The rumor mill is in high gear about Apple launching the next Final Cut Pro version at NAB in Las Vegas next week. There’s a Final Cut Supermeet user group scheduled for Tuesday, April 12th.

Traditionally, there are a series of sponsors and speakers lined up for the Supermeets, but word got out today that all the speakers and sponsors have been canceled to make room for an Apple only event. Philip Bloom was set to do a lecture with Canon and he’s been canceled, Avid’s confirmed their sponsorship was canceled, and a talk by director Kevin Smith is being moved to another building, apparently to disassociate it from the Supermeet.

Given that the Supermeets are Final Cut focused, as well as Apple’s Final Cut preview back in February, it stands to reason Apple may very well be demanding exclusive stage time to unveil a major upgrade to Final Cut Pro, if not the entire Final Cut Studio package. If it indeed happens, it’ll be quite the event, as the current FCP version is a bit long in the tooth, especially compared to all the major advancements of Avid and Adobe. I for one have been contemplating switching, but tentatively holding out to see what Apple comes out with.

For the latest updates, it’d be worth listening to Larry Jordan’s Digital Production Buzz podcast on Thursday night (9pm EST). Larry’s co-host is Michael Horton, the Supermeet organizer. Larry usually does a live check-in with Michael, especially at big events like NAB, so it’d be natural to expect some questions on Apple’s request. In the mean time, here are a few other postings on this:

[UPDATE: The Supermeet web site just posted a note about their agenda saying “The Final Cut Pro User Group Network is excited to have a very special guest presentation at the 10th Annual Las Vegas FCPUG SuperMeet. Come to see a surprise sneak peek at something very special – you really do not want to miss this one!”]

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