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I’m pretty convinced every time an analyst opens his or her mouth about Apple and we post it, a kitten is eaten by a bear somewhere*. This week’s “Wacky Analyst Random Rumormongering” comes from Jefferies analyst Peter Misek who claims that Apple is about to launch “a new far reaching cloud-based service” based on video. Oh, really? Let’s examine the reasons why we are visiting fantasyland, shall we?
At least Business Insider was so bold as to say this is “informed speculation,” although that’s pretty much what these analysts do, isn’t it? Unfortunately, the speculation appears to have happened in a brushed-aluminum vacuum chamber, where Apple is capable of setting terms with media companies and ISPs at-will and everyone works in a completely ego-free marketplace — but none of those things are true in reality. Besides, the “streaming media” speculation has been around ever since this data center had a concrete foundation.
Misek claims the data center is going live soon and that Apple will build others around the world. Plus, he says this data center is “too big” for mere music. Well, we knew the data center would go online this Spring, since Apple told us all this in a quarterly earnings call. The part about building more around the world is pure speculation. Apple uses Akamai for caching, so why bother with more data centers so soon? It’s possible, but I see no evidence considering how long it took them to build this data center. Then again, Apple Retail has had a meteoric rise… As for the thing being “too big” for video, what about software services? This isn’t just about storing petabytes of data, this is also about uptime, scaling and keeping monstrous amounts of data intact. You know, like email and calendars and possibly office documents.
Continue reading Don’t hold your breath for an Apple video streaming service
Don’t hold your breath for an Apple video streaming service originally appeared on TUAW on Tue, 12 Apr 2011 15:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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