It seems to be a mandatory component of the kabuki that is Apple press events and coverage thereof: Nearly every such product rollout is initially dismissed as a disappointment. Despite the welcome return of Steve Jobs, this morning’s one certainly is certainly getting lukewarm reviews, in part because it failed to involve even such relatively mundane rumored gizmos as an iPod Touch with a camera.

I came with my expectations firmly in check, and saw at least one bit of news which will change my life as a user of technology for the better (iTunes’ new tools for managing iPhone apps). So while I may not have been wowed, I also wasn’t nonplussed by the lack of all-new products or other major developments. And as usual, a lot of what was interesting at this event had as much to do with implications as the concrete facts. After the photo of Steve, fourteen questions and attempts at answers…

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Twelve hours from now, Apple’s music event will be underway, and I’ll be  sitting in the audience providing liveblog coverage right here. The big news won’t quite have come yet, but by noon we’ll know all. For now, though, it’s still predictin’ time–and here are some from you guys.

Yesterday night, I posted a quick survey about the event, asking you to pick which items would happen from a list covering some things that have been rumored or predicted, or which just sound logical. If we define a prediction as something which more than fifty percent of the folks who took the survey think will occur, only three made the grade: You think we’ll see an iPod Touch with a camera, that Steve Jobs will make an appearance, and that there will be a new version of iTunes with social networking features. It now looks like the Beatles won’t show up on iTunes tomorrow; you made an almost-prediction that they would, with exactly fifty percent of respondents predicting their arrival.

Here’s everything you voted on. (I should have also asked about Apple’s reported “Cocktail” format for digital albums, but didn’t).

I also asked whether Apple will discontinue the iPod Classic tomorrow. You predicted it would, in a squeaker: 51 percent versus 49 percent.

Thanks for voting, everyone; I’ll check back in tomorrow with a final tally of how we did…

Last time Apple had a big product rollout, I asked you to make some predictions. Collectively, you did better than some of the big-time Apple pundits. Now we’re just hours away from the company’s music event, which Technologizer will cover live beginning at 10am PT on Wednesday.

So let’s try this again, with another quick survey. I’ve listed some of the products that have been rumored or predicted for the event, and also let you predict whether the iPod Classic will get the axe or live on to play another day. I’ll close the survey Tuesday night and report on your verdict before the event happens–then follow up with a look at just how uncannily accurate you were.

Click here to take the Apple Music Event survey.

Tumblr developer/blogger Marco Arment has posted his best guesses about what Apple will announce–iPodwise, at least–at its music event next Wednesday (Technologizer will be there to liveblog the news). Arment’s predictions seem logical enough–which doesn’t guarantee their accuracy, of course–and the most interesting thing about them is that he thinks that Apple will discontinue the iPod Classic, the high-capacity, small-screen, no-touch, no-apps model that’s the direct descendent of the original 2001 iPod.

In the era in which the iPod Touch is unquestionably the most exciting iPod and the Nano is the dominant “traditional” iPod, are there any reasons why Apple wouldn’t kill the Classic?

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If it’s September in the world of technology, one thing is pretty much a given: Apple will release some new iPods and update iTunes. I’ll be in the audience at San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Gardens next Wedneday at 10am as the company does that–I’m assuming–and maybe tells us other stuff of interest, too. (If you think it’ll announce a tablet, tell us now so you claim immense foresight, really good sources, or ESP if it does–most of the world has decided it won’t.)

I’ll blog the event as it happens, as quickly as humanly possible (courtesy of Cover It Live). If there’s a Q&A session, I’ll try to ask a question on behalf of the Technologizer community, so if you’ve got any queries right now relating to Apple and its music-related products, ask ‘em in the comments on this post or at the home page for our coverage. And join us on Wednesday right here, won’t you?

When Apple released the voice-controlled third-generation iPod Shuffle back in March, lots of folks understandably fixated on the fact that Apple had moved the controls to the earbud cord, making it impossible to use the Shuffle with third-party headsets. Apple said that it would license the design to other headset manufacturers. And today, Klipsch announced the Image S4i headset, which sports a microphone and the on-cord buttons needed to control the Shuffle. Available in August, it’ll sell for $99.99–twenty-one bucks more than the Shuffle itself. I’d love to know how many Shuffle owners there are out there who are serious enough about sound to invest more in a headset than they did in their audio player.

Of course, Klipsch says the S4i provides a superior experience–it’s got sound-isolating earbuds and a 360-degree microphone, among other features. And the headset also works with some fancier Apple products: the iPhone 3GS, second generation iPod touch, fourth generation iPod Nano, and the iPod Classic 120GB.

iPod Touch gets microphone, camera?

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Hero Android phone: fatally flawed.

Macs finally get BlackBerry software.

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You would think a PC guy could escape Apple’s clutches. I’ve been successful until now, but I recently bought an Apple iPod Touch. Here’s the weird part: I love it.

If you own an iPod Touch, you’re wondering why it took me so long. For the rest of you: This is one fun device, and a terrifically useful one with the right applications. Watch a video to see what the gizmo does. (Warning: The presenter is a hurt-your-eyes perky Apple evangelist.)

Actually, I had no choice. My wife, Judy, heard about iBird ($30), a must-have birding program available for the Apple iPhone and iPod touch. The app does away with the hassle of carrying birding field guides; iBird shows images and illustrations of birds, plays their songs, supplies behavior and range details, and more. (Even if you’re not a birder, watch a video of iBird in action–it’s amazing.)

