Avi Wilensky
3.4K posts
Apple’s original idea for a TV: The idea was to make something with a huge display that could be nestled into a stand for TV viewing, but also serve as a touch-screen Mac or giant iPad if needed. It would have been a bit similar to the old-school Microsoft Surface (now known as the PixelSense) — something that could handle media, videoconferencing and even office work. At the height of Apple’s ambitions, it hoped the device would turn the industry on its head like the iPhone did years earlier. Teams at Apple built full-scale prototypes, crafted user interfaces, and started to contemplate plans for manufacturing and the supply chain. Apple fans, meanwhile, had long anticipated that the company might make a TV set — prodded in part by comments from co-founder Steve Jobs. Though he wasn’t referencing the Surface-like concept, he famously told biographer Walter Isaacson that something TV-related was coming: “I finally cracked it,” he said. The product would seamlessly sync with other devices and the iCloud service, Jobs said, and “have the simplest user interface you could imagine.”
Apple doesn’t need its own TV set. But it should make a low-cost TV streaming stick to bring its content, apps and smart home features to more households bloomberg.com/news/newslette…
