Well, the big keynote for Macworld 2008 has been delivered and as expected, Steve Jobs announced a lightweight notebook computer, the MacBook Air. Hundreds, if not thousands of Mac websites, news outlets and bloggers have all weighed in on the pros and cons of this tiny feat of engineering. However, what nobody is taking about is the lackluster quality of the keynote address itself.

Traditionally, Steve Jobs delivers a near-flawless performance during his highly anticipated keynote addresses. Sure, there have been the occasional technical glitches, but Steve has always had a way of brushing them off and still imparting the intended sense of awe and amazement we’ve come to expect. Some attribute this to the Reality Distortion Field or Mr. Job’s artful (and plentiful) use of the word, “Boom!”

After watching a video of the keynote, I got the distinct impression that Steve just wasn’t as sharp and rehearsed as usual. There seemed to be a higher than normal number of mistakes made during his speech, some of which he corrected but a few of which he did not. His delivery lacked the oomph and awe of past performances, and he hardly used the word boom at all.

It’s understood that nobody is perfect, and this is by no means meant to be an anti-Steve rant. I’m bringing this to light because all too often, Mac users are accused of worshiping at the alter of Apple in an almost cult-like fashion and going on and on as if Steve Jobs can do no wrong. Well, he can. You can watch the keynote for youself at Apple’s website, if you don’t believe me.

Very early in the keynote, Steve attributes Time Machine as being a feature of the Tiger version of OS X, not Leopard. While this is not the biggest mistake in the world, I’m sure it raised a few eyebrows in the audience. He continues on to his first big announcement, Time Capsule, with a, “500 Megabyte drive… 500 Gigabyte drive, sorry…”

The second announcement was new features for the iPhone (and iPod touch). Steve begins by hyping the number of iPhones sold since it launched. He then goes over the market share of the competing smart phones while standing in front of a large 3D pie chart, pointing out that for the third quarter of 2007 alone, the iPhone got almost 20% of the market. So far so good, until he says that Nokia got only 1.3% of the market, except the chart shows 3.1%. Oops! He does manage to insert a, “Zhoom!” while demonstrating web clips, which I’m guessing is like his patented, “Boom!,” yet faster.

Announcement three was iTunes movie rentals and the AppleTV software upgrade. No major mistakes here. During the demo Steve was showing off how it is possible to rent movies directly from the AppleTV with no computer required. There was a funny moment during the demo, when Steve says, “if I want to buy this, excuse me RENT it…” I’m sure Apple’s legal team all had a collective increase in blood pressure with that near miss! There was a slight technical glitch showing Flickr photos, but I’m not going to really count that as a mistake, per se.

The final announcement was, of course, the MacBook Air. With all of the coverage this had already received (and continues to receive), I’m not going to comment on it here. However, there is one final MAJOR mistake during the keynote, near the very end. Randy Newman? Really? Steve Jobs clearly is losing his mind!