Apple today announced it will host its annual Worldwide Developers Conference(WWDC) in June and for the first time it will be with an all-new online format in its 30-year history.
This change may have a greater impact on the 6,000 participants of the event than the general public.
Although the event has dominated San Francisco, San Jose, or Santa Clara convention centers for years, the company is working with local authorities to help limit the spread of the new coronavirus. This requires a change in the format of the meeting.
"We are delivering WWDC 2020 this June in an innovative way to millions of developers around the world, bringing the entire developer community together with a new experience," said Phil Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.
"The current health situation has required that we create a new WWDC 2020 format that delivers a full program with an online keynote and sessions, offering a great learning experience for our entire developer community, all around the world. We will be sharing all of the details in the weeks ahead."
In fact, this year's WWDC cannot be cancelled or changed, because it was never officially announced or scheduled before today.
Apple usually confirms the date and venue of the WWDC conference between late February and mid-March. In recent years, Apple has used a lottery system to manage the overwhelming demand for tickets from participating developers.
Tickets cost $1,599 each, including live keynotes and attending a week-long conference focused on current and latest Apple technology hosted by key Apple employees.
On March 9, Santa Clara County began banning public gatherings for 1,000 or more people in an effort to limit the spread of the new coronavirus-a measure that will last at least until the end of March.
Although the WWDC conference will be held in early June, Apple needs to sell tickets in advance.
Now, people are beginning to worry about the impact of the new coronavirus, and Apple has to carefully decide the format of its meeting.
Due to the impact of the new coronavirus epidemic, many companies including Google and Adobe have cancelled face-to-face gatherings, and major technical meetings from MWC to GDC and SXSW have also been cancelled or postponed.
This is not the first time Apple has made adjustments to its developer conference, but this adjustment is arguably the most important one.
Before 2003, the WWDC conference was held in May instead of June, and after 2003, the WWDC conference was held in June, and later advanced from the end of June to an earlier date of the month, and one year was held in August.
Apple moved the WWDC conference from Santa Clara to San Jose, then to San Francisco, spent 14 years in San Francisco's Moscow Convention Center, and then returned to San Jose.
The attendance of the WWDC conference ranges from 2,000 to 6,000, with participants from more than 80 countries.
Long before the impact of the new coronavirus, the company was ready for some of today's changes. Apple renamed its WWDC application to Apple Developer and created a one-stop window for developer news, past activity videos, and live video streaming.
Although the content of the developer conference will continue to be available in the app, the keynote will be more widely disseminated through Apple's website and other media so that developers and the general public can hear what will be released later this year What's new in MacOS, iOS, iPadOS, WatchOS and TVOS.
