Getting ready for WWDC 2013 (Photo credit: Schill)
I've done a little bit of magic in my time. Call it conjuring, trickery, magic, illusions, or any other name, but one key element of the art is the performance. It's no big secret that when I talk about moving a chosen playing card from one sealed box, across the room, to another sealed box, I've probably already moved it and you didn't notice.
But for those few moments, my job is to make you believe that I can. No matter that the rational mind will be shouting "you did this five minutes ago!" if during the performance you believe, then the job is done, the reward is greater, and everyone - even if only for a brief moment in time - believes that teleportation exists.
That's why I love the time around WWDC.
The 'magic' has already happened. Months, if not years, of design, development, coding, and manufacturing, have led to this moment. Everyone knows that it should all work (let's call Apple Maps an experimental error), that all the pieces are in place, and the hard work has been done.
What's left is the showmanship, the skill of balancing expectations, the tease, the reveal, and the subsequent delivery. The majority of tech companies manage this with great competence, but Apple is the master of delivery.
It helps that their products have a huge customer focus, and that people want to buy them, but part of this success is down to the emotional connections that are created around the product launches. With Steve Jobs you really believed he was changing the world, and not just introducing an incremental update of an OS (with the requisite '200 new features' mentioned). You believed that nobody else could have come up with the software features in the iPhone. You believed.
Steve the Showman knew this was part of the deal with Apple, and he was generous with his time in keynotes and presentations. Others took to the stage to introduce their little bit of magic... Phil Schiller being one of the more noticeable members of the Magic Gang.
The job of ringmaster has passed to Tim Cook, and watching previous announcements, he has his own style, but the magic, from himself and the rest of the team who take to the stage, is still there.
I'll be watching the news as it comes in from WWDC, and the tech journalist in me will be working out the facts from the fluff. But the artist in me will be watching the flourishes, the flair, and the accuracy on show at the Moscone Center.
Because in all the tech industry, nobody else comes close to putting on a show than Apple.
