Apple announces iPod Photo(!), in 40GB ($499) and 60GB ($599) models. The new player offers 15 hours of music playback, or, 5 hours of photo slideshows.

This is great news for the microcontent publishing meme (and sites like Flickr).

Here's the link from the Apple Store

Gizmodo has great coverage:
- big color picture of player
- first details
- connects to TV
- has S-video features

iTunes 4.7 looks like a good upgrade too (surprised Apple didn't have iPhoto for Windows done in time for this launch...)

Oh, Apple also launched its EU iTunes Music Store. (All iPod, all day over at Apple.)

Good to see Apple playing for keeps!

As I mentioned here, in Flash Podcasting, the next (obvious) step for multi-sensory playback devices (with this announcement, we now have audio + "moving still images"), is a facility to synch/coordinate the various media types for playback. Hopefully Apple is thinking the same, and "slideshows" will run against a timeline metaphor, that allows me to specify which segment (of which AAC file) I want to play when a given photo is displayed; basic "play this playlist against this slideshow" would be a disappointment! 1-2 weeks, and we'll know for sure.