I often listen to podcasts while I work (at my home office), and frequently, they are produced by twit.tv. This afternoon, I began listening to the latest episode of the main show, This Week In Tech (TWIT), and there was a surprise guest… Geordi La Forge! 🙂
Didn’t know he was so much of a tech guy. AND, a Mac guy! Very nice. Knew I liked him… 😉
Well, the keynote is over, and the announcements have been made (iLife ’09, iWork ’09, iWork.com, new 17″ MacBook Pro, and even a DRM-free iTunes!) And while there was no Steve… there were some pretty neat things.
Check out the extensive video tutorials for both iWork ’09 and iLife ’09. Some really amazing new features in iLife like face recognition, amazing integration of geo-tagging, and a greatly improved iMovie app.
No time to go in depth here, but definitely worth the upgrade. Both iWork and iLife are $30 off through April 20 with the purchase of a new Mac. And you can buy a Mac Box Set (Leopard, iLife 09, and iWork 09) for $169. (That’s a really good deal, actually.)
Come by my Apple store and check it out! 🙂
Today at 1pm EDT, Apple fans all around the world will be tracking the always greatly anticipated announcements to come from the keynote presentation at the annual Macworld Convention and Expo in San Francisco, CA. But this year, the keynote will be a bit different. And perhaps less highly anticipated than usual?
No Steve Jobs.
This year, one of the most famous CEOs on the planet will not be presenting the reports on Apple’s progress, the new products, and he most certainly won’t be uttering his now-famous line, “One more thing…” Does that mean Apple will not be announcing any new products of any significance? Is it just because this is the last Macworld that Apple will be attending?
Will it still be FUN????
Seriously. This day just after Christmas has been just as big (and fun) as any holiday for Apple fans around the globe. It used to be even more, but Apple has begun announcing product updates and releases much more on their own schedule, and throughout the calendar year over the past several years. They have already diminished the significance of the first Tuesday in January, but … still…
My thought is that it’s a little bit of everything. Life changes. Obviously, Apple has decided that the big trade show/convention deal is not in their best interest. (Even one with their name in it!) So, that is a change. Eventually, Steve Jobs will move on from Apple. That will be a change. Life is change.
Today, I, along with Apple fans all over the world, will be following along (as we are wont to do) as Apple moves forward. A bit unceremoniously (last Macworld keynote… no Steve Jobs…) but I’m sure to more FUN in the future. 🙂
I may have a report here later regarding whatever “FUN” Apple announces today.
[NOTE: I am writing this as a fan of Apple, not as an employee of Apple, Inc. I have no special knowledge, or inside information on products or personnel or anything of the sort. So don’t ask.] 🙂
For some reason, this little feature in Mac OS X 10.5 Disk Utility (and previous iterations of OS X) keeps popping up as a solution lately. I thought perhaps readers of this blog might benefit from a little reminder, and quick tutorial for performing this routine maintenance task.
First, what it is not. It is not “defragging” your computer. (Spell check doesn’t like that word.) Windows users frequently ask for a way to do such a thing on the Mac, but to my knowledge there is no way built into Mac OS X to do such a thing, other than what happens at log in. Mac OS X does perform similar tasks each time you log in to your computer.
What it does do is explained in this support article from Apple. I don’t completely understand it, but what it does seem to do is take care of “quirks” that pop up every now and again. It could be a computer that seems slow, or files not behaving the way you think they should… I have prescribed it a lot recently, and it seems to do the trick.
How it’s done:
For good measure, you can log out and back in. (Or restart the computer.)
If you’ve been noticing “quirks”… give that a try and see if it improves performance on a sluggish or quirky Mac!
Given that I am now employed by Apple, I will refrain from speculating on any of the product or service announcements that will be made, but this invitation went out from Apple this week, regarding an event scheduled for next Tuesday morning (local time) in San Francisco. Looking forward to seeing what they announce!
(Believe it or not, even working for Apple, I don’t know any more than you do!) 🙂
I’m late to the party with this one, but it’s been busy around here… what can I say?
So, last week there were reports that a genuine Mac OS trojan had been discovered “in the wild” (meaning, in the real world, affecting real Mac users). I checked it out (per the link above) today and found that it’s still just a good opportunity to get some hits to your site.
