12-inch Customization with Free mini-Cooper stickers...

Looks like I am not the only one who had this idea:

Arrogant Mac Snob

Gene Jablonowski of Chicago writes, "The May 2004 issue of Wired has a Mini Cooper ad that provided pinstriping stickers to personalize a Mini. I personalized my 15" Powerbook G4 instead. Perfect match. :-)" [Cult of Mac]

Here's what I did:
full view

close-up I had to use a lowercase 'k,' because Kristin had already grabbed the stickers and affixed "Krissy *" just to the right of her track pad, along with two pin stripes on the upper right corner of the outside chassis of the screen, as soon as I mentioned that I was thinking about using the stickers to customize my 12-inch. I went for small and unobtrusive initials in the bottom right corner with an upside down E in place of the number 3.

New Opera Beta for your 3650...

Rael points to the newly released Opera Beta for Series 60. Check it out.

More on iTMS DRM (a longish rant)

I received an email from Josh in reply to my earlier post about the new iTunes 4.5 DRM. He points out that my mentioning of the DRM being cracked is misleading because it only allows networked-sharing of the tunes, and doesn't actually strip them of the DRM. Yes, but cracked is cracked. It's vulnerable, and I think intentionally so. Also, he mentions that we may have lost 3 burns, but at least we can authenticate more computers. A reasonable trade off? Maybe, but the point is that I didn't pay for 7 burns and 5 computers. I paid for 10 burns and 3 computers, and Apple retroactively changed the rules on me without consulting me or compensating me. Apple is walking a rather thin tight-rope with the iTMS right now. It's an interesting balancing act they're walking between bullying from the music industry and inconveniencing their customers. Josh also says: "I wouldn't be surprised if, in a few years from now, we're not entitled to burn these to CD's *at all.* It's the one avenue that Apple can't protect." He's right, and this is my major gripe. Because it isn't really an Apple issue (because Apple is avoiding making it their issue); it's the music industry intruding on our fair use rights. I was talking to an Apple rep the other day, and he said that Apple is just doing what it has to do to keep the record companies signed up, because, legally, the entire DRM legal contract is a bunch of blustery bullying as it contradicts prior laws about fair use. Legally, I should be able to make a copy in whatever format I want as backup and preservation of my property, just as I should be able to photocopy a 5 page chapter of a 800 page book that I own and need to read when I don't want to lug around the 8 pound book. Copying music only becomes illegal when you start distributing it widely (via peer to peer or multiple CDs that you distribute) or when you start selling or acquiring bootleg copies. DRM and the music industry's approach to this issue throws innocent until proven guilty out the window, assuming guilt on the part of all consumers, and unnecessarily inconveniencing consumers and infringing on our rights as property owners. That's totally messed up and wrong, and unfortunately, enough money is being thrown behind this wrong-headed and anti-American (in principle, I mean) movement where it risks eventually being made into a set of bad laws that continue to rob us of our rights (which seems easy enough to do in our current Patriot Act-backed unfree and un-American political atmosphere). I can't really hold Apple at fault for DRM, but I can hold the music industry at fault. I like the iTunes Music Store and prefer shopping online there over going out and buying an actual CD. Right now, the convenience of that over-rides the inconvenience of the DRM. However, if things keep on going the way they are going and no one stands up and points out how wrong this all is—whether that is Apple, one of the record labels, or some poor schlep who gets wrongfully sued for exercising his/her fair use rights—how it is bad business, bad law, and bad for business and for the law, then that dynamic is going to shift, and something else will be the more convenient way to go and iTMS will die (or more correctly, it will have been forced to commit suicide by the music industry, which itself is in its death throes and lashing out at all its would be allies: us, the customers). Sorry for getting political. //rant off

MailEnhancer...

I don't know how I missed this until now, but thanks to the new MacWorld that Zinio delivered to me this morning, I just discovered MailEnhancer. The automatic signature-synchronization feature alone makes this a great little Mail.app add-on. Get it.

Gmail update...

Well, I think we're a week into this experiment now, and the response came in a huge 175MB burst at the outset. Since then, the numbers have crawled up to 180MB of 1GB of Gmail filled. Come on people! LET'S FILL THIS SUCKER UP! cksampleiii@gmail.com. Also, the spam filter continues to perform sporadically with rather unsatisfactory results, only catching the most well known spam and intermittently blocking email from addresses that it has previously let through.

DRM crippling older purchased iTMS songs...

A nice breakdown of why iTMS DRM sucketh. All your 10 times burnable DRM songs were robbed of three of their burns when you updated to iTunes 4.5. I don't know about you, but I feel as if I am entitled to a partial refund. I think this sort of "we can change the rules on and functionality of your previously purchased property any time we damn well please" aspect to the DRM is what makes me want to strip every song I buy of it. Good thing somebody has already cracked the new scheme... I wonder if 4.5.1 will be released soon to countermand this hack.

New Panther-compatible Sizzle

Sizzle is the best. It is free. It makes disk images from mpeg, vob, and other files associated with DVDs. Use DVDBackup to rip the files from your DVD, then use Sizzle to break up the vob files across several DVD-Rs. You can then use Disk Utility to burn the images. Rather than blowing close to $100 for a commercial DVD/CD burning program, use Disk Utility and Sizzle to achieve the same results for free. Free is cool!

Where were all the bottles?

See this:

Pepsi iTunes Promo A FlopThey wanted to give away 100 million free iTunes Music Store tracks, only 5 million were claimed. I’m not mathmatician but that seems a little under schedule to me. [The Unofficial Apple Weblog]

I blame Pepsi distribution for this lack of free songs that were cashed in. I only saw 2 iTMS promotion bottles here in New York during the entire promotion (and that wasn't even until a week after the promo had supposedly ended). I got my one free song, tho. Maps by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

New iTunes Locks down your Tunes again....

