Phil Schiller at Apple's iPad event
Once again, as a new Apple product announcement was imminent, I asked you to make collaborative predictions about it by taking a survey. Sixteen-hundred of you took up the challenge. Now that we know what the new iPad is like, it’s time to score your guesses.
Resolution
Reality: 2048-by-1536 (85% of respondents)
Your prediction: 2048-by-1536
Processor
Your prediction: quad-core (68%)
Reality: a dual-core processor, but with “quad-core graphics”
RAM
Your prediction: 1GB (79%)
Reality: Apple didn’t say, but 1GB, according to The Verge’s Bryan Bishop
Storage
Your prediction: 64GB (59%)
Reality: 64GB
Broadband
Your prediction: LTE 4G (58%)
Reality: LTE 4G
U.S. Carriers
Your prediction: AT&T (91%), Verizon Wireless (84%), Sprint (59%)
Reality: AT&T and Verizon, as before, but not Sprint
Home Button
Your prediction: it’ll have one (77%)
Reality: it does
Siri
Your prediction: it’ll have it (86%)
Reality: it doesn’t — but it does have voice dictation
Cameras
Your prediction: at least one them will be higher-res (86%)
Reality: the rear one is
Thickness
Your prediction: it’ll be thicker than the iPad 2 (41%)
Reality: at .37″, up from .34″, it is
Weight
Your prediction: it’ll weigh the same as the iPad 2 (47%)
Reality: it weights 1.44 pounds, up from 1.33 pounds
Battery Life
Your prediction: It’ll run up to 10 hours (49%)
Reality: Apple says it does (for 3G; for 4G, it goes for 9 hours)
Name
Your prediction: iPad 3 (72%)
Reality: “The New iPad” or simply “iPad” (two of you predicted this — maybe Tim Cook and Phil Schiller took the survey?)
Availability
Your prediction: within two weeks (35%)
Reality: on March 16th — which is, indeed, within two weeks
iPad 2 Fate
Your prediction: it’ll stay on the market (88%)
Reality: it will
Apple TV
Your prediction: Apple will announce a new one (62%)
Reality: it did
Presenter
Your prediction: Tim Cook will preside
Reality: he did
By my count, that’s 12 facts you got right, and two you got wrong. And for three — processor, carriers, Siri — I think you deserve partial credit. Not bad!
How did you manage to figure out most of the major points? Seems to me it’s pretty straightforward. Collectively, you read most of the pre-announcement scuttlebutt, knew the key rumors and could tell the difference between the plausible ones and the ones that just didn’t sound right.
Anyhow, thank you and congratulations. Let’s do this again for the next iPhone, shall we?
Rebecca Greenfield of The Atlantic, incidentally, rated the rumormongering of major blogs. By her accounting, The Verge was most accurate and Ars Technica was most off-base.