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Judging the accuracy of Apple rumors may not be a cakewalk, but one technique is surprisingly effective and obvious: Ask yourself if past Apple history suggests that a rumor sounds like something the company would do. By that measure, the current rumors about iPod Touch and Nano models with built-in video cameras sounds entirely plausible. The iPhone 3GS‘s camera shows Apple has invested in video-recording hardware and software. It’s gradually been turning every iPod except for the screenless Shuffle into a video device. And given that a high percentage of people who want iPods own them by now, Apple could use a strikingly new feature with wide appeal to tempt them to upgrade.

On the other hand, I’d be surprised if concurrent rumors about Apple getting ready to build projectors into iPhones and iPods are the real deal. Projectors may be getting tinier, but they aren’t yet teensy enough to cram into a phone or MP3 player that’s as thin as the ones Apple likes to make. And how often would a real person want to project an image from an iPhone or iPod in the real world? Not all that often, surely. Apple history shows that it’s not all that interested in adding exotic features that won’t be used much, and is almost never the first company to embrace a new technology. (It tends to cheerfully sit on the sidelines while other companies make bleeding-edge products that are noble in their ambitions but frustrating in practice.)

I’m not saying that there will never be Apple handheld devices with built-in projectors, but I don’t think we’re a couple of months away from seeing them. And a couple of months from now is almost certainly when Apple will announce its new lineup of iPods. Any guesses (or wishes) about what the Fall 2009 lineup of iPods will involve?

On Wednesday, a legendary gadget turns thirty–Sony’s Walkman, which put high-quality music into our pockets for the first time. Back when I was at PC World, we named the original model, the TPS-L2, as the greatest gadget of all time; the iPod was #2. The Walkman name lives on via new phones and digital audio players; if the iPod name is still in use in 2031, thirty years after the debut of Apple’s first music player, I’ll be impressed.

I was reminded of the anniversary by a fun BBC story by a 13-year-old who tried replacing his iPod with a Walkman (he wasn’t impressed). And I was moved to create a T-Grid comparing 1979′s TPS-L2 to today’s most highly-evolved iPod, the iPod Touch. Like the Beeb’s teenaged tester, I wouldn’t give up my iPod (which happens to be an iPhone) for a Walkman. But I’m not so sure that the TPS-L2 wasn’t equally as impressive (and fashionable) in its day, in its own way…

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Want a reason to check  out RealPlayer SP, the new beta of the next version of RealPlayer, a media player that most of us have used at one time or another but which is no longer omnipresent? It’s got a new feature that’s pretty cool: the ability to easily download video from YouTube and other sites, convert it, and then get it onto a bevy of devices.

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There’s a surging sea of portable speakers out there for iPods, but ones designed to work well with iPhones are a rarer breed. Which is why I’m impressed with DGA’s Livespeakr, a collapsible, battery-powered speaker setup that was designed with the iPhone in mind and which delivers very good sound quality considering its cost ($99 list in black or white versions; $85 at the Livespeakr site) and size.

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Among the many uncanny parallels between Stephen Paul Jobs and Walter Elias Disney is this one: Very early on, both abandoned the work that in some respects might seem to define their careers. Walt Disney began as a cartoonist, but by the late 1920s he had nothing to do with the drawing of Disney cartoons and is said to have told folks that he couldn’t have held down an animator’s job in his own studio.  And Steve Jobs held technical positions at HP and Atari at the dawn of his time in Silicon Valley, but his contributions to Apple have never been those of an engineer.

And yet, as I browsed Apple patents in recent months for stories like this one, I wasn’t surprised to discover that Jobs’ name is among the inventors listed on dozens of Apple filings over the past thirty years (with a thirteen-year gap in the middle during his absence). It doesn’t feel like glory-hogging, either: Anyone want to make the case that major Apple products would be pretty much the same if Jobs hadn’t contributed ideas and refinements? And Jobs’ name is typically one of several or many on a patent, usually along with that of Apple design honcho Jonathan Ive and other, lesser-known colleagues. (Most Jobs patents relate to industrial design; some are for software; none are for circuitry or other under-the-hood technologies.)

Rummaging through Google Patent Search‘s records of patents credited in part to Steve Jobs is an absorbing way to reflect on some of his accomplishments and failures–and maybe even to learn some new things about what makes the man tick.Yes, his name is on the patents for most of the iconic computers, MP3 players, and other gizmos sold by Apple from 1998 to the present. (I’ve written about some of them before.) But you know what? It’s not the famous, obvious stuff that I find most interesting–it’s the sidelights, loose ends, and mysteries. I’ll look at ten of those in a moment.

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Techwise, it’s a slow day…

iPod Nano to get camera?

Intel, Microsoft dislike big netbooks.

Kids text 80 times daily.

Windows Vista SP2 is ready.

Microsoft’s future visions video, remixed.

Photorealistic games: 10-15 years?

Gotta love this 1878 sign.

Twitter on the Twitter show.

A happy May to you!

Swine flu tracking for iPhone.

The 240GB iPod upgrade option.

Twittering from the White House.

Apple’s next iPhone: Flip replacement?

Twitter administrator account gets hacked.

The military’s ultrasecure Windows XP.

Dell offers 120 laptop designs.

Android gets sued over trademark.

Are Kindle owners…kinda old?

Rumor (yes, again): cheap Macs.

Here’s a look at the new Nano in all its polychromatic glory–I’m running this image from the Apple Store sideways so I don’t have to shrink it. (If these were real Nanos, the displays would all rotate automatically.)