In case you haven't had the chance to play around with it all yet, here's the scoop:

New iTunes Makes Beating the DRM That Much Harder If you messed around with iTunes 4.5 today you might have noticed a whole gang of changes, one you probably didn’t notice is that it’s a lot harder to beat the DRM from iTunes Music Store AAC files. Previously you could use any number of third party applications to strip the DRM and convert the files to MP3s or something else, now that’s not an option. If you want to use the songs you buy on more than 3 computers now, you have to burn them to a CD, then reimport them as MP3s. Nothing like being made to jump through hoops, eh?

[The Unofficial Apple Weblog]

Hoops, eh? Yeah. This is what is going to have to happen to resolve these problems. Someone is going to have to strip their iTMS purchased songs, breaking their contract with Apple, but only using the tunes within their legal fair usage rights. Then, that person is going to have to publicize what they have done so widely that the music industry forces Apple to sue them for breach of contract. THEN, that person is going to have to fight a long battle in court to show that the iTMS agreement is unlawful, b/c it countermands existing fair use laws. Not a fun ride, and I wouldn't want to be that person. Also, there's a good chance that as bass ackward as the music industry is, that they would withdraw all support from iTMS once they lost this battle. So, what to do? Burn and rip. Burn and rip. Only 7 times that I can burn a certain playlist, b/c of DRM? Well, that's okay. I'll just burn it to CD the minute I buy it, effectively and unnecessarily wasting my time to render my purchased music fair use compliant, and then immediately rip it again and have a whole slew of non-DRM blocked songs on my 'puter. I'll also every so often burn a data DVD with all my purchased music with DRM intact as backup, just in case anybody ever knocks on my door, intrudes in my privacy, and (erroneously) accuses me of doing something illegal. Let's just hope that if that ever happens, that 1. the bad laws that are PACKED into the Patriot Act have been repealed and / or are no longer in effect. 2. I have both the time and the money to sue the pants off these people for inconveniencing my life so and to prevail.

Record HDTV with your Mac...

Thanks to Lance for pointing out this nice little Mac OS X Hint about requesting a firewire capable HDTV cable box from your cable company (they are required to provide this by law if asked) and using a few bits of software to capture and watch HDTV directly on your Mac via Firewire. That's really cool, but talk about needing a really big hard drive! I think I'll stick to my current fav: using DVArchive to import shows I've recorded on my networked ReplayTV to my Mac. Tonight's O.C. is almost completed copying!!!

BluePhoneMenu

Rael over at MobileWhack points to BluePhoneMenu, which provides info about your paired 3650 (or other bt phone) in your 12-inch's menu bar.

Use your 12-inch with the lid closed...

KBarticle on using your 12-inch with the lid closed and an external monitor. I didn't think this was an approved feature, but hey, they released a Knowledge Base Article on it. Coolness.

Software Update finally populated...

I have all the new stuff now. That took a while...

Your Software is Up to Date...

Check this out:

QuickTime / iMovie get minor updates
Both QuickTime and iMovie got minor updates today--making it a great day to run Software Update (iTunes was also upgraded to 4.5). The most interesting addition to QuickTime is the "Apple Lossless Encoder" which retains the full quality of an audio CD, but in half the space. AAC encoding was also tweaked.

iMovie gains increased stability, improved performance, and a few bug fixes. [MacMerc]

Nice, right? Yeah, except my Software Update keeps telling me that everything is up to date. *scratches head* UPDATE: Ahhhhh, yes. Standalone updaters are here and here. UPDATE TO UPDATE: Neither of these work. Says my software is too new. wtf?

iTunes 4.5

Go here to download iTunes 4.5. And, if you click here you can download a free copy of Foo Fighters' My Hero.

Hacking a ReplayTV

So, I got an incredible deal on an open box ReplayTV from BestBuy. 40GB model for $49.95. I'm looking at the MacReplay TV Forum and Replay TV FAQ to figure out what all I can start doing with this sucker. One of the first things I am doing is getting DVarchive so I can start porting video from the ReplayTV to my 12-inch (where I just so happen to have a DVD burner ;-b).

Airport Software 3.4.1 (8.9MB)

Looks like Apple's come back from the drawing board. Run Software Update now to get Airport Software 3.4.1 (8.9MB):

This software update provides improved AirPort wireless networking software, and is recommended for all users with an AirPort Extreme and AirPort enabled computer or an AirPort Extreme base station. New AirPort Extreme Features

• Improved antenna output control.
• Enhanced logging from your base station which is compatible with syslog.
• Performance improvements for WPA security implementations.

Lock and load...

PlayFair alternative & anti-DRM, anti-zealot musings...

Check out FairTunes, which converts "any authorized protected iTunes song into an unprotected, uncompressed file" and "Supports AIFF, Wave, QuickTime, System 7 Sound, MuLaw, and AVI file creation." Also, DVDJon has released a bit of open source code to strip the DRM; it's written in C, so I imagine it could be ported to OS X. I was disappointed when looking at his site to see he's been harassed by Mac zealots. This is sad to hear. I love Macs, but I hate zealots of any flavor. Zealots enable Apple to continue to produce products with multiple production problems. The response should be to raise hell (i.e., complain until it is fixed) anytime something you spent your hard-earned money on goes sour, but more often than not, among the zealot crowd, the response is more like, "My powerbook is falling apart but, oh, well, I love it anyway." BIG PROBLEM IN THE MACINTOSH COMMUNITY. And this would appear to affect the 99cent iTMS songs too. Don't get me wrong, I love the convenience of iTMS, but I really don't like the DRM. Everyone, especially Americans considering our long history of what constitutes ownership, should support strongly any movement to strip it from the tunes, because it is just flat out bad law that sets bad precedent otherwise. I'm interested to see if Jobs addresses these issues at all today, but I think the RIAA has him and Apple tied up more than the FairPlay DRM has our purchased songs lassoed. I am excited to have found Jon's blog via here and here, tho.

