Apple rumored to create social media consolidation client

[AppleInsider]

Apple could be creating a standalone social networking application that will connect to multiple Web sites and share music listening habits with friends, according to a new rumor.

Following up on a report from last week, The Boy Genius Report shared more information Tuesday from their inside source, expanding upon the purported social media integration perhaps coming in iTunes 9. However, now it is said that the feature will not be a part of iTunes, but instead a separate application developed by Apple.

"The social networking integration that we reported iTunes 9 would have seems to be part of a bigger social networking push by Apple," the report states. "We’ve been informed that Apple has plans to tie iTunes 9 into a "Social" application that they plan to release in the future. It was said that the application (separate from iTunes) will be similar to Yahoo’s OneConnect offering and consolidate all your social networking services. (iPhone application? Desktop app? Wasn’t clarified to us)."

The report goes on to say that the new application would allow users to share their listening habits with friends on social networks, send music to friends, and update statuses on numerous Web sites at the same time. iTunes 9 will reportedly also have the ability to broadcast music statuses, separate from the alleged social media application.

The source also expanded on the previously-reported application organization feature, which is said to allow users the ability to reorganize the order of their App Store software from within iTunes. The source states that users in iTunes 9 will be able to sort applications alphabetically, by genre, date added, or in a custom order.

The Boy Genius Report also shares some skepticism, stating that some of the details seem "a little far fetched." However, in their original report, the Web site called the tipster " a pretty reliable source." The yet-unannounced iTunes 9 could be announced at Apple's annual iPod event in September.

Last week's rumors also corroborate with a report from AppleInsider, suggesting official Blu-ray support could be coming soon to the Mac. Sources cryptically suggested that two compelling new features would come with Apple's newest iMacs. One of those features is said to have long been on the wish-lists of many Mac users while the other is expected to cater to the semi-professional audio/video crowd.

[PG4G]

I suppose I'm interested to see if this turns out. The truth is, just like iChat did for IM, we need for social networking sites. At the current stage, we've got hundreds of ways to social network, and no way to link our networks.

It will be interesting to see where Apple heads with this one, I think. They could be onto something.

[Zoolook]

Does anyone really think Social sites have legs in the long term. I must be getting old, but I have difficulty understanding the value of seeing that someone watched Episode17 of Fringe last night.

[anantksundaram]

Originally Posted by Zoolook

Does anyone really think Social sites have legs in the long term. I must be getting old, but I have difficulty understanding the value of seeing that someone watched Episode17 of Fringe last night.

I sort of agree with you, but increasingly, I am beginning to wonder whether there is something to this social networking thing. It does seem like every kid over 14 that I know is on it. It is certainly a generational thing.

It will be great to see what Apple does with this. I hope it is not the me.com folks that are put in charge of it (I have been generally disappointed by the way they have implemented me.com. While it has improved quite a bit, it is still clunky, expensive and offers too little storage in the basic plan.)

[charlituna]

Originally Posted by PG4G

I suppose I'm interested to see if this turns out. The truth is, just like iChat did for IM,

seems to me that there is your software right there. a new ichat. already has AIM and Jabber. why not expand it.

[Foo2]

Apple Squirt?

[talonhawk]

Originally Posted by PG4G

I suppose I'm interested to see if this turns out. The truth is, just like iChat did for IM, we need for social networking sites. At the current stage, we've got hundreds of ways to social network, and no way to link our networks.

It will be interesting to see where Apple heads with this one, I think. They could be onto something.

It makes the most sense to be a part of iChat or to go alongside iChat. Does iTunes really need a whole new app rolled up inside of it?

[ljocampo]

Well maybe not social networking in the strict sense of the word. I'm into guitar playing and I visit youtube everyday just for that. It's my hobby playing, listening and seeing how others play the songs I enjoy. This type of music networking accounts for an awful lot of youtubers.

I bet special interest groups would love a well made intuitive program such as Apple could produce to bring even more people together. Apple has for years been hawking the video chat crowd by installing iSight cameras in most of their products, and now better cameras in iPhones and iPods. Maybe Apple thinks it's ready to tie all that hardware together.

I don't know. But if anyone can do it, it's Apple. I hope so.

Just my two cents.

[Zoolook]

Originally Posted by anantksundaram

I sort of agree with you, but increasingly, I am beginning to wonder whether there is something to this social networking thing. It does seem like every kid over 14 that I know is on it. It is certainly a generational thing.

