Hasta La Gadget!

The blogosphere went buck wild with Apple rumors prior to this week’s Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco. The rumors ranged from the predictable to the wacky, with publications placing bets on everything from new iPhones to a fabled touchscreen tablet.

Of course, many rumors proved to be correct while others were irrevocably wrong. Fortunately, by studying the outcomes, we can learn who to trust — and what to expect before Apple’s next big product unveiling.

Here’s our status report of all the WWDC rumors, followed by a report card grading the publications responsible for them. And, for the sake of fairness, we grade ourselves, too.

New iPhone
Source: Daring Fireball; Apple iPhone Apps; MacRumors; WeiPhone
Status: True
Anyone could have guessed Apple would announce a new iPhone at the Worldwide Developers Conference this week, given that the current iPhone 3G and its predecessor launched July 2008 and June 2007, respectively. Nonetheless, prior to the conference, Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster placed an oddball bet that no new iPhones would be announced at WWDC; rather, he anticipated Apple would host a special event later this month or in July to unveil iPhone upgrades.

The tech blogs won against a supposedly informed analyst by having faith in the most obvious outcome, which is quite often a good strategy when playing the Apple guessing game. Daring Fireball’s John Gruber stood out among the crowd: He even knew the new iPhone’s name (iPhone 3GS) before anyone else in the blogosphere. That deserves extra credit.

Two New iPhones for Verizon
Source: BusinessWeek
Status: False
This was another case where banking against the obvious resulted in a miss. Verizon’s CEO Ivan Seidenberg said in April that Apple was unlikely to share the iPhone with Verizon until 2010, when the carrier begins rolling out its fourth-generation network. Also, Apple said in an April earnings call that the company had no plans to change its exclusive contract with AT&T. Nonetheless, with no mention of those two factoids, BusinessWeek reported hearing from two sources “familiar with the matter” that two new iPhone devices for Verizon could be available as soon as this summer. Clearly, it doesn’t take much for one to qualify as “familiar with the matter,” given how vague and loaded that phrase is.

To be fair, BusinessWeek does, toward the end of the story, cite Munster, who says such a deal would be unlikely due to “technology hurdles involved in building and supporting its first CDMA iPhone.” Fine point — so fine, in fact, it should’ve appeared in the first or second paragraph.

Touchscreen Tablet aka “Media Pad”
Source: BusinessWeek
Status: False
In the same story as the one above, BusinessWeek alludes to the second iPhone device for Verizon as a “media pad” enabling users listen to music, view photos, watch high-definition videos and place calls over a Wi-Fi connection. The publication’s source describes the device as smaller than the Amazon Kindle, but with a bigger touchscreen than the Kindle’s. This sounds an awful lot like Apple’s fabled touchscreen tablet that rumor blogs have been squabbling about since July 2008. We have faith that such a device will surface in the next year or so, but BusinessWeek suggested the tablet could launch this summer, meaning Apple might possibly announce the device at WWDC. Nope.

Incremental Upgrades for MacBooks
Source: 9 to 5 Mac
Status: True
Apple fan blog 9 to 5 Mac received a tip that the MacBook family would receive minor upgrades at WWDC. We agreed that this was likely to happen, because Apple’s MacBooks generally have a lifespan of seven months before they’re refreshed. The news that came out of WWDC was even better than expected: Not just upgrades, but significant price cuts that should poise Apple for significant growth in the notebook market.

iPhone-Specific Rumors

Speedier processor and additional RAM
Source: Daring Fireball; Apple iPhone Apps; MacRumors; WeiPhone
Status: True
We expected Apple to boost performance in the new iPhone: The company called the handset “the future of gaming,” and a processor and memory boost for the iPhone would help deliver on that statement. Sure enough, that happened; the S in iPhone 3GS even stands for “speed.”

Magnetometer
Source: The Boy Genius Report; Daring Fireball; WeiPhone
Status: True
Various blogs did some clever investigation to dig up this detail about the new iPhone before Apple could even introduce it — the addition of a magnetometer (i.e., digital compass), which will enhance the handset’s GPS capabilities among other changes. A job well done.

Same Industrial Design as 3G
Source: WeiPhone; Daring Fireball
Status: True
This was a smart bet, because when added together, all the probable rumors suggested most of the new iPhone’s changes were occuring inside, leaving the outside unchanged. Sure enough, the iPhone 3GS looks exactly the same as the iPhone 3G, even in the same colors.

