Because although Eating Honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn't know what it was called.

–Winnie the Pooh

Great product announcements in the Steve tradition have certain recurring ingredients:

• Context. Steve gives us some observations about the state of things — some trend, some emerging industry sector, some new technology. He gives not only objective facts but some unique insight that Apple has, something different from what everybody else is doing or predicting.
• Design. He then reveals the product that is Apple's answer to the need or opportunity revealed by their insights. There may or may not be any new technologies involved, but the product makes unexpected design choices that make it different from its predecessors. The differences may lie either in creative innovations or in bold decisions to leave things out — creative simplifications, if you will.
• Partnerships. Besides innovative design, the really groundbreaking announcements involve business partnerships that no one but Apple (in particular, Steve) could have pulled off. I'm thinking of the deals with the music companies that made the iTunes Music Store possible, and the deal with Cingular (now AT&T) that made the iPhone possible.

I don't know whether Steve himself will be presenting today. I don't know if I will have a burning desire to own whatever product is announced. All I know is that someone (if not Steve) will be weaving a story around the above ingredients, and I'm eagerly awaiting the telling of that story.