when design cues are taken from real world predecessors. Said BBC’s Tom Chatfield:
“Ive replaces perhaps the world’s most influential exponent of skeuomorphic software, Scott Forstall, whose work at Apple included creating iOS as we know it – complete with a compass app that looks like a handheld orienteering compass, a notes app mimicking yellow sticky paper, [and] a calculator app designed like an old-fashioned accountant’s pocket calculator.”
Expect iOS 7 to be “flattened,” with an emphasis on usability that trumps mere aesthetic value. However, these visual changes must be subtle enough to avoid confusing long-time iPhone and iPad users. As reported by the International Business Times, iOS 7 has been code-named “Innsbruck,” – which means “the bridge over the inn” – perhaps “symbolizing it as the bridge between the old interface and the newly designed one that is likely to incorporate iOS 7.”
iRadio
If Siri was WWDC 12’s big software reveal, iRadio will probably be this year’s addition to the iOS ecosystem. Over the past month, Apple has signed two of the biggest players in the music industry, Universal and Warner, to streaming music deals. Apple is also eager to cash in on supported in-app advertising to boost its own iAds division’s profit margin. iRadio seems too lucrative to be looked over for Monday’s highly anticipated keynote.
While its debut is all but guaranteed at WWDC, questions remain about the iRadio experience. “For one, it isn’t known whether Apple will offer some sort of iRadio Premium service that would eliminate the ads,” wrote App Advice’s Bryan M. Wolfe. “For another, we don’t yet know whether iRadio will run through iTunes, or through a separate application.” Further, as pointed out by Forbes, “Vodaphone already has a service called iRadio in Ireland, so it is unclear if Apple will in fact be able to call its product ‘iRadio’ or will have to go the Apple TV route and name it simply ‘Apple Radio.’”
MacBook refresh
The final rumor follows an insight from Ming-Chi Kuo, a KGI Securities analyst with a proven track record for Apple hardware predictions. “Kuo said the biggest change to the MacBook lineup in 2013 will be the introduction of Intel’s Haswell processor, which replaces the Ivy Bridge architecture currently used in the company’s computers,” wrote Apple Insider.
Alongside the upgraded laptops, Apple will be releasing an OSX update to match up with the expected hardware refresh. OSX 10.9 is expected to include improved multi-monitor support and Siri voice control. It will probably not be the fresh start that Lion seemed to represent, but 10.9, code-named “Cabernet,” “should come with a few new features and some tweaks to make things easier for power users,” said Mashable’s Pete Pachal.
WWDC 2013 kicks off at 7:00 am PST at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. You can watch a live stream of the event on your iOS device by downloading Apple’s official WWDC app.