Apple WWDC 2019: An Analysis (Premium)

Apple’s annual WWDC keynote address is a chance to see how the firm’s major platforms will advance in the coming year. And this year’s show was notable on a number of levels. Apple expanded its platform count from four to five by breaking out iPadOS from iOS. It highlighted two major developer advances, something it usually ignores in the marketing-heavy keynote. Most of the people at WWDC 2019 were first-time WWDC attendees, a first. And Apple was focused heavily on the integration of hardware, software, and services.

With all that in mind, here’s a quick overview of each platform announcement and which I think matter or do no matter.
Apple TV and tvOS
After almost ten minutes of patting himself on the back, Tim Cook finally moved into the first and least interesting hardware platform that Apple would discuss that day, Apple TV. And perhaps not surprisingly, Apple TV is getting only incremental updates this year.

Apple TV users will be able to take advantage of multi-user support, a feature that’s been available in services like Netflix and Hulu for years, but is perhaps a bit more unusual when you compare this system to other set-top box experiences like Roku.

That’s a pretty obvious feature. But Apple’s strength is in integrating its various products and services together into a cohesive whole. This is good for users, but it’s also designed to make it harder to leave the Apple ecosystem.

There were two key integration pieces announced for the next version of tvOS, the Apple TV’s software platform.  Apple TV will now display song lyrics when you listen to Apple Music, and it will do so in-sync with the music. And Apple TV will work with Apple Arcade, the firm’s coming game service, and will work with the two most popular video game controllers in the world, the Xbox One Controller and the PlayStation DualShock 4.

None of this is earth-shattering. But Apple TV is already a mature product, and if you ignore its remote---again, a crime against humanity---it works very well already.

Innovation: B
Excitement: C
Value: B
Apple Watch and watchOS
After a tough first year, Apple refocused Apple Watch on health and fitness, and it has steadily added innovative new features that really differentiate it from other smartwatches and fitness trackers. As important, it has worked to make Watch more of a standalone device without actually removing the lock-in integration that keeps users in its ecosystem. (You can’t use an Apple Watch with Android, for example.)

For 2019, Apple Watch is picking up a nice set of functional updates, some of which are new and some of which are improvements of existing features. There are lots of new watch faces, Taptic Chimes that accent taptic alerts with sounds, and more Apple apps on the platform, including Apple Audiobooks, Voice Memos, and Calculator, all of which are pretty obvious additions.

The biggest platform change, from what I can tell, is that developers will...