What We Took Away From the Latest #AppleEvent

Apple's March 25 conference marks the turning point where the Cupertino company is going all in on services. These services are designed to increase consumer anonymity. Apple is committing to not sharing personal information or consumption profiles. There will be no advertising in the services offered either.

Among the new service announcements, one to note is Apple News Plus, a service that aggregates various magazines and, based on your interests, offers you content from more than 300 publications without having to subscribe to each one individually. We assume the list of publications is set to grow, and it's a safe bet there will eventually be French-language content.

Apple Card was also part of today's announcements. A virtual credit card that integrates directly with the iPhone. Every purchase will be geolocated so consumers can more easily remember what they bought. Merchants will have every reason to accept this payment method. For online purchases that don't support Apple Card, the app will generate a credit card number, an expiration date, and a CVV number for each transaction to ensure the buyer's anonymity. Various rewards programs will be offered.

Apple Arcade is a subscription service for games that can be played on iPhone, iPad, and the traditional Mac alike. Apple promises around a hundred games available for download when the service launches.

Apple TV Channels and Apple TV Plus are together the biggest announcement of the conference. Apple TV Channels will offer traditional American TV channels à la carte, such as HBO, PBS, and CBS, natively within Apple TV, Roku, or Amazon's Fire TV. Apple TV Plus, for its part, will be a competitor to Netflix. Original content, produced exclusively for Apple TV Plus. We already know that Oprah Winfrey, Steven Spielberg, Steve Carell, and Reese Witherspoon will be among the collaborators on the content that will be broadcast.

Are we witnessing Apple running out of steam when it comes to the innovation that has transformed the world of technology over the past fifteen years or so? Will it be enough to convince investors?

Whatever your opinion, let's agree that Apple's offering will have to face major industry players. We will no doubt witness a marketing war between companies with far more resources and market capitalization than most of us discussing this article.