They've tried this with Boxee, and I've watched a few things that others have recommended etc. I'm just a little cautious about the whole 'transmit everything I do' approach to life. Mind you, I like Genius, which relies on collecting this data and it'd be good to recommend things to friends who I really talk about shows etc with.

It will be great to see what Apple does with this. I hope it is not the me.com folks that are put in charge of it (I have been generally disappointed by the way they have implemented me.com. While it has improved quite a bit, it is still clunky, expensive and offers too little storage in the basic plan.)

Tell me... good for syncing calendars with the iPhone (shame 'to do' and notes are missing) but a missed opportunity so far.

[al_bundy]

Originally Posted by anantksundaram

I sort of agree with you, but increasingly, I am beginning to wonder whether there is something to this social networking thing. It does seem like every kid over 14 that I know is on it. It is certainly a generational thing.

It will be great to see what Apple does with this. I hope it is not the me.com folks that are put in charge of it (I have been generally disappointed by the way they have implemented me.com. While it has improved quite a bit, it is still clunky, expensive and offers too little storage in the basic plan.)

most Facebook users are over the age of 50

it's a lot easier to use facebook than email people once in a while

[Winston Wolf]

I do the social thing online, so I am curious to see what Apple comes up with. I like what I read about the Palm Pre, how it consolidates your separate contact lists, etc. into one view.

That being said, I hope this isn't a replay of the Sherlock application. I can see developers of TweetDeck, etc. complaining about unfair competition, etc.

[ljocampo]

Originally Posted by anantksundaram

It does seem like every kid over 14 that I know is on it. It is certainly a generational thing.

I'm not so sure it is a younger generational thing only. I'm 62 and use these networks a lot. I see more and more retirees enjoying the wider world without leaving their home. Last week there was an article about twitter being used mostly by the 25+ crowd. I see more older musicians hanging out on these sites than younger ones. I'm not saying young people are not using them. They are, but they'd rather text on their phones. I believe this social networking phenomenon in cross generational on the Internet, particularly since it's global in nature.

[Winston Wolf]

Originally Posted by anantksundaram

It will be great to see what Apple does with this. I hope it is not the me.com folks that are put in charge of it (I have been generally disappointed by the way they have implemented me.com. While it has improved quite a bit, it is still clunky, expensive and offers too little storage in the basic plan.)

Agreed. Me.com is sufficient, but definitely not top of its class, especially when there are free alternatives from Google, etc. I was kind of hoping Apple would just integrate Mac OS X with Google's mail and calendar services. I know there are third-party utilities that do this, but it's so much nicer when it's built-in and just works.

[Rokken]

Originally Posted by charlituna

seems to me that there is your software right there. a new ichat. already has AIM and Jabber. why not expand it.

While we are at it, I hope Apple is going to integrate iChat with live messenger support. There's next to none in Europe that uses AIM.

[psychodoughboy]

I'd hope to see this app downloading address book info, et cetera, from Facebook, like the Palm Pre does. Facebook ordinarily blocks people from doing that, but apparently made a special deal with Palm to allow it - it'd be great to see Apple do the same. Maybe they could even tie it into iPhone OS 3.1 to fully duplicate that functionality of the Pre.

[SpamSandwich]

Apple should just work with Google to integrate their upcoming Google Wave into iTunes and be done with it.

[ljocampo]

Originally Posted by Zoolook

They've tried this with Boxee, and I've watched a few things that others have recommended etc. I'm just a little cautious about the whole 'transmit everything I do' approach to life. Mind you, I like Genius, which relies on collecting this data and it'd be good to recommend things to friends who I really talk about shows etc with.



Tell me... good for syncing calendars with the iPhone (shame 'to do' and notes are missing) but a missed opportunity so far.

I think .me has been making progress. Maybe not fast enough.

Wouldn't it be wild if Apple was going into the ISP or even Tecom business with MobileMe, as the frontend to support their own data and VOIP plans for their iPhones and iTouches tying it in with this new social networking thing. It could be why their going to spent billions in NC on that new data center backbone.

[TenoBell]

I'm in my mid thirties and everyone I know is on Facebook. I think most people my age resisted Myspace, but have fully embraced Facebook

What Facebook does For me os allow me to easily connect and communicate with the hundreds of people I've met over the past twenty years of my life. Outside of this service it would be impossible to keep of with everyone.

