The rumor mill is fairly certain, less than a week away from the MacWorld 2004 Keynote Address, that Steve Jobs is going to kick off Apple's new year in a very "music-centric" direction. Stories surrounding a possible new line of mini-iPods are narrowing predictions down towards either one or two new models built around 1", 1.5 GB hard drives built by a company called Cornice. Mac Rumors is reporting that these drives may be available to Apple in bulk for as little as $50-65 each, which would make a $99, 400-800 song iPod a very realistic possibility come next Monday.

Apple's claim on the future of the way we purchase and listen to music is certainly well staked out with the iTunes Music Store and a line of industry-leading digital audio players that may well expand in scope next week. But signs point to our favorite computer maker's moving deeper into the forces that control music creation, as well.

Much of the music you hear on pop radio nowadays is created on Digidesign's ProTools, a "digital audio workstation" (DAW) that allows producers, engineers, and musicans to record and edit multiple tracks of audio with virtually limitless ability to reshape the music using digital effects, single- and multitrack overdubbing, and other tricks of the trade. Comprised of proprietary hardware and software, ProTools is a computer-based system that is compatible with both Windows and Macintosh machines. Many ProTools systems are based around Macs, but the Windows world has started to catch up to the Mac platform in terms of both multimedia capabilities and popularity.

ProTools is not the only DAW platform out there, but it is the current industry standard. Apple may have tipped its hand towards changing all of that when it acquired audio software maker eMagic in July of last year, and rumors are swirling that the campaign to "switch" recording studios from ProTools to an Apple-branded DAW may begin in full next Monday. Apple Insider, amongst others, has cited sources who are predicting the unveiling of an Apple DAW product some two plus years in the making.

What does this mean to you and I? Not much, unless you make your living in the music industry. Fully tricked out ProTools systems sell for upwards of $10,000, so it's not like you're apt to find one under the christmas tree next year. However, there are two potential trickle-down effects to look out for.

First, if Apple dives headlong into the music creation software market, it's likely to do so according to its usual three-tiered product approach (i.e. iMovie, Final Cut Express, Final Cut Pro). This could mean pushing Logic Platinum 6.0, its $700 pro-audio offering, alongside a new piece of digital audio hardware purported to have been co-developed with Apogee Digital. Without getting too far into it, pro-level digital audio production is dependent upon both high-powered software with a solid core architecture (i.e. OS X's Core Audio) and the capacity for effect plug-ins and a dedicated input/output/mixing hardware system. A serious run at the ProTools market would require Apple to unveil the latter to complement Logic's handling of the former. You can read much more speculation on this part of the equation here.

The middle tier of the product line could be handled by an "express" version of Logic designed for prosumer/home musician types who want to create their own mp3/AAC's and demo-quality CDs without needing to mortgage the house to do so. A sub-$300 version of Logic capable of handling multi-track recording and some plug-in effects, and wrapped in Apple's tradmark user-friendly GUI, could be packaged with one of a number of third-party hardware solutions (or one taken from eMagic's own line and branded with an Apple) for less than $1,000. The development of firewire technology has just started to give way to a new breed of firewire-based digital I/O interfaces from M-Audio and others that afford something approaching pro-level sound quality and flexibility on a home studio budget.

Remember the desktop publishing revolution? A similar thing is now happening with music, though the potential market for music-makers may not be quite as big as the core base of school, community, and family newsletter publishers.

The consumer-level third of the equation could come from a revamped iTunes 5, or even a rumored separate application with a cleverly hip name like "iSpin." There's been lots of underground buzz in the past year about iPods being used in clubs as digital turntables of sorts, and wouldn't it be nice if Apple released a special DJ version of the iPod with advanced mixing capabilities? One rumor site even went so far as to post a seemingly fabricated screenshot of iTunes 5, complete with a "dual deck" interface custom-made for mixing two songs together, DJ-style, for real-time playback. This mockup included DJ-style controls for beat matching, pitch change, and other mixing effects.

While this mockup (which has since been taken off the Web) did look to be a fake, the most interesting aspect of it to me was the inclusion of a "Record" button in the UI. Just last week I tried to help my girlfriend's dad figure out how to digitize his aging collection of vinyl LP's using his Mac. While a number of third-party appliations exist to aid in just this process (and OS 9 users can still use SimpleSound), but wouldn't it be nice to have the process of converting analog music into an mp3/AAC file be streamlined in one application?

If Apple really wants to dig its heels into the digital music world at MacWorld next week, I'd like to see them come out strong with a three-pronged attack: 1. Logic Pro and an accompanying "ProTools-killer" piece of hardware for the professional user; 2. Logic Express, priced at $299 or less for the home studio enthusiast and compatible with sub-$500 hardware interfaces possibly even including an Apple-branded unit, and; 3) iTunes 5 or a spin-off app with two key new features: First, a recording button for one-step conversion of your old analog music (LPs and Cassettes) to digital and single-track recording from a microphone just for fun, and; second, a mixing feature so wannabe DJ's can entertain at home, a frat party, or the local club by plugging their iBooks into the PA system.

Apple's claim on the music consumer's ears has already been laid with the iPod and iTunes, and will only grow bigger this year with more iPods and big-time marketing campaigns to be launched with Pepsi and other corporate sponsors. Now it's time for Mr. Jobs to take aim at the people who create the music, which means both a professional-level strategy and a means for getting the average person interested in making music ... at buying a Mac beacuse it's the coolest, easiest, most fun way to do it.

Next up -- MWSF '04 Rumor #3: Your iLife is about to be rebirthed ... and AppleWorks may be, as well.

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Noah Kravitz is an educator, musician, and writer who calls Brooklyn, NY home takes his iPod with him everyday on the commute to work at a school in Spanish Harlem. He is the author of the forthcoming book, Teaching and Learning with Technology and the drummer for Automat, whose music you can't yet purchase at the iTunes Store.