cafarmer

I would like to see them create an iCloud Home Server.  Something that would sync content you bought to the device... go all in on a walled garden that provided a "realm" for all of your devices.  Expand iCloud to not just provide storage, but to allow content creators to publish content that customers in the walled garden can consume and subscribe to - removing the ability for content providers to know who you are when you buy from them. I would also like to see this device work with the internet and without the internet. This could be a new internet... imagine the iPhone with the App Store, but no safari and the apps cannot reach outside the application's iCloud storage/datasets (no more data brokers... all exchanges would be anonymized with the vendors).  No more browsing; Facebook, Ebay, WSJ, Twitter, Instagram... all content providers publishing to iCloud (a little clarification on the social media part - I don't think those apps would even participate, I think Apple should integrate all features of Instagram, Facebook and TikTok into the platform - killing them off).  Part of that would include that content providers publish their content to a "shared catalog" or "shared content guide"... fix the whole streaming app garbage.  Magazines, forums, friends, live broadcast content, on-demand content, music... all available content from a single guide or experience.  (side note: apps are not the future of television no more than apps were the future for music.  Can you imagine going to 7 different record label apps when you got your first iPhone/iPod instead of one iTunes experience?)

If you are reading this thinking; "What about banking!" "What about console gaming!"... well, that's the thing about disrupting something.  It would have to be addressed without breaking the tenets of the system.  Maybe the iCloud Home Server would be able to sandbox certain devices... (like your work computer and the xbox/playstation)... and maybe your bank would have to join some kind of iCloud banking transaction system.. or just use your Apple Card for everything.  Also, if you are thinking "no way would anyone cut themselves off from the open internet!"... well, you know there is a "dark web", right?  Do you yearn to go check it out?  Thought not.  FOMO?  Thought not.

By the way, I had typed this up in more detail a couple years after Steve died and sent it to Tim Cook... not to my surprise, never received an answer back.  Then every time something horrible was revealed about the internet or some new rumor... I would send it again.. I probably did this for 6 years and then stopped.