Let it snow!; let it snow!; let it snow! -- Six snow applications for the Mac

• Moving from a PC to a Mac Help Document Posted
• Mac OS X v10.3 'Panther' Up-To-Date Program Extended
• Inside The Vatican With Mina: Gregorian Chants And Fullscreen Virtual Reality Panoramas
• Court Rules Music Subpoenas Illegal
• Music Sharing Fingered In CD Sales Slump
• Mac Night Owl: Your Mac Christmas Shopping List
• ATI Reports Record Revenues in the First Quarter
• An Unencrypted Look at FileVault
• Linux adoption to soar in '04?
• Mac Night Owl: A Paragraph Worth of Monday Rants
• Cyon Research Publishes Analysis Of The AEC CAD Market As It Applies To Macintosh Users
• 2004 O'Reilly Open Source Convention Call for Participation: Opening the Future: Discover, Develop, Deliver
• eWeek: Apple's QuickTime Expands 3GPP2 Mobile Support
• Dutch Supreme Court rules Kazaa legal
• eWeek: Experts Warn Yet Another Windows Vulnerability
• eWeek: BlackBerry Handheld Gives Way to BlackBerry Service
• eWeek: Getting Linux 2.6 Into The Enterprise

• Bible Reader Free 0.96 Released
• Memory Monitor 1.2.3 Displays A Graph Of Memory Usage In The Dock
• iText X 3.1.2 Text Editor/Word Processor [OS X]
• Transmit 2.6.2 FTP Client [OS X 10.1 up]
• FaxEmailHelper 1.2 Enhances Fax Forwarding By Email In Panther [OS X 10.3 up]
• ThermographX 1.2.1 Temperature Monitoring Utility [OS 10.2.4 up]
• MacWalker 1.0 Screensaver, 3D PowerBooks Walk In The Space [OS 10.2 up]
• SimpleKeys 2.0.1 Sets Hotkeys To Trigger Macros And Type Text [OS X 10.1 up]
• Safe Place 1.3 Secure Password And Serial Number Storage App [OS X 10.1 up]
• Launch Items X 1.6.1 Opens Customized Files/Folders From Cm/Menu Bar [Mac OS 8.6 up/ OS 10.2 up]
• DiveTableX 2.0 Open Water Scuba Dive Planning Software [OS X 10.1 up]
• Downfall 2.2.1 Released

• MacMice Flexible iSight Holder For Powerbooks And iBooks Announced
• Mellel 1.7 Beta Is Here
• Valentina Technology Release 1.10 Introduces Xcode And Panther Support On Mac
• Radical Breeze Holiday Special - 3 apps for $10
• Apple Security Update 2003-12-19 for OS X 10.2.8 and OS X 10.3.2
• Apple Mac OS X Server 10.3.2 Panther Server Software
• Final Cut Pro 4.1.1 Update Released
• DeepSix for Mac OS X updated to 1.2
• Seapine Software Upgrades TestTrack Pro 6.1 and Surround SCM 2.1 Software Development Lifecycle Tools

I've been giving and receiving gifts for over 30 years now, and I can honestly say I've never been party to the exchange of the perfect one. There have been some really good ones, mind you. Bill Stiteler one year gave me a "shoehorn with teeth." Wonderful. One time, in a gift exchange with friends, I stopped at McDonald's on the way to the party, bought a Big Mac, wrapped it right there on the counter, and entered it into the exchange. Perhaps not perfect, but I had a good time that night saying, "Can we hurry up and exchange gifts? Mine's getting cold." Perfect for me, anyway.

And what happened next? Well in Seattle they say, that gamers' hearts grew three sizes that day!

Plus: iBook Battery Update note

• Happy Trails to the eMac...
• Where To Get A Pismo?
• Dual Boot Machines
• Mac Version of Copernic Terminated

• Hidden Costs of Mac Ownership
• AOL Members Now Have Instant Access to Apple’s iTunes Music Store
• Some New Macs Being Sold Without Panther
• iBook G4: Customer-Installable Parts Procedures
• Steve Jobs to Keynote at Macworld San Francisco 2004
• Subject: Mac Night Owl: Still More Apple Christmas Presents: You've Got iTunes
• eWeek: Apple Releases 10.3.2 Panther Update
• eWeek: Apple's QuickTime Expands 3GPP2 Mobile Support
• eWeek: Adobe Launches Digital Media Store
• eWeek: Linux 2.6 Arrives
• eWeek: Windows XP SB2's Firewall Will in Your Face
• If It Seems Too Good To Be True Department