Originally Posted by Zoolook

Does anyone really think Social sites have legs in the long term. I must be getting old, but I have difficulty understanding the value of seeing that someone watched Episode17 of Fringe last night.

[Cubert]

"One of those features is said to have long been on the wish-lists of many Mac users while the other is expected to cater to the semi-professional audio/video crowd."

I'm assuming the later refers to Blu-Ray, but any ideas out there on the former?

Firewire 400?
SD card Slot?

[Galley]

I would like to see a way to publish your iTunes library to a MobileMe gallery. Ideally, it would act like the Grid View in iTunes. Visitors could browse your library, and stream previews directly from the iTunes Store. Last.fm playback data could be integrated.

[al_bundy]

Originally Posted by psychodoughboy

I'd hope to see this app downloading address book info, et cetera, from Facebook, like the Palm Pre does. Facebook ordinarily blocks people from doing that, but apparently made a special deal with Palm to allow it - it'd be great to see Apple do the same. Maybe they could even tie it into iPhone OS 3.1 to fully duplicate that functionality of the Pre.

you can do it on the blackberry

a lot of people were even complaining that when you installed the BB facebook app it added pictures to all your address book contacts from facebook. there is an iphone app, but since there is a duplicate data bug in the iphone sync software it doesn't work very well

[Logisticaldron]

Originally Posted by Galley

I would like to see a way to publish your iTunes library to a MobileMe gallery. Ideally, it would act like the Grid View in iTunes. Visitors could browse your library, and stream previews directly from the iTunes Store. Last.fm playback data could be integrated.

It sounds like you could write an app for that for Windows and OS X for a new social networking site. Or even a way for it to tie into MySpace, Facebook, etc. so that friends can your music. Even have it update the app on Facebook or a plugin in MySpace with the song you are currently listening too. Personally, I have no need for such a thing as I’m an old fart, but technically it’s not difficult to parse the iTunes Library XML file and make a webpage of the data.

[Bobo Decosta]

My guess is : iChat going twitter style and available for windows. iChat integration with twitter, facebook, flickr! iChat on the iPhone ...

[Chris_CA]

Originally Posted by Zoolook

but I have difficulty understanding the value of seeing that someone watched Episode17 of Fringe last night.

What is Chris_CA doing right now?

Reviewing AppleInsider articles

[JupiterOne]

Originally Posted by al_bundy

you can do it on the blackberry

a lot of people were even complaining that when you installed the BB facebook app it added pictures to all your address book contacts from facebook. there is an iphone app, but since there is a duplicate data bug in the iphone sync software it doesn't work very well

I've heard of people complaining about BB downloading the pictures too. Maybe some folks want that, but I can't imagine that I would want all my FB friends added to my iPhone contacts.....and then synced to my Mac.

First of all, my "Friends" group in my contacts are my real friends...the ones I call and email and hang out with regularly. Most of them are FB friends too. But then there are the 100 or so FB friends that are just people I met at a party or was introduced to at a bar....and all of a sudden now we're FB friends, but whatever, it's just FB. I definitely don't want these mere acquaintances in my iPhone contacts.

[Logisticaldron]

Originally Posted by Bobo Decosta

My guess is : iChat going twitter style and available for windows. iChat integration with twitter, facebook, flickr! iChat on the iPhone ...

Hmm, I’ve heard about iChat for Windows for awhile but the idea has never rang true to me. I don’t see a financial advantage for it like iTunes to sell iPods/iPhones and Safari and QuickTime to push certain standards. With iChat for Windows they are using 3rd-party protocols. It seems like it would tie some things together but without a business model of some kind that Apple can benefit from I don’t believe it will happen.

[Virgil-TB2]

Originally Posted by Winston Wolf

Agreed. Me.com is sufficient, but definitely not top of its class, especially when there are free alternatives from Google, etc. I was kind of hoping Apple would just integrate Mac OS X with Google's mail and calendar services. I know there are third-party utilities that do this, but it's so much nicer when it's built-in and just works.

As a MobileMe user I have to disagree with this.

It may be expensive, and it certainly has limited functionality, but it is most definitely "top of it's class" in terms of usability and the manner in which the things it does have are implemented. There are free alternatives for each part of the MobileMe service but to categorise the necessary struggle with implementing and integrating all those multiple alternatives into your life as being in a "better class" than MobileMe is quite an exaggeration IMO.

