As predicted yesterday in numerous publications and as recounted below, Apple Computer today announced that it will be moving from IBM’s Power PC chip to the Intel Pentium chip, currently used in Windows computers. Yesterday I linked to Wired‘s Cult of Mac blog which stated that while speed may have been an issue, one of the other main reasons behind the switch was Apple’s desire to use Intel’s new Digital Rights Management protection that’s embedded in the new Pentium chip, a technology that will allow Apple to pitch the major movie studios with an ITunes-like digital movie store.

At the Apple WWDC conference today, Steve Jobs announced the switch but digital rights management was on nobody’s lips. However, read these comments after the conference by Jobs on CNBC in light of the Cult of Mac theory as well as one other salient fact: that Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo are all shifting to IBM’s Power PC chips for future versions of their gaming machines that are intended to have other multi-media capabilities. What’s shaping up is some kind of “War of the TIVO” spin-offs between gaming consoles and Mac-based PCs.

From CNBC via Think Secret:

“‘We have a good relationship with IBM, and they’ve got a product road map, and today, the products are really good,’ Jobs said when asked what IBM had failed to deliver, in his estimation. ‘But as we look out into the future, where we want to go is maybe a little bit different. We can envision some awesome products we want to build for our customers in the next few years, and as we look out a year or two in the future, Intel’s processor roadmap really aligns with where we want to go much more than any other.’

The transition is beginning now, Jobs said, to ‘get us where we want to be to build the kind of future products we want to build.

‘Our products today are fine,’ Jobs added, ‘but it’s really a year or two down the future where we see some issues.'”