Apple is holding their iPhone OS event today and there have been a couple more rumors circulating regarding the announcements. The first of which is from Kaufman Bros. analyst Shaw Wu. Yes, the same Shaw Wu who predicted that Steve Jobs wouldn’t be at September’s iPod event (in other words, his track record is a little hit and miss).
Shaw Wu claims that Apple will unveil iPhone OS 4.0 with full multi-tasking support and a new “iAd” mobile advertising service. Multi-tasking shouldn’t come as a surprise since it has been mentioned by multiple sources over the past few weeks. But, the iAd platform is something that hasn’t had nearly as many mentions. The first report I managed to find regarding the iAd service was from MediaPost late last month. There wasn’t any solid details about the service’s features but it’s safe to assume that it would be based off of Apple’s recently acquired Quattro Wireless and would give developers of free App Store apps and web apps the ability to monetize their offerings.
The second rumor is based on speculation about Apple’s Pages, Keynote, and Numbers for iPad documentation that states “printing directly from iPad is not currently available.” While this doesn’t come right out and say that these applications will support printing, it does leave the window open for the future. It’s possible that Apple decided to include this simply to make it clear that printing isn’t supported, but they also could have included it because it’s something they’re working on.
I have little reason to believe that printer support will be included in today’s announcements but I can’t imagine it will never make it’s way into the OS. If Apple sees this as a serious content creation platform (and the existence of Pages, Keynote, and Numbers indicate that they do), printing is one feature that can’t be overlooked for too long. It will happen, but when is a different question entirely.
I likely won’t be able to write about today’s announcements until later tonight but rest assured I’ll be waiting with bated breath to see what Apple has in store for the future of iPhone OS.