If those other free products were easier to use, and also had more functionality than MobileMe you might have a point, but at the moment MobileMe is pretty much just equivalent to those services but better executed, more integrated, and of course, more expensive. But that's what people are paying for, the lack of having to struggle and set it all up themselves.

Google's services in particular only make any kind of sense if you already have most of your identity connected to Google (as you yourself seem to have). A new user trying to pick between the two alternatives gains no real advantage over using the Google based free alternatives other than price, and they loose the advantage of having it all set up for them.

[Techslacker]

Twitter and Facebook are huge right now. If Apple can market that they have a cool client for those sites it could lead to better sales. Now throw in some itunes goodness and it can help with itunes and perhaps ipod/iphone sales.

No matter how much the media wants to spin it, native looking apps are still heavily desired over dressed up sites in web browsers. If Apple can have one included in the OS or with iLife, that can be a nice perk for many if it looks and works good.

[Johnny Mozzarella]

Originally Posted by Foo2

Apple Squirt?

Welcome to the new social.

[Logisticaldron]

Originally Posted by Virgil-TB2

As a MobileMe user I have to disagree with this.

Me too. For $65/year it’s saved me several times over the years. Now it has more features and capacity than ever and it’s still the same price.

People seem to only focus on one or two of MobileMe’s features when they make decisions about its price and usefulness. “I’m not going to pay for email” or "I can get free storage online” when in fact the true beauty is all the features combined with a single account and no setup.

While I agree that it’s top of its class I do understand that if the price doesn’t warrant the expense for those not interested in using MobileMe’s many features. Back To My Mac and syncing of Mac and user account settings are enough to keep me a loyal customer. I don’t even use the email, I use Gmail for that.

[Virgil-TB2]

Originally Posted by Logisticaldron

Hmm, I’ve heard about iChat for Windows for awhile but the idea has never rang true to me. I don’t see a financial advantage for it like iTunes to sell iPods/iPhones and Safari and QuickTime to push certain standards. With iChat for Windows they are using 3rd-party protocols. It seems like it would tie some things together but without a business model of some kind that Apple can benefit from I don’t believe it will happen.

iChat is a perfect example of how Apple doesn't do social networking very well at all.

I chat all the time and have various handles on various services, but as a MobileMe member I cannot use iChat without using my only real email address as my handle which is connected to all the pieces of myself I would want to keep *off* a social network situation.

I have a RL professional profile to maintain which is attached to my MobileMe account and all that is tied up with my real life details like my credit card and real address. As a result, iChat is absolutely useless for anything that isn't directly connected to my professional life, and I have never used it even though "i chat" all the time.

Apple doesn't "get" the Internet at all really, and the idea that they are getting into being social finally is good news, but something to be taken with huge grains of salt. I would bet it will take them years to get this right. They make great computers, but some things are completely alien to their DNA and this is one of them.

[Johnny Mozzarella]

Originally Posted by psychodoughboy

I'd hope to see this app downloading address book info, et cetera, from Facebook, like the Palm Pre does. Facebook ordinarily blocks people from doing that, but apparently made a special deal with Palm to allow it - it'd be great to see Apple do the same. Maybe they could even tie it into iPhone OS 3.1 to fully duplicate that functionality of the Pre.

I have an iPhone app that syncs up with my Facebook account.
It grabs people contact info and even their profile picture and adds it to my address book. MyPhone+ is the app.

[hmurchison]

Sounds like the Social App would be a nice new member to iLife.

iLife 10 with "Socialize"

[Johnny Mozzarella]

Originally Posted by al_bundy

you can do it on the blackberry

a lot of people were even complaining that when you installed the BB facebook app it added pictures to all your address book contacts from facebook. there is an iphone app, but since there is a duplicate data bug in the iphone sync software it doesn't work very well

MyPhone+ works great. no problems.

[Logisticaldron]

Originally Posted by Virgil-TB2

iChat is a perfect example of how Apple doesn't do social networking very well at all.

I chat all the time and have various handles on various services, but as a MobileMe member I cannot use iChat without using my only real email address as my handle which is connected to all the pieces of myself I would want to keep *off* a social network situation.

I have a RL professional profile to maintain which is attached to my MobileMe account and all that is tied up with my real life details like my credit card and real address. As a result, iChat is absolutely useless for anything that isn't directly connected to my professional life, and I have never used it even though "i chat" all the time.

