Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 10 March 2009 14:41
Opinion and Analysis
Page 1 of 3
Rumours emanating from Taiwan that Apple may be working on a touch-screen netbook should come as no surprise if you think about the Mac and iPod maker's current product line.
Some people argue that Apple already has a netbook - more accurately, two of them.
The iPod touch provides web and email access providing your connectivity needs are satisfied by WiFi. If you need the (almost) always-on connectivity delivered via the mobile phone networks, there's the iPhone 3G.
According to at least one measure, mobile browsing represents a tiny fraction of web use, even though the
lion's share of it is taken by the iPhone and iPod touch.
For some purposes - and admittedly this is based on brief experience with various products - Apple's handhelds provide as good an experience as netbooks.
But even with the easy-to-use zoom capability, that small screen can be a big disadvantage.
So it would make a lot of sense if Apple's 'real' netbook turned out to be an oversized iPod touch rather than a shrunken MacBook.
Apple's been talking down netbooks, but that happened with video-capable iPods. So what other clues are there about the company's intentions? See
page 2.
