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Can Apple Save the Netbook?
Three Reasons Why Netbooks Just Aren't Good Enough
12" PB Replacement is Here no, Wait, There
Apple and the Digital Rights Management debate
EFF To Apple: Free Speech Isn't a DMCA Violation
Torrent for Mac is go
Apple Offers Limited Black Friday Price Cuts
NASA developing Ares rocket with iTunes
Apple Investigates MacBook Problems
PC Advisor Reviews Apple MacBook Air 1.86GHz SSD
Another Year, Another iPod - Don't be afraid to shake it with the Apple's new nano.
This Software Brought To You By Ovaltine
he Mac Night Owl: Not Everything From Apple Just Works!
The Tech Night Owl: Succeeding in the Auto Business: It Starts By Selling Cars People Want
Can Apple Save the Netbook?
PC World's Neil McAllister says:
I'm a big fan of netbooks - the compact, lightweight, inexpensive laptops pioneered by Asus with its Eee PC line. Small, rugged, and yet full-featured enough for Web browsing and other light computing tasks, my Eee PC 901 has become a treasured companion for business travel. But the cost of newer netbook models has crept up, and many vendors are now offering standard-sized notebooks at rock-bottom prices, making the value of netbooks less clear.
That's why I was excited to hear the rumors that Apple may be readying a low-cost netbook of its own, to debut in 2009. While other vendors scramble to keep up with the Joneses, Apple is well-known for creating innovative products that shake up staid categories. The prospect of an inexpensive mobile computer that melds the netbook form factor with technologies and concepts from the iPhone is intriguing. Could it really happen?
For the full commentary visit here:
http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/154656/can_apple_save_the_netbook.html
Three Reasons Why Netbooks Just Aren't Good Enough
TechCrunch's Michael Arrington says:
The debate about Netbooks, which are very small and very cheap laptop devices, is beginning to heat up. The category is only about a year old but sales are expected to top 5 million this year.
Lots of people think Netbooks are the next big volume market because they allow people who previously couldn't afford computers to own one. People got so bullish on the devices that sales projections reached 50 million units by 2012.
I've had a chance to test many of the units, though, and I can say that the promise is much bigger than the payoff. Perhaps that's why Intel is rethinking whether the devices are as great as everyone's expectations.....
For the full commentary visit here:
http://tinyurl.com/5pruks
12" PB Replacement is Here no, Wait, There
PB Central's Joe Leo says:
With last month's announcement of new and totally revised MacBooks and MacBook Pros, the lead-up to it came the hope of two things highly desired by most die-hard Mac users. One, a true and fitting replacement to the 12-inch PowerBook G4 - short of a new netbook style Mac notebook - and two, an entry-level Mac notebook priced under $1000....
Of course, none of that happened and Apple aficionados were once again, disappointed and let down by their favorite Mac maker. Well, they're the only ones that make Macs, so go figure....
Never mind the $899 price point that never surfaced. More people were disappointed over the fact that there still wasn't a real replacement for the ever popular and smallest-to-date Mac notebook ever created, the 12-inch PowerBook G4.
A reader of this site even sent me an email that same day, asking if a used 12-inch PowerBook would be better than the just released brand new 13-inch unibody MacBook in terms of what he was looking for. Basic computer usage, but more importantly? The portability factor which highly took into consideration size and weight, plus the fact that he was on a budget.
Anyone currently looking for a Mac that's small, "cheap" (in the $499 to $699 range), and still does pretty much what you need and has high-end processing power, need not look anywhere else but eBay or Craigslist, since the 12-inch PowerBook G4 is the king of that hill.....
For the full commentary visit here:
http://tinyurl.com/5wttrd
Apple and the Digital Rights Management debate
The Independent's Mark Webster reports:
iTunes couldn't work for Apple without Digital Rights Management (DRM), as then you could buy a song once and pass it on to three million people. The music companies Apple uses to supply content to the iTunes store would totally spit the dummy.
While Apple clips the ticket for every song that moves over iTunes, naturally, the company passes on a percentage to the musicians and to the aforesaid companies, too. Most people would agree you ought to be paid for your efforts. (Funny, that.)
But to those weaned on the amazing repository of 'free' songs out there (not to mention movies and more) in the bad old days of peer-to-peer file sharing find this hard to understand.....
For the full report visit here:
http://tinyurl.com/6xf4kq
EFF To Apple: Free Speech Isn't a DMCA Violation
ReadWriteWeb's Sarah Perez reports:
Apple has always been very protective over their proprietary software. The company doesn't want anything but iTunes to control an iPod - and for good reason, too. The iTunes Store is a money-making machine with over 65 million active customers helping the company sell billions of songs, videos, and apps. Despite iTunes' popularity, however, there are still those out there who would rather run their own software.....
With the latest iTunes update, Apple has once again changed the hash, meaning it needs to be reverse-engineered again. The developers doing so collaborate together and share their thoughts on iPodhash, an open-source project hosted on Bluwiki, a free web site that lets users create wiki pages.
