What’s in Store for iPhone 3.0?

Late last week Apple invited the media to a special event to be held on March 17th in its Town Hall building in Cupertino. The purpose of the meeting is to give “an advanced preview of what we’re building” regarding iPhone 3.0. What could be in store for the OS X iPhone?

The media event invitation did not allude to a release of the next generation iPhone OS update, but merely mentioned a “preview.”

Last year, Apple demoed an iPhone 2.0 OS that included enterprise and third party native application support.

Some rumors have mentioned new features such as the long overdue background notification feature that has failed to materialize so far but had been promised last year.

Multemedia messaging capability (MMS) and a tethering solution to power wireless data communication for your notebook through your cell phone were also mentioned in the rumors.

Finally, what is most likely the most anticipated and eagerly sought after feature that could launch the iPhone into the stratosphere of productivity, the ever elusive, copy and paste functionality. 

This event will be a “sneak peek” at what Cupertino has in store for the next major upgrade of the iPhone OS. The alleged upgrade will most likely be a free update to all current iPhone (3G only?) users and a nominal fee upgrade for iPod Touch users due to the different accounting rules that govern each product.

This upgrade will also most likely be the foundation for a slightly larger touchscreen device that has been rumored to make an appearance later this year (a.k.a. MacTablet or iPad).

Copy and paste would be a must for such a device, amongst other functions we take for granted on our desktops and notebook computers.

The next generation hardware of iPhone will most likely be June or July and ship with the new operating system just as the iPhone 3G did last July. Perhaps a faster processor and better battery life will enable true multitasking.

But don’t hold your breath to hear any details about that device just yet. Apple still has plenty of iPhone 3Gs to sell until then!

So let’s see what Apple has up their sleeves come Tuesday, while the world celebrates St. Patrick’s Day!