Improved camera with auto-focus lens, video recording and video editing
Source: Engadget; MacRumors; BusinessWeek
Status: True
The iPhone 3GS’s camera sports a 3.0-megapixel camera (up from the 2-megapixel cams in its predecessors) with auto-focus and video-recording capabilities. The video recorder also includes an editing interface. Woohoo!

$200 and $300 price points to be maintained
Source: Daring Fireball; Apple iPhone Apps
Status: True
It was a wise guess that Apple would maintain the same price points: Apple’s iPhone 3G was a tremendous success, selling more than 10 million units in 2008, so why not keep the same price points? Later, Daring Fireball went the extra mile and predicted Apple would keep the 8-GB iPhone 3G alive, selling that model for $100 to attract even more consumers. That turned out to be right, too.

Storage options increased: 16 GB and 32 GB
Source: Daring Fireball; Apple iPhone Apps
Status: True
The iPhone 3G came in two models, an 8 GB and 16 GB, so 16 GB and 32 GB was the logical next step. Sure enough, that happened.

Sleeker design
Source: Apple iPhone Apps
Status: False
We thought there a possibility the new iPhone 3GS would get a tiny bit sleeker while maintaining the same overall design, but this turned out to be wrong. The rumor originated from Apple iPhone Apps, a rather obscure blog, so our hopes weren’t very high for this.

1.5 times the battery life of the current models
Source: Apple iPhone Apps
Status: True
Though Apple iPhone Apps’ rumor report was mostly wrong, it was correct about battery life. Apple claims the iPhone 3GS offers 1.5 times the battery life than its predecessor.

OLED screen
Source: Apple iPhone Apps
Status: False
We didn’t believe this for a second: OLEDs are expensive and would likely drive the iPhone’s price points higher — not a great idea in this economy.

Glowing Apple logo on the back
Source: Apple iPhone Apps
Status: False
Unnecessary feature, and sure enough, a false rumor.

Discontinuation of the metal band surrounding the edge of the device
Source: Apple iPhone Apps
Status: False
We doubted this, because we saw no evidence of it. Also, a reader intelligently pointed out that the metal band is the basis of the structural integrity of the device.

Rubber-tread backing
Source: Apple iPhone Apps
Status: False
We didn’t think this would happen, either, soley based on the fact this would be ugly, and Apple doesn’t like ugly stuff.

Built-in FM transmitter
Source: Apple iPhone Apps
Status: False
Nope. Not a feature users are demanding, and other iPods don’t have it, so why would Apple introduce it in the iPhone?

Grading the Blogs

Without further ado, our report card:

Daring Fireball: A+
Gruber appears to have some pretty damn trustworthy sources: Prior to WWDC, he knew everything from the name of the new iPhone to the fact that it would remain the same colors. Who is his mole?

BusinessWeek: C
Major minus points for drumming up a rumor that was clearly and utterly improbable. Plus points for being right about video editing in the new iPhone.

9 to 5 Mac: B
Kudos for guessing the MacBook upgrades would come, though there weren’t many details about what would be included in those upgrades.

The Boy Genius Report, Engadget and Mac Rumors: A-
Smart investigation led these publications to dig up details about the new iPhone’s camera. Thanks for spoiling the surprise, guys!

WeiPhone: A
A commenter at Chinese Apple fan blog WeiPhone was the first to suggest the new iPhones’ improvements would be internal, leaving the outside unchanged. The tipster said the new iPhone would include a faster 600-MHz processor (up from 400 MHz in the current iPhone), 256-MB RAM (up from 128 MB), and a larger storage capacity of up to 32 GB (up from a maximum of 16 GB). Spot on!

AppleiPhoneApps: D-
This blog’s rumor report was so bogus and unlikely that it receives our lowest grade yet. An FM transmitter? C’mon.

And finally:

Wired.com: B
All of our WWDC predictions and iPhone predictions were correct, although we did miss a few things: Price cuts for the MacBooks, the inclusion of the iPhone 3G for $100 and a super low price tag ($30) for Mac OS X Snow Leopard. Also, we were slightly off with the release date of the new iPhone and iPhone 3.0: Our source said to expect late June or early July, but it turns out iPhone 3GS is hitting stores June 19. Not quite late June, but close.

Photo: Adam Jackson/Flickr