Apple doesn't "get" the Internet at all really, and the idea that they are getting into being social finally is good news, but something to be taken with huge grains of salt. I would bet it will take them years to get this right. They make great computers, but some things are completely alien to their DNA and this is one of them.

I agree, but there are ways around it. You can create an AIM name for create an alias in MobileMe/.Mac, the problem with the latter is that it is still an email address, even though it won’t be directly tied to you personal accounts.

Another issue that shows that Apple doesn’t get it, or simply doesnt’ care, is the lack of MSN support in iChat. There is a large part of the world that uses MSN or Windows Messenger or whatever they call it now. I think much of Europe, South America, India, Philippines are in this camp, with Yahoo dominating Japan and other Asian countries, with the US mainly being AIM.


PS: (This last paragraph has nothing to do with anything, but I feel the effects of multiple chat clients and of IMing on phones is interesting to include] Though I mostly use AIM I also have the other chat clients running for certain friends in other parts of the world. This means I use Adium, but that is okay by me since Adium rocks. I even paid $15 for Beejive on the iPhone and have installed the Adium plugin for Emoji since I’m now getting more iPhone users sending me Emoji in chats to my computer. (this

[psychodoughboy]

MyPhone+ is great... until you want to sync phone numbers or email addresses like the Pre can.

[Bobo Decosta]

Originally Posted by Logisticaldron

Hmm, I’ve heard about iChat for Windows for awhile but the idea has never rang true to me. I don’t see a financial advantage for it like iTunes to sell iPods/iPhones and Safari and QuickTime to push certain standards. With iChat for Windows they are using 3rd-party protocols. It seems like it would tie some things together but without a business model of some kind that Apple can benefit from I don’t believe it will happen.

What's the financial advantage of Safari for Windows?

The business model for iChat for windows would be tied to mobileme in the long run. If they can do the job like we expect it from Apple they could come up with a client that brings every important social network together. Apple would reach out to a large number of active users that it might still not reach with iTunes. After a few months people will not be talking about facebook, twitter or whatever because they use iChat. Apple has his cool momentum and could take advantage of their name to start one big community, something still lacking on the mac although their is already huge community we still aren't connected. If this would work out like I expect it would be it would also make the iPhone the ultimate social networking tool. Yes it has already all the apps of the major social networks but one app would be Apple style, multiple apps to spread the same message is just stupid so ...

[Johnny Mozzarella]

Originally Posted by Bobo Decosta

My guess is : iChat going twitter style and available for windows. iChat integration with twitter, facebook, flickr! iChat on the iPhone ...

They should drop AOL support and go to just Apple IDs.
They have over 50 million customers with Apple IDs.
iChat for Mac, PC and iPhone would give them instant reach.
If should integrate with Facebook chat, twitter, Flickr and MobileMe.
The iPhone app should be free.

THIS SHOULD BE APPLE'S ANSWER TO AT&T DROPPING THE BALL ON MMS FOR IPHONE.

[Bobo Decosta]

Originally Posted by Johnny Mozzarella

They should drop AOL support and go to just Apple IDs.
They have over 50 million customers with Apple IDs.
iChat for Mac, PC and iPhone would give them instant reach.
If should integrate with Facebook chat, twitter, Flickr and MobileMe.
The iPhone app should be free.

THIS SHOULD BE APPLE'S ANSWER TO AT&T DROPPING THE BALL ON MMS FOR IPHONE.

Exactly my point!

[Logisticaldron]

Originally Posted by Bobo Decosta

What's the financial advantage of Safari for Windows?

Pushing WebKit development and use, which in itself pushes more open web standards, which is another way of saying helps kills IE dominance and other propriety plug in support.

There may be other reasons too, like iTunes Store eventually dropping the Java it uses to render the store in favour of lighter setup that requires no Java to be installed. Say, if ChromeOS is to be based on web standards Apple may even want a web-based version of iTunes that runs completely within a browser window and uses HTML5’s database features to still pull your local iTunes DB.

The business model for iChat for windows would be tied to mobileme in the long run. If they can do the job like we expect it from Apple they could come up with a client that brings every important social network together.

If you have a MobileMe account you can use any IM client that supports AIM. You can still sync with Outlook and whatever. There is still no financial benefit for Apple at this time to adding a new IM client to Windows.