Mac OS X Panther Hacks

Rael just announced that Mac OS X Panther Hacks has gone on to production and will be forthcoming from O'Reilly this June. I contributed a handful of hacks to the book and am looking forward to seeing the finished product, which you can pre-order from Amazon. Exciting stuff! Check it out.

Gmail vs. SpyMac: Day 6

I'm giving up on SpyMac. It is just way too slow. It loses. Gmail, however, is still struggling as well. I had an influx of new email after a comment post over at Slashdot, but still not that overwhelming. So far Gmail is at 178MBs with 2195 emails. Also, I am here to report that their spam filter only catches the most widely known spam (like that Ambassador from Mumbabwe *sp?* who needs my assistance). As soon as I posted on Slashdot, I started receiving tons of porn attachments and subject lines filled with porn references, as well as tons of pornographic body text, and Gmail didn't block a bit of it. In any case, keep sending stuff. I want to see what happens when (if ever) it reaches a gig. We're nearly 2/10ths of the way there!

Gmail to support Safari when done with beta...

This quoted from all over the place, and I would normally clean it up a bit more, but I'm kind of rushed this morning. All apologies:

Gmail to work with Safari

When Gmail was released a lot of people noticed right away that it didn’t work with Safari, cutting off a lot of Mac OS X users - turns out that was a mistake that is high on the list to be corrected.

When Internet search engine giant Google launched its free 1GB email service, Gmail on April 1, 2004, they did so without support for Apple Computer Inc.’s Safari Web browser. The browser requirement page on the company’s Web site lists several compatible browsers for the beta of Gmail, but Safari is still not among them. All of that will change before Gmail is available to the public, according to Google co-founder Sergey Brin.

Brin noted that he was “embarrassed” that Gmail’s beta doesn’t support Safari, but said that they will add Safari support before its public release.

”We’re going to make it work with Safari and that’s one of the high priority things,” Brin told MacCentral. “I’ve heard that you can sort of get it to work if you’re desperate. I want to fix that, and I want to make it work really well.”

[The Unofficial Apple Weblog]

Cool.

And now for something completely different...

Cool little meme...

Danah's book Exercise
Via Danah Boyd:

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 23.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the sentence in your journal along with these instructions.

[Ted Leung on the air]

"A breach of etiquette could easily lead to a duel, and hence death, or to war between two factions."—The Art of Japanese Swordmanship: A Manual of Eishin-Ryu Iaido by Nicholaus Suino.

"Set as authorized; could not connect; iSync" problems with 3650

Brian D. Foy notes over at MobileWhack a problem he was having with his 3650 and iSync, and the trouble he had tracking down a solution. If you're having a problem with Set as authorized; could not connect; iSync, you should check this out.

iTalk Review...

So, Powerpage has a much more detailed review of the iTalk than mine from the other day. Go check it out.

If you want to talk to someone at TechTV...

If you want to contact someone at TechTV, please go to their website and contact them directly. Don't pop into a chat conversation with me, uninvited and ask me if I happen to know someone at TechTV. I only know one person with TechTV, and only in a very tenuous and virtual chat-based way, and I am not going to introduce you to them or provide you with their email / chat handle. Go to TechTV and contact them through the appropriate channels. //rant off.

Update on Apple's Unfair Play with PlayFair...

Slashdot has a great little write up of the PlayFair fiasco, and points to this really great and thorough discussion of what has happened with PlayFair, what Apple has done, and what the more serious ramifications of this incident are. The plain and simple fact of what is ludicrous about this whole incident is stated in this section:

PLAYFAIR IS NOT MUSIC THEFT PlayFair does not give the user any special facilities that Apple itself has not given the user:

1. PlayFair requires a valid key from Apple to convert the format of music downloaded from iTunes. PlayFair cannot convert downloaded songs' formats without authorized keys.
2. PlayFair is not a music distribution program. All PlayFair does is convert songs from one, restricted format to another, less restricted format.
3. PlayFair is not a method for making illegal copies of iTunes songs. PlayFair by itself cannot be used to copy music to CD, distribute on a peer-to-peer (P2P) sharing network, play music or edit songs.
4. PlayFair saves time in converting songs. The Apple iPod permits the iTunes user to make a music CD out of iTunes songs. After that the user can convert the songs in that CD to MP3 or another digital format for playing on portable, non-Apple music players. By converting iTunes songs directly to a common digital format, PlayFair shortcuts this sequence by eliminating the need to make a CD and then convert it.

One nice bit of info here is the link to a copy of the C&D letter from Apple. I think I mentioned earlier that I don't think Apple is the source of this stupidity. They are most likely receiving pressure from the very stupid music industry to eradicate this "threat." Dear Music Industry, WAKE UP! The only thing you are consistently ERADICATING is your PAYING CUSTOMERS!