• Tex-Edit Plus X 4.6b1 Text Editor [OS X 10.1 up]
• POPmonitor 2.1.3 Spam And MailBox Management Software [OS 8 up/ OS X]
• Apple QuickTime 6.5 Multimedia Player & Authoring System
• HyperNext Creator 1.0 Card Based Software Creation For Beginners [OS 8.6 up/OS X]
• HyperNext Player 1.0 Runs Stacks Built By HyperNext Creator
• Kodak EasyShare 3.3 Software For Digital Cameras [OS 10.2.3 up]
• Apple Java 3D and Java Advanced Imaging Update 1.0 Extends The Java Platform [OS X 10.3.1 up]
• DiscBlaze 2.1.2 Multisession CD/DVD Burner, CDRW eraser [OS 10.2.6 up]
• iPitch 1.2.1 Guitar Tuner That Plays Notes To Aid In Tuning Guitars [Mac OS 8.6 - OS X]
• Mac Messenger 3.0a14 MSN Chat Client
• Pariahware Releases Days Away v1.3.1
• Acrux Software Announces X-Builder Version 1.0.3 Authoring Tool For OS X

Specials from the Apple Store for Business, Ramjet, O'Reilly, Outpost, CompUSA, and CDW

Mariner Write 3.6b2 Word Processor
• Gee Three Sweet Multiport Now Available For G3/G4 Power Macs
• New 2Gb Fibre Channel RAID Storage Solutions
• Speed Download 2 ‘Last Minute’ Shoppers Promotion
• Akumen Debuts FireWire 800/1394b USB 2.0 (64Bit) Combo PCI "SuperCard"
• Revzeroconf Networking SDK for Revolution Released Open-Source SDK for Zeroconf/Rendezvous Networking
• Microspot Announces Interiors 3.4 for OS X
• Super Get Info 1.2 Replacement For The Get Info Command
• Apple DVD Studio Pro X 2.0.3 Professional DVD Authoring Tool
• VectorWorks 10.5.1 Object Based CAD Program Updated
• Spector 3.0.14 Spyware Program, Records User Actions And Online Activity

Mac users looking for new ways to use their Apple iSight need look no further than Boinx's iRecordNow v1.1. This software enables you to manually control the iSight focus, sharpness, hue, saturation and brightness while recording.

I've learned to expect a lot from the Missing Manuals series books, and iPhoto: The Missing Manual does not disappoint

Just in time for your last-minute shopping, Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness ships.

New Specials from The Apple Store, J&R, MacWarehouse, Publishing Perfection, and MacZone

Once again, Willow Design has managed to come up with a clever and functional product whose overall impression is one of elegant and tasteful simplicity.

Two major OS X updates for Christmas

• 55 Operating Systems on a PowerBook 17"
• Canada Legalizes P2P Downloading
• G5 Laptop Next Year?
• PC Users Still Clueless When It Comes To Apple
• The Mac @ 20 - Apple's Key Moments
• Mac OS X 10.3: Chart of Available Mac OS Software Updates Posted
• Apple Hits Back
• Willow Design 2003 Year End Overstock Inventory Sale
• Unsanity and OWC Theme Contest
• SiteLink Network Offers Low-Cost Web Hosting Top-Quality Web Hosting With Personal Service
• Mac Night Owl: Apple's Christmas Present: A Slew of Software Updates
• Runtime Revolution Wins Macworld Eddy Award
• eWeek: Zander's Succession at Motorola Greeted Cautiously by Analysts
• eWeek: Linux Developers Spar Over Enterprise Desktop
• eWeek: Feds Unite on Security Benchmarks
• eWeek: Oracle 10g: It's the Automation, Stupid

• Burnz v1.0.7 CD/DVD Burning Softeware Released [OS 10.2.8 up]
• Cocktail 3.3 General Purpose System Modify / Repair Utility [OS 10.2 up]
• Ultimate Pen 1.1.1 Draws On Top Of Any App, Including The Finder [OS 10.2 up]
• SpamSlam 2.0.1 Kills Junk Email With Statistical Filter & Challenge/Response [OS 10.2 up]
• SimpleKeys 2.0 Sets Hotkeys To Trigger Macros And Type Text [OS X 10.1 up]
• MarketAnalyst X 3.0 Real-time Stock Charting/Analysis, Trading System [OS 10.2 up]
• KeystrokeRecorder 3.2.1 Records Each Keystroke To A Text File Or Email [OS X]
• Xpublish 1.1.8 1-click html Publishing Supports Unlimited Sites & Entries [OS X 10.3 up]
• iKeeper 2.0.1 Update Available