Now Apple has asked for that site to come down, a request that the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) says is out of line. Earlier this month, a lawyer from Apple's legal firm O'Melveny & Myers sent out a takedown notice to the site stating the content was illegal under the terms of the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). According to the cease-and-desist email, the site is "disseminating information designed to circumvent Apple's FairPlay digital rights management system." It continued, "FairPlay is considered anti-circumvention technology under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The DMCA explicitly prohibits the dissemination of information that can be used to circumvent such technology."
For the full report visit here:
http://tinyurl.com/5c2kbl
Torrent for Mac is go
The Register's Chris Williams reports:
Mac users are finally being offered their own version of Torrent, the most popular BitTorrent client.
Torrent for Mac came out in beta yesterday. Version 0.90 is compatible with OSX Leopard only and the developers warn there may be "serious bugs".
For the full report visit here:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/11/28/utorrent_mac/
Apple Offers Limited Black Friday Price Cuts
Reuters reports:
Apple Inc's much-anticipated Black Friday event offered consumers discounts on Mac computers, iPods and accessories at levels similar to years past, despite speculation about deeper price cuts.
Apple, a company renown for its marketing prowess, had stoked consumer excitement by announcing a one-day Black Friday "shopping event," without giving any further details....
For the full report visit here:
http://tinyurl.com/6ps3av
NASA developing Ares rocket with iTunes
ITWire's William Atkins reports:
NASA is using iTunes to post video updates on the progress being made on its new manned space project, specifically the crew's Ares I launch vehicle and the Ares V heavy launch vehicle for cargo transport to space.
According to the media report sent from the Marshall Space Flight Center (Huntsville, Alabama), NASA uses iTunes to share development progress of Ares rocket, "The Ares Projects quarterly progress reports offer viewers a rare glimpse at the on-going development work of the next-generation launch vehicles that will take explorers to the moon and beyond in coming decades."
For the full report visit here:
http://www.itwire.com/content/view/21981/1066/
Apple Investigates MacBook Problems
Gizmodo reports:
They may be sleek and pretty as a picture but the latest Apple MacBook and MacBook Pro laptops have been hit by a series of mysterious graphics-related issues.
For the full report visit here:
http://uk.gizmodo.com/2008/11/29/apple_investigates_macbook_pro.html
PC Advisor Reviews Apple MacBook Air 1.86GHz SSD
PC Advisor's Ken Mingis reports:
I really like Apple's newly revamped MacBook Air, which got extensive under-the-hood updates last month. And I really, really like the apparent speed boost offered by the larger solid-state drive (SSD) in the Air I've been testing for the past week.
I'll have more to say about that SSD in a bit, but suffice it to say that the drive makes a noticeable difference in how fast the Air boots up, how fast programs launch and how fast this slimmest of Apple laptops feels - especially in comparison to the stock 4,200-rpm hard drive included in my first-generation Air.
For the full review visit here:
http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/reviews/index.cfm?reviewid=107770
Another Year, Another iPod - Don't be afraid to shake it with the Apple's new nano.
The Cape Breton Post's Timothy R. Schulte says:
What sounds like a Coke bottle really is the newest iPod nano.
The curved, aluminum design results in the thinnest iPod ever. It's also the first to feature Apple's new Genius technology, which automatically creates playlists from the songs in your music library.....
For the full report visit here:
http://www.capebretonpost.com/index.cfm?sid=193669&sc=667
This Software Brought To You By Ovaltine
Are we having a recession yet? Ask and ye shall receive. If the bad news keeps rolling in from Wall Street, coded phrases like "economic downturn" won't stop companies from acting as if the recession is already here.
No wonder pundits are predicting boom times for SaaS, cloud computing, and other, subscription-oriented software offerings. Who wants to sink cash into software as a fixed asset when returns from short- and long-term investments are drifting into the red?
To suggest that the death of traditional desktop software is imminent, however, would be premature. Too many of the current online offerings are too immature, too insecure, or too unreliable for mission-critical use. Still, that doesn't do much to dispel the grim but very real spectre now haunting the software industry: How in the hell are we going to make money?
Some claim the answer is that last refuge of scoundrels: advertising. A growing roster of top-ranked IT companies - from Google to Microsoft, Mozilla to Symantec - have been boosting the bottom lines of their products with cross-branding and marketing deals. But will it really work, or is it just another house of cards?....
For the full commentary visit here:
http://weblog.infoworld.com/fatalexception/archives/2008/11/this_software_b.html
he Mac Night Owl: Not Everything From Apple Just Works!
Every few days, I see a message floating above the desktop asking if I want to sync something on my MacBook or Mac Pro. It may be something in the keychain, such as login information, or a preference in Mail or another Apple program.
Here's the URL for today's commentary:
http://tinyurl.com/5gmmx6
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The Tech Night Owl: Succeeding in the Auto Business: It Starts By Selling Cars People Want
Many of the ads from Detroit's beleaguered auto makers sound the same. Their cars have great gas mileage and, yes, you can actually get low-rate financing if you try one of their special programs, although the truth is that credit remains hard to come by these days.
For the full commentary visit here:
http://www.macnightowl.com/newsletter/2008/11/newsletter-issue-470/#want
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http://www.macnightowl.com/newsletter/rss
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