Gmail Vs. SpyMac: Day 5

Gmail is now up to 127MBs (with 2176 emails), thanks to someone helpful who wrote a server script that has been forwarding game logs from a game server to the account. Also, since they are text-based logs rather than attachments, the ad-bots are scanning it and serving up adverts about gaming. None of this has been caught by Gmail's spam filter. One person who sent about 15 emails to the account had the last 5 blocked by Gmail's spam filter and the first ten went through fine. Not really sure what the rule is that caused that. Seems like odd behavior to me. I did actually receive one honest to goodness spam courtesy of some little spambot crawling this site, and it has been caught and delivered to the spam folder properly. So, it's a bit too early to tell, but it looks like Gmail's spam filters may err on the side of being overly-protective. Gmail catches at least some spam, so that's a +1, but it is overzealous, so that's a -1. So no progress today. Gmail still at -2. SpyMac is still dog slow with emails that were sent a day ago suddenly popping up. Nothing has been filtered as spam. Even the same bona-fide spam message that Gmail caught is sitting there unperturbed in the normal inbox. And it is still only at 27MB. I cannot tell if this is b/c people are sending stuff to Gmail and ignoring SpyMac, or if SpyMac simply is sooooo slow and far behind in processing my mail that the other 100MBs of mail that Gmail has over on SpyMac is still floating out there somewhere amidst all the ones and zeros. SpyMac loses another point for not catching actual spam: -1. Total SpyMac score = -4. So far, both services are losing. But, here's an interesting read about why the idea of Gmail being a bit of privacy-stealing evil is hyperbolic and silly. Check it out.

Gmail Vs. SpyMac: Day 4 & Race update...

Ok. I have to give SpyMac -5 points for being soooooooo incredibly slow. I am hoping this is just due to the large amounts of traffic they have been receiving since implementing their 1GB email and that it will soon start improving, but so far, I am receiving emails about a day late. Not cool. As for the race, Gmail has proven faster to update giving it a +1, giving it a -2 overall, but Spymac has been so slow that its previous score of +2 is now -3, so Gmail is actually in the lead. Spymac: 28MB. Gmail: 98MB (that's almost a tenth of a gig!). Also, I saw this program earlier today DMG Scissor, which breaks up DMG files into smaller e-mailable files that can later be reassembled. So, since the bots at Gmail don't seem to be able to scan attachments, you could use Gmail as a viable online backup space, by creating encrypted DMG files of important documents that you break up into 5MB segments using DMG Scissor, send to your Gmail email account. That's a GIG of remote backup space for free. Oh, and also this and this about Gmail.

Things I am learning about Gmail...

40MB Gmail (hoot) 6MB SpyMac (boo) But, check this out: The people that have started sending files to the Gmail account have been sending attachments sans any body text, and here's where it gets interesting, as a result, there are no ads displayed alongside these emails. So, if you did want to use Gmail ad-free and wanted your info to remain private from Gmail's prying bot eyes, you could zip your email and send it as attachments. Of course, the people you were emailing would have to know that this is what is going on. What would be cool would be an underground Gmail network of people communicating via attachments with specially written scripts to automate the process. A GUI for the scripts that acted as your email client and sent the info via Gmail's shtuff... ok. I am obsessing. //crazy rant off.

Gmail takes the lead...

...in size anyway. Per my request, a few people have started emailing, and now Gmail is reporting 26MB of my available Gig being full, while SpyMac only reports 6MBs.

Fill 2 Gigs of Email Race!!!

Well, it's a friday, thus I should have expected the mediocre response so far. Thanks to those who have contributed, but we're only up to 6MB of email in each account, the Gmail and the SpyMac. Come on people, let's try to fill these suckers up! Tell everyone! Send multiple emails with large attachments! cksampleiii@gmail.com cksample3@spymac.com Neck and neck at 6MB...

THE GRAND EXPERIMENT: Testing GMail and SpyMac Mail: Send me lots of email...

Here's my GMail email: cksampleiii@gmail.com and here's my SpyMac email: cksample3@spymac.com I want to try an experiment to see if we can even approach filling up these two email accounts with their 1GB of space each. Please, everyone who reads this blog, or happens to trip across it. I ask that you take a moment to send an email to each of these addresses. Preferably with attachments. And please, don't send any actual correspondence to these addresses. I'm currently just testing them and won't read what is sent to them with the real type of scrutiny that correspondence deserves. Dear SpamBots, Please register these email addresses with as many SPAM servers as you have ever crawled and have them send me insane amounts of SPAM. I want to test the Spam filters on these services, and you're little bits of evil code will help me do both that and aide in my attempt to reach that 1GB limit. Thanks for your help and please pass along the info about this experiment to your friends and family. ;-)

Griffin iTalk vs. Belkin Voice Recorder...

So now I have both the Griffin iTalk and the Belkin Voice Recorder. I will be keeping the Griffin iTalk and giving the Belkin Voice Recorder away to a friend, however, both are exceptionally cool and useful products. The only down side to the Belkin Voice Recorder was the inability to plug headphones or an external mic directly into it. Really, the headphones is the main issue for me, as the Belkin mic is really good. In fact, I think the internal mic on the BVR is a little better quality than the one on the iTalk. However, the iTalk does have a plug for an external mic, which also doubles as a headphone jack. Unfortunately, you cannot listen on the headphone set while recording with the internal mic on the iTalk, which was something I was really excited to try out. However, I can leave the iTalk on my iPod at all times, ready to go and record whenever I need to, which is better than the BVR, which I had to pop on. Also, the speaker on the iTalk is much louder and clearer than the one on the BVR. I recorded three different short clips for you to listen to for comparison purposes. This one was recorded with the iTalk and an AKG microphone plugged into it via a Shure line matching transformer. As you can tell it is much cleaner sounding, but much more quiet (and difficult to hear) as well. This could be because I actually was holding the AKG about 1/4" away from my mouth, but in any case, it would be nice if there was some sort of gain control. Here's the recording with the iTalk. It is much louder, with more ambient noise and some popping. It was recorded while holding the iPod about 6-8" from my mouth. Here's another recording with the Belkin Voice Recorder. Not as much popping, but still some. Not as loud. Not as much ambient noise. All three files are in AAC format. None of them are in any sort of *amazing* sound quality because Apple put a cap on the throughput on this functionality on the iPod. Anybody want to hack it?