The so-called “trojan” is an AppleScript file that must be downloaded, and double-clicked (opened) in order to do anything. I must admit, what it is able to do is impressive. It somehow works around the OS safeguards and is able to do some things only an administrator should do. However, it still requires user activation.
So, the Mac continues to be (by far) the safest computing platform available. I do wonder if this particular script “counts” enough for Apple to have to say there are now (1) viruses for the Mac?
(NOTE: I visited a page where Apple used to claim there were currently zero viruses for the Mac OS, and now it does not explicitly say that. Perhaps they are becoming a bit less smug about their incredible security? Perhaps.)
How busy have things been around here of late, you ask? Well, today I was browsing my news RSS folder (for the first time in a while) and caught a few articles titles referencing the big WWDC keynote today at 10am PST… and I thought, “TODAY???”
That’s right, folks. There are big doin’s today in the world of Apple, and I was totally unaware of it!
I’ll try to do better next time… 🙂
I posted recently some thoughts on the ongoing myth that Apple computers are more expensive (comparing “apples to apples”) than their Windows-running counterparts. It’s pretty amazing that such thinking is still widespread. I like to give folks the benefit of the doubt, and say they just haven’t actually seen the real numbers for themselves…
Today came across another article debunking several myths about Apple/Mac OS. Here’s one snippet of what he said:
While users do pay some premium for both the Apple brand and the innovation that goes into Apple’s often brilliant hardware design, the premium is not out of line with that users already pay for name brand systems from vendors such as Sony, HP or Lenovo. In many cases, comparable Apple systems are priced similarly or in some cases are even cheaper than their competition.
If you’re interested, you can read the full article by Michael Gartenberg at his blog. It’s relatively short. And, if you really still think PCs running windows are cheaper… just read the article. 🙂
(Also, it’s not just the price myth, he also takes on the software myth as well as the proprietary myth. Sheesh. Why so many myths??) 🙂
It’s been quiet here at GregsHead because it’s NOT been quiet in Greg’s office or Greg’s home! I even tried to post something like Steve did yesterday, but didn’t have time to finish it! Ha! 🙂
But wanted to post a link to this article about the Apple market share myth(s). Pretty interesting stuff. Was chatting with a fellow Mac user about it and he sent me this link.
From what I have seen (from my decidedly Mac-skewed vantage point) the world is much more than the fabled 2% Mac market share. And, as the article says, we are some of the coolest tech/computer users out there. 🙂
It’s not too late to “go Mac“…
🙂
I can’t really believe that this still comes up, but I’ve been talking with a friend who is in the market for a new computer, and though there are several people close to them who insist they would love a Mac, is still convinced that he can get “the same” computer for less. Folks… this is just not true. Perhaps a little less… but usually the opposite is true. I wrote about this here TWO YEARS ago, and Apple has gotten heaps better in those two years.
I was trying to figure out why I can’t just let it go sometimes. I think it’s just my personality. I need stuff to be true. (Though, not in everything… but I guess the stuff I care about.) If someone just doesn’t want a Mac, that’s OK (too bad, but OK) 😉 But if they say they don’t want it because they can get the same computer for less… that’s just not true. I think it all works out pretty evenly in the end, except with a Mac you get no viruses, spyware, everything just works “out of the box” (all included in the computer) and you get the Mac OS, which is fantastic. (Not to mention their superior customer support.)
I’m really not trying to be a salesman… and I TOTALLY understand the need to spend less on a lesser product simply due to lack of funds. TOTALLY. But I just wanted to say again, Macs are not ridiculously overpriced. You get what you pay for, and we think, with Mac, you get even more than what you pay for.
If you’re at all interested, or even if you think you know that you’re NOT interested… check out this section of Apple’s website. apple.com/getamac. Not only are all the cute/funny ads there, read the 10 reasons (and more) “Why You’ll Love a Mac.” Great list. Explained well.
Everyone gets to choose and use what they’d like, but we, the Campbells, can’t say enough how great Macs are, and how much you’ll love ’em if you try ’em.
(This blog post brought to you by an Apple fan and user for over 13 years now. No money was received for this endorsement.) 🙂
