Getting a jump on the increasingly shortened post-Labor Day pre-holiday hype period, Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) has invited selected members of the news media to an event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco where, speculation is, anything can happen short of resurrecting John Lennon and George Harrison and putting together a Beatles reunion.
Because the press invitation included the picture of a guitar, speculation immediately ran to the addition of a Beatles catalog for the iTunes store. Since the company has recently floated--then failed to comment on--rumors that it was negotiating for a 99-cent TV show package, other speculation ran to an Apple TV (or as they'd like to call it, iTV) pronouncement.
That speculation was doused by a Bloomberg report that has Apple boss Steve Jobs looking askance at the hit value of Apple TV. "This isn't a revolution in the making. Even if Apple wanted to try that, studios have all but nullified the possibility by refusing to let Apple sell subscriptions to favorite shows to be watched whenever and as many times as you like," the report said.
So what's the big deal? Nothing much, according Gleacher & Co. analyst Brian Marshall who predicted Apple will emphasize modifications to the iPod and make some minor announcements around iTunes. "Apple TV, that's still chugging along. They will likely introduce (Apple TV) in a sleeker case with more storage, but that's not going to be a big deal," he told Computerworld.
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