Apple Developer Docs on new 12-inchers...

Saw this over at Powerpage:

PowerBook and iBook Developer Notes
Apple has posted the developer documents for the newest PowerBook and iBook revisions, both HTML and PDF versions are available. The "New Features" sections provide detailed information on the new laptops. Read More...

Read more...

Support Powerpage.org by shopping at Amazon.com!

[PowerPage.org]

Cool. Drool... I want a new slightly faster tricked out 12-inch...

Nokia working on fixing Blusnarfing hole...

This bug hasn't been noted to affect 3650 users, but nevertheless, it is good to know that Nokia is working on plugging the security hole that makes bluesnarfing possible. Check out Gizmodo's write up of it and take special notice of Snarf from Thundercats in blue. Whoever at Gizmodo thought to include that pic with the story is a friggin' genius!

PowerBook G4, iBook G4: Troubleshooting the Slot Load Disc Drive

PowerBook G4, iBook G4: Troubleshooting the Slot Load Disc Drive KB Article—check it out.

New Toys: Griffin SightLight and iTalk

HA HA! They are finally here! I just received my long-ago-ordered SightLight and iTalk from Griffin Technology today. I will play around with them tonight and tomorrow and post more detailed reviews soon. In the meantime, here's a pic: HOOT!

Gmail vs. SpyMac: Day 2 TIE!

So, 1GB of data per account, right? I decided to try emailing some attachments between the accounts. First, I attempted, ambitiously a 60MB video file. As expected this failed with both Gmail and SpyMac. SpyMac notified me that the file was too big after spinning its wheels for a few minutes. Gmail didn't give me any such report. It simply timed out and I received an error that said "The message contained no data." Then when I try to resend, I either got the same message and when I closed it warns "Are you sure you want to close this message without sending?" or some such warning. Then, I lowered my expectations a bit. Decided to try a 12MB file, which is within the size limit for my work email. Same results. Neither account could handle it. So, I figured I'll try close to a megabyte more than macmail can handle. 4.3MB file. It sent from SpyMac without a problem and downloaded it in Gmail easily. I sent it via Gmail (I think) but it hasn't shown up in SpyMac's box yet. UPDATE: 4 hours later it came through. Have to wait and see. If it didn't send, then that's minus one against Gmail. If it did send, then this is just SpyMac's slow response, which was one of its minuses from yesterday so it is a tie. In any case, looks like about 5MB is the limit. For 1GB of space, that sucks!

Pictures of New 12-inch's guts!

Check out these pictures of the disassembly of the new 1.33Ghz 12-inch. Found this link here. Coolness.

Gmail vs SpyMac: First Impressions (2GIGS!!!)

So, I decided to go ahead and sign up for both SpyMac and Gmail to give them each a test run. I now am in command of 2GB of email space. TWO GIGABYTES!!! Just for email. And there is the first drawback. I want to post a bunch of pics and videos to both of those gigs and link to them from this site. But, seriously, day 1 impressions: Gmail is faster than SpyMac mail. That's its plus. Gmail won't run in Safari (my browser of choice), however, which is a huge minus. I have to run it alone in Firefox, which means one more redundant program open. Third minus, it is only web-based; I can't run it in Mail.app. Fourth minus, ads, ads, ads. That's one plus and 4 minuses for a first day score: -3. HOWEVER, I can run SpyMac mail from within Mail.app alongside my other email accounts (plus), if I do decide to use it via the web, it is Safari compatible (plus), it contains no ads whatsoever (huge plus), but it does take longer for mail coming to the account to show up than with Gmail (one minus). That's 3 pluses and one minus. First day score: +2. Stay tuned for more, when I get a chance to really play with these babies...

Kernel Panic...

No idea what caused it, but I just had my first kernel panic in MONTHS. According to the log file, this is what crashed:

0 libSystem.B.dylib 0x900038f8 __vfprintf + 0x38

Whatever that is... Wasn't printing anything...

Gmail verses SpyMac

Well, I signed up for a SpyMac email account with 1GB of server storage space: Pretty impressive. It took a while for the SpyMac team to get my account up and running, but now that it is, I am going to test it out for a while. If it works nicely, I think I am going to ditch .mac, which ever since it was part of iTools has been beleaguered by multiple problems and server issues that Apple has failed to solve even now when I am into my 2nd paying year of service. Ironically, as I was navigating to Blogger to post this little bit, I saw the following little snippet: Funny that after finding out how Gmail intends to trounce on privacy with their email scanning bots, I'm much more interested in going with email from a place called SpyMac. Heh.

Share2Blue2th for Konfabulator coming soon...

After playing around with Konfabulator for a while, I decided to attempt to write a version of my Share2Blue2th scripts as a widget. Don't know when I will get this done, but just wanted to let everyone know that I was working on it.

The Apple Bluetooth Module Firmware Update 1.1

Run Software Update now to get the Apple Bluetooth Module Firmware Update 1.1:

The Apple Bluetooth Module Firmware Update 1.1 improves Bluetooth performance and reliability. When this Update package is downloaded, it will install the software updater (listed below) for the Apple Bluetooth Module in the Applications/Utilities folder. Double click the installer and follow the on screen directions. Bluetooth Firmware Updater

If you're the cautious type, you can hold off until after I restartinstall it and I'll let you know if anything went screwy! Update: So far so good... I just connected to my 3650 without a hitch. Wonder what's changed...

