Giving HP Its Praise

Joe Wilcox | January 08, 2004, 03:24 PM

I find today’s music partnership between Apple and HP somewhat surprising, but not because a Windows PC manufacturer is cozying up to the Mac maker.

HP doesn’t often get the "oohs" and "aahs" it deserves when releasing new consumer products. Apple unveils a tiny iPod, and it’s headlines around the world. I find that to be a perplexing phenomenon, because HP develops some truly innovative products.

Last August 11, HP unveiled more than 100 new consumer products in a single day. A good dozen, if released by Apple, would have been showstoppers at a Macworld Expo and CEO Steve Jobs’ "One more thing."

Take the Scanjet 4670 scanner, here, which sleek design is defined by a transparent cover that closes like a book. Another: Image Zone Software, here, which offered some nifty ways to organize photos, including location by way of a navigable globe. The DVD Movie Writer dc3000, here, offered a no-nonsense way of retrieving VHS, Hi8 or Digital 8 movies and burning them to DVD.

Today’s announcements, made at the Consumer Electronics Show, are no exception. HP unveiled the LightScribe Direct Disc labeling technology. Consumers flip their burned DVD over to use the laser to burn on a label, seen here. Now, that’s useful innovation in action. If Apple had released the LightScribe (maybe as iScribe), headlines everywhere would have heralded another truly, remarkable innovation.

So, I find perplexing that with all HP’s innovation the big news story coming out of CES today is the company’s plan to offer iTunes on new PCs and its own version of Apple’s iPod music player.