Previously, Apple marketing used the Mac OS X nomenclature for its operating system releases. The same was true for the preview marketing material for Lion (below).
The word Mac however was dropped in the marketing material as the release date neared (below).
And this is the main graphic after Lion’s release:
The installer splash screen however uses Mac OS X Lion:
It isn’t out of the ordinary where engineering and marketing aren’t always in-sync (or have differing agendas). While one should also not read too much into this change, my personal thought is this another one of those “writing on the wall” tip offs regarding Apple’s focus and the further unification of iOS and Mac OS X several years down the road where the lines between the two will continue to blur especially once the company figures out how to leave old desktop form factors behind. Therefore, leaving off the word “Mac” from OS X is just an initial start of a longer term re-branding effort.
True, Apple’s current mantra is to enable gestures on their laptop and desktop lines via a trackpad since current form factors do not make direct interaction with the screen ergonomically viable. Apple of course has patents to try and figure out solutions like the following:
Apple would of course have to figure out what to do with desktop systems like the mini and Mac Pro which can be mated with any display. With my cracked and foggy crystal ball, I can see Apple eventually wanting to simplify the marketing of direct multi-touch gesturing across their desktop and laptop product lines by offering all-in-one systems and ditching the headless form factor all together (again, just my opinion even though personally, this does not enthrall me). Alternatively, the above could also apply to include displays which when coupled with a mini or Mac Pro, would enable the feature. As noted in a prior post, I personally still believe the Mac Pro will eventually disappear as Thunderbolt devices gain traction as this will negate some of this form factors advantages over time.
IMHO, Lion is just the initial step towards this goal and therefore, dropping the term “Mac’ from the OS X portion on the marketing material gets everyone used to the re-branding today.
