Digital Marketing and Web Strategy by Bob Hazlett | One Half Amazing!

I had lunch the other day with the ever-brilliant Future Josh. I had some ideas that I wanted to run past him. When we get together though, the conversation invariably keeps coming back to Apple. We talked about my ideas, but mostly we floundered around all things iPhone 4S, Steve Jobs’ legacy and more.

Then he said something utterly futuristic about Siri, Apple’s voice-command software, and where he envisioned it going.  Right now, on the surface it resembles a virtual personal assistant and note taker, but as we talked he unfolded how it could be more than just a helper application. Josh proceeded to eulogize that Siri was Apples decoy into Google’s search market. He believes that Apple is already making plans to fast forward what we consider basic search today. So instead of simple text searches, Apple could be positioning itself as a natural language search engine to compliment its array of products and essentially squeezing Google and Microsoft out of the picture. This idea is beyond the browser and is already made up of a large (and willing) audience.

As voice recognition and technology evolves, searches and commands could be seamless. Can you imagine a search engine that could actually sense your tone and factor such into its results? A more sophisticated example might be the day where you can ask Siri the temperature inside your house and then instruct it to increase or decrease the thermostat – all without picking up your device.

Apple won’t depend on advertising revenue to pull this off either since their model is different than Google’s. Apple creates services for its users to sell more products while Google on the other hand creates services to sell more ads. Bingo bango!

Here’s your handy-dandy cheat sheet for all the cool stuff that Apple introduced today including new iPods, an update to the Apple TV and a new version of iTunes which incorporates a music social network.  Click here for an overview of it all.

Steve Jobs was pretty pissed last time when all those damn bloggers kept taking down his precious wi-fi, so for their event tomorrow, they are finally opening up to the public and streaming the entire thing live on their home page. Finally, common folks can to sit at their desks and eat lunch while a man in a black turtle neck sells them things that he knows will be obsolete in 3 months.

All you need to check it out is a Mac running Safari, an iPhone or an iPad.  Regular Windows nerds should call that one hipster friend that they secretly despise.

This Apple nerd is pulling for an update to the Apple TV (so I can finally get rid of satellite) and an update to iOS 4 for the iPad.  I swear to God, if Steve mentions anything about a new iPhone, I’m going to go get $200 worth of quarters and shove them directly in his hard drive.

If you’re in the Central Time Zone, the event starts at 12 noon.  You can view it at apple.com

Here are the details on iPhone 4

• Better battery life, faster processor, sharper screen
• Improved 5MP camera with flash
• Shoot 720p HD video and edit right on your phone
• Second front facing camera so you can video chat (only over wi-fi)
• Updated operating system (available on June 21)
• Pre-orders start June 15, due out on June 24
• $199 for 16GB, $299 for 32GB

more details at Apple.com

If Google or Apple went out of business tomorrow, which one would you be more disappointed about? Discuss.