The chances of Apple having to cancel — or drastically change the format of — its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) have ramped up significantly, with Santa Clara County banning all mass gatherings.
Both Apple’s Cupertino campus and the WWDC venue in San Jose fall within those county limits. The ban, announced Monday night, is currently planned to last for only three weeks. However if the spread of the COVID-19 novel coronavirus continues it’s highly possible that gets extended.
The pressure on Apple to cancel its yearly developers conference and possibly a planned March product keynote has gotten a little tougher.
The Public Health Department of Santa Clara County, where Apple’s headquarters is located, recommended Thursday the postponing or canceling of mass gatherings to prevent the further spread of the coronavirus. That calls into question whether Apple will hold its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in June, as it traditionally does.
With COVID-19 spreading in the San Francisco Bay Area, and at least one upcoming event at a critical planning stage for the high-tech giant, Apple must make some tough decisions about how to proceed, according to conference experts contacted by Cult of Mac.
Apple faces mounting pressure to decide whether to cancel, delay or change the format of its annual Worldwide Developers Conference, typically held in June. The same holds true, although to a lesser extent, for Apple’s rumored March product keynote.
“There’s a lot to consider for Apple and it won’t be easy,” said Ian McGonnigal, marketing executive with Experiential Executive, who has consulted on conference and convention planning with more than a dozen Fortune 500 companies. “Reputation is a huge challenge here and that’s part of it. Companies don’t want to appear tone-deaf to what’s going on out there.”
The coronavirus killed another major tech event today as Facebook revealed the in-person component of its annual F8 developers’ conference is canceled due to concerns around the coronavirus COVID-19.
Facebook’s move comes close to the time when Apple normally announces the dates for its Worldwide Developers Conference. The iPhone-maker revealed WWDC 2019 dates on March 14 last year, but with more and more tech events getting shut down, it could change Apple’s plans for its biggest conference of the year.
To showcase the increasing utility of its WWDC app, Apple changed the app’s name to something that sounds relevant all year long. The app formerly known as the WWDC app is now know as the Apple Developer app.
While Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference takes place for just one week in June, the WWDC app increasingly included “in-depth information” from Apple experts throughout the year. And the new name is just the beginning — Apple plans to make the app even more useful for developers.
WWDC may be best known to casual Apple fans for its keynote speech, but it’s a whole educational week for devs.
While the best way to experience the Developer’s Conference is to attend live, not everyone is able to. With that in mind, Apple has just made videos of all its 2019 instructional sessions available. And they’re fully searchable.
The warp-speed WWDC 2019 keynote truly delivered the goods. Tim Cook and his lieutenants took the wraps off tons of exciting new features coming in iOS 13, iPadOS, macOS Catalina, watchOS 6 and tvOS 13.
And then, in a hardware shocker, Apple even showed off an insanely powerful new Mac Pro.
Relive Apple’s epic presentation — and get our take on what it all means — in this week’s free issue of Cult of Mac Magazine for iOS. Or read on to get the rest of the week’s best Apple news, reviews and how-tos in your browser.
This week on The CultCast: Our WWDC 2019 reactions! Apple keynotes don’t get more legendary than this one. Plus: Crazy cryptographic tech powers Apple’s new Find My app, and our favorite features of iOS 13, macOS Catalina, tvOS and watchOS.
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Apple lavished attention on all its platforms at WWDC this year. We even got a first look at the all-new Mac Pro. But another announcement, which didn’t grab so many headlines, may prove to be the most important thing to come out of this year’s developer conference: SwiftUI.
SwiftUI promises to fundamentally change the way developers create apps for Apple products. And you don’t need to be a techie to appreciate why it’s such a big deal.
One of the nerdiest rock bands of all time is set to take the stage at WWDC 2019’s biggest party today.
Apple revealed this morning that Weezer is the headlining act of the WWDC19 Bash, the exclusive event that’s only for developers attending the conference.