New 12-inch Powerbooks...

Apple just announced new Powerbooks. I'm already drooling over the new 12-inch:

"More.” It’s the word that best describes the new 12-inch PowerBook G4. It has more speed: it’s 1.33GHz PowerPC G4 processor and 167MHz system bus provide impressive performance gains. It offers twice the video memory — 64MB, to be exact — resulting in a noticeable boost in graphics performance. It provides more storage, coming standard with a 60GB Ultra ATA/100 hard drive. It’s available with a 4x SuperDrive that delivers double the DVD burning speed. And, the pièce de résistance, it ships with AirPort Extreme built right in. And though you may get more performance than ever, the 12-inch PowerBook G4 still starts at just $1599.

4xDVD Superdrive. USB 2.0. Built-in Airport Extreme AND...Firewire 400?! Why on earth doesn't Apple put a FW800 port in these suckers?

I H8 .Mac and iDisk...

One of the things I hate most about Panther is the new iDisk "feature" which is buggy as hell. For a while now, I've randomly switched between keeping a local copy of my iDisk on my desktop and doing without it. I want it to work, but it just always bugs out on me. Although I have it set to only sync manually, it continually switches its preferences to sync automatically, and this morning was the last straw, as I woke up my 12-inch to see the following: And no matter where I clicked or what I did, this large dialog box remained, floating on top of all my other windows, dominating my screen, making my morning a little less fun for a Monday. So, I rebooted. Disabled local iDisk. I also wish Apple would get off their butts and fix all the intermittent problems that my .mac mail continually has. That would be nice, too...

Browser-based iTunes...

iTMS-4-ALL looks to be a pretty cool way to access the iTunes Music Store, if you don't have (or don't want) a copy of iTunes 4 lying around... Here's a link to the live script. Pretty cool. You can also download and install on your machine. It looks to be built in Perl and is released under the GNU GPL. Sweet!

Apple update pro software lineup: Motion, FCP Pro HD, DVD Studio Pro, Shake, Logic...

Check it out. Apple has announced a slew of new software updates to its pro line, along with a new member, Motion for real-time motion graphics design.

Airport Software 3.4 (9MB)

Airport Software 3.4 (9MB) available now via Software Update:

This software update provides improved AirPort wireless networking software, and is recommended for all users with an AirPort Extreme and AirPort enabled computer or an AirPort Extreme base station. New AirPort Extreme Features

• Improved antenna output control.
• Enhanced logging from your base station which is compatible with syslog.
• Performance improvements for WPA security implementations.

Tungsten T3 and Share2Blue2th

Check this out. Alastair has my scripts working with his T3, but for some reason the connection times out after 3 minutes. Anyone else using my scripts with a Tungsten T3 have any advice / workarounds for Alastair? Also, I managed to establish some minimal communication with the mysterious JRLove who originally posted the command line instructions that Jim Wright, Terry Chay, and myself tweaked, and I squeezed into the scripts. His name is Jean-René Rouet. Thanks, Jean-René!

Apple continues unfair play with PlayFair

This from BoingBoing:

Apple takes Playfair bullying to India
Playfair is the program that removes the use-restriction wrapper from your iTunes Music Store tracks. It used to be hosted on SourceForge, but they chickened out when Apple sent them a bullying note demanding takedown under the ludicrous and loathesome DMCA. Playfair moved to a host in India, which apparently has no such law, but now Apple has nastygrammed the Indian hosts too, resulting in another takedown while the Indians get some legal advice. Gee, Apple, you really can't buy publicity like this. Well, you can. But why would you want to?Link(via /.) [Boing Boing Blog]

My guess is that Apple is receiving pressure from the lovely music industry to fix this problem. Point is, I should be able to use the mp3s I've paid for however I please, DRM be damned. I really wish one of the labels would figure this out and stop harrassing their customers. The first one to do so is going to be the first one to start turning a noticable profit for a change.

Bloggin' from The Ballpark on a 12-inch

MacWorld's Jason Snell is blogging from SBC Park in San Francisco on his 12-inch thanks to a park-wide wifi connection. Not being a huge baseball fan (I feel it moves too slowly), this type of open connectivity at Yankee Stadium might persuade me to attend a few games with my fiancee's family who are all huge Yankee fans...

Final Cut Express 2.0.3

If you are fortunate enough to have updated to Final Cut Express 2 (I'm still running 1.0), good news: there's an update that improves QuickTime compatibility and capturing movies.

Konfabulator 1.6

The fabulous Konfabulator has just been updated to version 1.6. It lets you easily run hundreds of freely available widgets or create your own with a slight bit of JavaScript. Check it out.

New 12-inchers next week?

According to AppleInsider, two new 12-inchers will debut next week.

Should I be concerned?

So I launched System Preferences a little while ago and was shocked to find an icon missing. Is this something I should be really concerned about? Update: Ran Cocktail and now the icon is back. *whew*

h00t!

I know this has nothing whatsoever to do with this blog, but I met with my dissertation director today and she gave me the green light to pass my proposal on to my readers and for getting the proposal through the system this semester, which means I can move on to the actual writing of my dissertation by the summer. tee hee hee....

Gentoo Linux 12-inch...

Go here. Download the newest .iso image. Launch Disk Utility and burn a copy of the image to CD. Stick CD in your drive, reboot, hold down C. Result:

Ogg Vorbis for your 3650

Check it:

OggPlay for Symbian Series 60 and UIQ smartphones—Symbian OggPlay is an open source Ogg Vorbis player for Symbian smartphones. [MobileWhack]

Coolness. Now I can strip all the DRM from my iTMS songs using PlayFair and then re-encode into Ogg for twice the music on my little MMC card for my 3650.

