Services King of Chicago — Benjamin Bloom

Maitre D': You're Abe Froman?

Ferris: That's right, I'm Abe Froman.

Maitre D': The Sausage King of Chicago?

Ferris: Uh yeah, that's me.

Maitre D': Look, I'm very busy. Why don't you take the kids and go back to the clubhouse?

Ferris: Are you suggesting that I'm not who I say I am?

Maitre D': I'm suggesting that you leave before I have to get snooty.

Ferris: Snooty?

Maitre D': Snotty.

Ferris: Snotty?

[thanks wikiquote]

Someone sent me a link to a BusinessWeek story, "Could Apple Become Games Console King?" Just to put the fortune teller hats on, I think we ought to think back to when the Mac Mini was introduced, and everyone said it would be Apple's way to dominate the video home entertainment experience, esp. with Movies. The idea behind this seemed to be that the strategic move was quite clearly aimed at a video download type of environment.

I'm going to pick Jan 2005 (the date of this "I, Cringely" column http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20050120.html) as the date of collective conciousness of this strategy. So the date of collective consciousness of the iTV/iGames strategy is September 2006.

How long before we get video games though ITMS? Even if Apple is getting better at licensing, is in bed with Disney, and has plenty of great HW engineers, it is going to be a while, I think. Not to mention waiting for 802.11n to be final. It can't possibly take less time than the realization of the iTunes Movie Store. Early 2008? That seems right to me.

If the PS3 ends up being as big an improvement over the PS2 as the PS2 was over the PS1, and the price settles a bit, I am not sure I bet on Apple to be the "Services King of Chicago" but Apple might sell a good bit of hardware...