January 26th?

“Though Apple’s attendance at Macworld is but a distant – well, year-ago – memory (the conference itself is now being held in February, rather than January) the Cupertino company seems to find it hard to give up the habit of making announcements in January, in a manner that will steal the glory from the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas (which Apple doesn’t attend). Used to be that Apple would, on the week before CES, announce various scene-stealing objects of desire – the Titanium Powerbook, MacBook Air and the iPhone being three classic examples. This year though with CES early in the year, Apple is keeping people waiting. According to the FT, Apple has rented a stage at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco for several days in late January. (Unfortunately we can’t check quite when on the rental form as it’s ‘being updated’.) The FT is also specifying 26 January, a Tuesday (Apple announcements are almost always on Tuesdays), as the day when it will do it. Apple used the same location last year to launch its refreshed range of iPods.”