Gopher Rules!

Wired has a new article up about Gopher. This is something I discussed back in November when I installed Gopher, so that I could run it old skool via the Terminal. Veronica!

Wright This Way

Jim Wright, who along with Terry Chay and myself, wrestled with DNS resolution (or lack thereof) in the initial stages of figuring out how to share the Mac's internet connection out to the 3650, and who helped critique and clean up the code on the first few renditions of my Share2Blue2th scripts just launched a new site. Go check it out.

Trojan Horse lacking in Trojans...

OS X Trojan Horse Is a Nag
The first Trojan for Mac OS X is anything but, experts say, and Thursday's warning from antivirus company Intego was unnecessarily alarmist. By Leander Kahney. [Wired News]

Not a good move by Intego. I think their small market-share is about to shrink drastically.

Unfair play with PlayFair...

This sucks:

Playfair is History

Earlier this week I was talking about Playfair, the app that strips DRM from iTunes. Well, according to MacSlash it’s been shut down.

”Apple computer issued a cease and desist order to Sourceforge to shut down the PlayFair web site (cache). The development team is currently looking for a new home for the project. It’s not surprising that Apple did this, but I guess I’m still disappointed whenever they whack someone with a lawyer.” No proof that it was an Apple C&D. You can still find PlayFair in a SourceForge search, but it returns a page saying “Invalid Project.”

[The Unofficial Apple Weblog]

Foo on Apple. DRM sucks. Update: Found this Register article, which notes that PlayFair is still alive, though it has moved to India to escape Apple's persecutionprosecution. Here's the new address. Check it out. Download it. Free your tunes...

Mac OS X Trojan: MP3Concept

There's a new horse in town:

Intego issues Mac OS X Trojan Horse warning
Macintosh security specialists, Intego on Thursday issued a security warning to its customers for the first Trojan horse to affect Mac OS X. Dubbed MP3Concept (MP3Virus.Gen), the Trojan horse exploits a weakness in Mac OS X where applications can appear to be other types of files, according to the company. [MacCentral]

This is what we get for making so much fun of all the PeeCee users over the past year.

12-inch Lockdown...

Macworld has an article up called "Laptop Lockdown" by Jason Cook that discusses how to secure your portable computer and its data, as well as ways to track it down if it is ever stolen. Check it out.

PocketSurfer for your 3650...

I just saw mention of the PocketSurfer over at engadget. It is basically a portable console for web-browsing that gets its internet connection over a bluetooth connection to the 3650's GPRS connection. Nice! Comes with a 640-pixel-wide display and a full keyboard. Oooooooh, I want one! It is $200 plus $10 a month for its web-proxy service that loads images with less bandwidth than your phone's standard GPRS.

Bring out the Gimp 2: The Update

The updated version 2.0.0-2 of Gimp.app has just been released. Gimp.app is the free self-contained application bundle of the GNU Image Manipulation Program for OS X. Needs X11 to run, but a heck of a lot cheaper than Photoshop, and just as powerful (if not more). See my previous post about it...

HALO Wireless Bluetooth Headset...

After receiving some inquiries about it, I just wanted to revisit the HALO Wireless Bluetooth Headset from Solteras for a quick overview. The HALO works great. The audio quality is better than my Jabra FreeSpeak, the HALO is much less physically intrusive on the ear, and the battery life is amazing, 10+ hours of talk time, (although after 8 hours the sound quality of the mic did start to suffer a little bit, gaining a "hollow" sound according to people with whom I was speaking). The only negative about the device is its look. Very large and noticeable on your head. People tend to stare at it, whereas with the Jabra FreeSpeak, they just glance for a moment and then move on. Of course, the Jabra only has 3 hours of talk time. Also, there is a blue blinking light, to let you know that the HALO is on and working, that you can see out of the corner of your eye when driving at night IF you have the boom arm extended. This is a potential safety hazard, as it is distracting to the driver, but simply closing the boom solves the problem and doesn't seem to have any bad side effects on the Halo's performance.

Give me back iChat AV Beta...

Ever since I updated to the full version iChat AV, rather than simply running the beta, I get spinning beach ball of death all over the place, and this really really annoying message, much too often:

The AIM service could not send the message: You have sent too much data too quickly. Please wait a little while before sending more.

Really starting to think about switching back to FIRE and using ohphoneX for whenever I want to have an AV chat...

Possible solution to Powerbook sleep issue...

Check out this post over at Yahoo! Groups 12inch Powerbooks group for a possible solution to the Powerbook sleep issue I've mentioned here before:

1) Backup and then delete com.apple.PowerManagement.plist (in /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/ on my system) 2) Shutdown 3) Reset PMU (hold down shift - ctrl - opt - power) 4) Reset NVRAM and PRAM (hold down cmd - opt - "o" - "f" while booting and at the OpenFirmware command line enter "reset-nvram" and press return, enter "set-defaults" and press return, enter "reset-all" and press return)

Cool. I need to give this a shot on Kristin's machine... Update: Well, I followed these instructions and the machine still works fine. Too soon to tell if it solved the problem. I'll leave her machine unplugged and see if the battery warning comes up and update here later...

Security Update 2004-04-05

Run Software Update now to download the latest Security Update (3.7MB):

Security Update 2004-04-05 delivers a number of security enhancements and is recommended for all Macintosh users. This update includes the following components: CUPS Printing, libxml2, Mail, OpenSSL

Restart required. Ugh...

SightLight Review on Powerpage...

O'Grady's Powerpage has a review of the SightLight for the iSight posted. I'm still eagerly awaiting the arrival of my SightLight, which I ordered when they were first announced...

