What next?

Aww, I can only select one!

They'll do the Mac Pro next. Redesigned case, everyone in the industry will hate it, Apple pushes people (idiots) away, but it's the best machine in its class going into the future, and the people in the industry that see that and buy it will be ahead of the curve. 

 

Then the 4th gen Apple TV, still a box, hopefully with better software and more integrated with Apple networking hardware.Aww, I can only select one! They'll do the Mac Pro next. Redesigned case, everyone in the industry will hate it, Apple pushes people (idiots) away, but it's the best machine in its class going into the future, and the people in the industry that see that and buy it will be ahead of the curve.

 

Then the 4th gen Apple TV, still a box, hopefully with better software and more integrated with Apple networking hardware. Then, I guess, a larger iPad. During all this time, they'll be starting to roll out Siri to Macs. 

 

3D printing I don't see. Consumers can't use that for anything. People don't want to build their own stuff; they want stuff built.

Tailpipe, you offer an interesting mix of "what next" options but I believe there are options which are far more likely given various acquisitions and the trajectory of Apple's previous offerings although I believe a few of the options you offer are correct:

Mac Pro 2013 - 95%

AppleTV (4th generation) - 30%

Siri improvements (rather than "Develop AI for all of its devices") - 65%

iCloud improvements (reliability, scalability at least) - 30% increasing to 70% in 2014

New iPad with Retina Display (4th generation) Power Consumption - 25% increasing to 75% in 2014

MIMO (multi-input multi-output) across most of the product line - 80%

802.11ac - 20% (see above) increasing to 80% in 2014

PowerVR Series 6 Rogue GPU - 75%

20 nm process - 5% moving to 70% likely in 2014

Optical Image Stabilization - 70%

NFC or Bluetooth SRFT - 50%

Improved User Interface - 100%

Greater SSD capacity - 10%

Greater RAM capacity - 10%



Either AppleTV or Siri have the greatest unrealized potential of all existing Apple products at the moment:

AppleTV:

• Free IPTV for the major networks (ABC, Bounce, CBS, CW, Fox, Ion, MeTV, My Network TV, NBC, PBS, RTV, TeleFutura, Telemundo, Univision, etc.)
• iAds commercials to remove or reduce cost of available programming from iTunes
• iTunes subscription model (ala Amazon Prime, Hulu Plus or Netflix)
• Live netcast (aka video podcast) programming availability (TWiT TV offers live programming for several hours per day) (see Free IPTV above as well)
• iAds to make the preceding possible, if necessary
• Single portal interface (all media is searchable via a single portal)
• Family Center - an iCloud interface that shares family information including Calendars, Contacts, Mail, Notes, Photo Stream, Reminders amongst family members
• Apps
• Gaming controller (ala Nintendo Wii or Microsoft Kinect)

Siri:
Automatically respond to calendar events, emails, telephone calls, text messages
Automatically check traffic and weather conditions before (known) times to depart from home or work
Improved voice recognition (dependent upon external developments at the moment) (likely reason Apple is using their own IP and three microphones in the iPhone 5)
Improved reponsiveness


Smartphones, including the Apple iPhone are only two years away from discontinued massive improvement in hardware. I estimate that smartphones will become a commodity device by 2016 at which time Google will essentially become the Microsoft of smartphone OSes.

Except for the Mac Pro. I expect its replacement to be next. At least when it comes to hardware. Software is rather unlimited. Operating system development is to rushed in my view. Apple needs to invest in more rigorous quality control than they have of recent. I always wanted an Apple shortwave radio but I guess that is a far to limited audience. I'd like to see Apple buy Agilent and put their touch on instrumentation. Personal robotics is another potential winner but the technology is in its infancy. AI needs to be integrated into the OS so that it can help you on your local machine doing what you do as a power user. Interesting but the technology here is in materials. I couldn't guess one bit.

You have some really interesting points here.
Apple needs to move forward with AI on all hardware. 100% that Apple will continue to work on iCloud. The problem here is vision, I just don't think it aligns with most users. We have the fourth gen iPad already. I'm also not sure what you are talking about power consumption wise, I expect Apple to continue to increase performance with each release only touching power consumption as an after thought. After all if we are truly in a post PC era, tablets will have to take on more and more workloads. I'd say it is almost a 100% certainty for the next iteration of Apple processor. This is very tough to call. Possibly. How about an Apple professional camera instead? I'm not sure why people get wound up about user interface, lets face it iOS changes (improves) with every release. This is huge. Frankly Apple hasn't been aggressive enough in displacing the need for magnetic drives. More importantly iPads can easily become storage constrained. The current approach with iCloud highlights the fact that Apple doesn't get it, so while most users could use more Solid State Storage, I'm mixed about how fast that storage will come. This is being dealt with on the desktop, iOS devices likely need another generation though iPad could use more RAM now. That will not happen. The networks are on hard times due in part to the Internet, they won't be giving anything away. No way in hell! The whole point with iTunes is that I have zero advertising to deal with. If Apple went this route I'd switch back to DVDs. Maybe! More online porn!

No seriously, the problem with video podcasts is with the recovery of production costs and maybe making a little profit if that is the motivation. Free TV doesn't allow for that. If Apple was to support such endeavors they really should look at the iTunes music model. No no no no! Nice idea, though many businesses could use the same sort of facility. There are so many possibilities for Siri and artificial intelligence in general that what can be done is virtually unlimited. I'm not sure where you heard that but frankly it is baloney.

Well the cloud is going to improve with the new data centers, and AI software is growing. I suggest Apple will build a Mac Pro and now that hardware is exceeding the requirements of software, Apple will start focusing more on software, like iOS 7 to match the capabilities of Windows Phone 8 and Android. It's an area they could improve on and now with Forstall gone and Joby Ive in the lead, great new ideas will come for iOS. 

 

In terms of new designs, in the next two years I predict apple will build a bluetooth lcd keyboard/application function space, that will allow for multilingual keys and increased app functions for content creators and the every day user/gamer. For instance, instead of seeing the letters awsd they could transform the keyboards keys into arrows for gaming apps you could purchase on the mac app store. 

 

Since apple has never done an iPhone in colors, I'll assume the next model will have the front black glass or white glass and have colorful shell, housing. It will also have wifi ac, and maybe nfc, but probably not.

 

AI is also increasing for data management, maybe OS X 11 will allow us to tell Siri on Macs to move files from one iPhone to the next or send files to persons without having to type their email address, if a user has it saved. I also thin that voice search in safari will be available in 2013, and in iTunes as well for content search.