That's what Apple tends to do, though.. They wait and wait until a market already exists, and then they redefine it. Maybe they're bidding their time for cloud services?

Spending over a billion dollars on a brand new datacenter says to me that they're interested in changing that record.

You must be with the U.S. Department of Education...

Well then Microsoft must be kicking serious ass in the space too because they have spent a lot more.

I am super skeptical of any company that spends a lot of money to break into an area that isn't in their 'core competency'. Apple has shown they only know how to offer online services for a high subscription rate. It'd be interesting to see if they can offer anything decent for free or a low price point.