MacFixIt reports IN-DEPTH on Powerbook sleep issue...

Looks like my first generation 12-inch isn't the only Powerbook out there randomly falling asleep when unplugged. MacFixIt has posted an even more detailed discussion of this issue in light of reader response from their last post about it. Interesting bits: a related KBarticle and another about calibrating the battery and still another about resetting the PMU (which I tried and didn't fix it for me). Also, there is mention of a utility called SlimBatteryMonitor. Check it out.

Playfair: Allowing you to play the iTMS songs you own on your 3650...

Check out playfair:

The playfair program is quite simple. It takes one of the iTMS Protected AAC Audio Files, decodes it using a key obtained from your iPod or Microsoft Windows system and then writes the new, decoded version to disk as a regular AAC Audio File. It then optionally copies the metadata tags that describe the song, including the cover art, to the new file.

playfair runs from the command line, and takes some basic familiarity with the Terminal to get it working, but relatively easy install all and all. Simply navigate to the decompressed playfair folder via the Terminal and:

$ ./configure
$ make
$ make install

Now, I can finally start listening to the songs I own on my 3650 and anywhere else I damn well please... HOOT!

What to do when your 12-inch won't print...

Here's a KBarticle that discusses what to do in OS X if your Apple doesn't print.

My thoughts exactly...

This post over at Backup Brain summarizes nicely the "So what?" I experienced yesterday when reading about Kinja.

MacFixIt reports on Powerbook sleep issue...

MacFixIt is reporting upon a problem that has plagued my first gen 12-inch since 10.3.1:

PowerBook suddenly falling asleep without "low power" warning A phenomenon we've experienced in-house since Mac OS X 10.3.0 is being reported by an increasing number of readers after the Mac OS X 10.3.3 update. Instead of providing the normal "You are now running on reserve battery power..." warning (generally followed by 5-10 minutes of actual battery time), out in-house PowerBook will sometimes fall asleep without warning - in some cases even when the battery indicates more than 30 minutes of usage remaining.

My new 12-inch does not exhibit this problem, and fortunately, it doesn't bother Kristin who inherited my old 12-inch, as she normally works while plugged in. However, it would be nice to find out what was causing this very frustrating problem and fix it....

Apple ProCare...

Apple has announced Apple Pro Care for $99 a year:

With ProCare, you’ll get added benefits over and above our standard level of service:

• Rapid Repairs. Get priority, next-day turnaround on in-store repairs.
• Reserve a Genius. No waiting at our Genius Bar with up to seven-day advance reservations.
• Complete setup. We’ll transfer your old files and get you ready to roll before you leave the store.
• Custom workshops. Book free, one-hour workshops to take your skills further.
• Exclusive discounts. Get special discounts on selected Apple and third-party products.
• Test-Drive. Try all of the latest Apple hardware in our store, before you buy.
• Price Guarantee. If you see Apple products for less at another store, don’t worry. We’ll match the price.
• Take It Home Today. Purchase any Mac, software, or accessory from our store inventory and take it with you today.
• My Mac. Let us help you personalize your new Mac by setting up your email and Internet account, installing software, connecting peripherals and more.
• Genius Bar. Get hands-on support from a Mac Genius during store hours.

This is great and all, but $99 a year? Shouldn't Apple provide the Price Guarantee and Take It Home Today features for anyone? They should bundle this with .mac. Also, check out this little detail from the Terms & Conditions page:

Fees may apply for repair services. Repairs are done on a first-come, first-serve basis. ProCare repairs will be performed as fast as possible within one business day. Such next-day service applies only to desktop repairs. Customer desktop units checked in by noon will generally be ready for pickup at 6 p.m. the next day. Repairs of portables will be performed as fast as a two-day service. Customer portable units checked in by noon will generally be ready for pickup at 6 p.m. on the second day, e.g., a laptop dropped off by noon Monday will be ready for pickup at 6 p.m. on Wednesday. Certain repairs will not qualify for a one-or two-day turnaround; for example, monitor repairs will continue to be serviced at Apple Authorized Repair Centers (Depots), and the turnaround time will be based on current Depot service levels. Repairs in Hawaii generally will take longer than two days. Speed of service depends upon availability of service parts and location of service repair.

and...

Apple is not responsible for Covered Products that are lost or stolen while in Apple’s possession. Apple’s total liability for the Services shall not exceed $50.

So, if I take my 12-inch in for repair, and they lose it, they are not responsible?! Just looks to me like more ways for Apple to slack off on support for everyone else and charge more money...

uControl: Remap your 12-inch CAPSLOCK!

This is pretty friggin' cool:

uControl: Turn Off Caps Lock For Good
uControl is a keyboard remapper and more. Meaning, those useless keys can now be reused, remapped, or reduced. PowerBook users will love the fact that you can disable the dreaded CAPS LOCK key.Read more... [PowerPage.org]

I'm installing this now. I ALWAYS ACCIDENTALLY (crap!) hit the caps lock key. UPDATE: ARGH! It won't install on 10.3.3, only 10.3.2! Grrr...

iBatt for your 12-inch...

Rayner software has released iBatt Beta:

On March 31, Rayner Software released the first public beta of iBatt. The new software title is an advanced PowerBook battery monitoring and diagnostic program. iBatt gets information about your battery that the system doesn't tell you, such as its total capacity, voltage output, and rate of charge/discharge. The beta is open to all, and is available at the URL below.

Check it out.

Apple to release Robotic 40foot Chicken called iChicken!!!

I hate April Fool's Day in the Internet Community. Everybody posts stuff like this and this and it makes you wonder if things like this and this (both of which would be really cool) are also pranks.