Apple Announcement Today April 8?

Apple plans on having an announcement today April 8, 2010, about the future of the iPhone OS, at a press conference at its Cupertino, CA company headquarters.

It's expected to include a discussion of iPhone OS 4.0 and possibly Apple's mobile ad platform.

People are so much excited to get something new from Apple after the release of Apple iPad which is revolutionary gadget in the world.

What will the announcement be exactly about? Any rumors so far?

Today Thursday April 8 2010, Apple CEO Steve Jobs took the stage in Cupertino, Calif., to introduce iPhone OS 4.0, the long-awaited upgrade for Apple's top-selling smart phone. As expected, the iPhone OS 4.0 will support app multitasking – a functionality that should make it easier for users to flip between active apps. Jobs was quick to stress that multitasking on the iPhone wouldn't totally suck up battery power.

Apple is getting into the advertising business. Today April 8 the company unveiled a new software for its mobile devices that has a built-in system for putting ads into applications. Speaking to press and developers on Apple’s campus here, Steven P. Jobs, Apple’s chief executive, said that the new system, iAds, would offer ways for developers to include complex interactive ads in applications for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Apple said it would sell and host the ads and give developers 60 percent of the revenue from ads that run in their programs.

With the average iPhone user spending about 30 minutes a day using apps, Mr. Jobs said there would soon be an opportunity to deliver one billion ads to the company's mobile devices every day. "This is a pretty serious opportunity and it's an incredible demographic," he said.

Asked whether ad revenue could be large enough to move the needle at Apple, Mr. Jobs noted the company will give developers a 60% share of advertising revenues. "This is not a get-rich-quick scheme for Apple," he said.

There are also big improvements to email and other features designed to make Apple’s mobile devices better tools for business users.

The new operating system, set to ship this summer, lets multiple applications run at the same time and gives the user quick access to them via a dock at the bottom of the screen. The current version of the operating system creates headaches for developers because applications can’t send or receive information unless they are active. That’s no longer the case.

This a big deal for certain kinds of applications. You now should be able to run apps like Pandora in the background, so you can listen to your music while doing other things. Applications such as Skype now could receive calls in the background (note that this was demonstrated over WiFi). The lack of multitasking has probably been the biggest weakness of the iPhone, compared with other mobile operating systems, and this should offer enough of it to overcome those concerns for most people.

At the event, CEO Steve Jobs noted that iPhone sales to date now tops 50 million units. Morgan Keegan analyst Tavis McCourt points out in a research note that as of the end of December, sales to date were 41.8 million. Ergo, the company sold at least 8.2 million in the March quarter, he concludes.