Ten Questions for Apple

Okay. Cult of Mac has nothing on old Rip. They asked 10 Questions Apple Must Answer in 2007.

I have 10 questions I'd like answered in 2007, too. In no particular order:

10. Can Steve Jobs beat Steve Ballmer at arm wrestling? Chess?

How about Battleship? Pinochle? Mumbledy-peg?

9. Will .mac ever feature a MMORPG server?

C'mon. The Windoze guys get Eve Online. Us slobbering Apple fanboys need something to talk about at work to prove that we don't have a life either.

8. Has the switch to Intel pissed Michael Dell off enough to make it worth it?

I'd just like to know for my own amusement.

7. Now that Mac sales are kicking ass, are you starting to think about really going after the Enterprise market?

If not, how about going out and finding all the old good games for Mac and updating them to OS X. You know, Crystal Quest, Dark Castle, Strategic Conquest, Arkanoids, all the old arcade game ports. There has to be a way to make a buck there. Those were great games.

Just a quick follow up question: Is the increase in Mac sales helping make the switch to Intel worth it in terms of Michael Dell being pissed off?

6. Now that Apple has the new campus in Cupertino, how about making Spotlight open in a regular window when you push ⌘-F?

That would be cool.

5. If I got kicked out of the house, how big of a tent would I need to set up a Dual-Quad Mac Pro?

I'm hoping that by combining a windmill, some photovoltaics, and a golf-cart battery, I can still pull all-nighters surfing the Mac blogs. It'll have a 30" Cinema Display.

4. Why doesn't Crazy Apple Rumors have a link on Apple.com?

There are dozens of really good, fun Apple-supporting blogs. Why doesn't Apple formally (or at least informally) recognize all this support in some way? It's good advertising. Why not embrace it?

3. What more can Apple do to send me a free 80 Gb iPod?

I'm willing to be as obsequious as necessary. It would also be nice if it came preloaded with the entire Beatles and Led Zeppelin catalogues. I already have most of it ripped from CDs, but still, it would be nice if I didn't have to spend all that time figuring out which ones I'm missing.

2. Why can't you look up Google on Apple?

It only seems fair.

1. How much time does Steve Jobs spend laughing out loud about all the Apple phone speculation?

I'd love to be there watching him read all this crap and laugh his ass off.

Gambling Fever

Here's a partial repost from 12/27. Way back when Apple was on its deathbed (again):

I'm willing to bet Rich Karlgaard (whose column in Forbes, 1/8/07 says "sell Apple") a fifth of single malt scotch and a box of cigars that Apple breaks $120 in 2007. ($60 after the split, that is.) Better than that, I'm not selling my stock, which – if I'm wrong – will cost me a hell of a lot more than a jug of hooch and a box of stogies.

I don't actually think it will top at $120, but I don't want to wait until it hits $140 in September for a celebration at someone else's expense.

2007 A Preview

Here are some things that will happen in 2007 related to Apple, the Macintosh, the iPod, Steve Jobs, California in general, possibly an accounts receivable clerk in North Dakota, and the stupid sonofabitch who cut me off pulling into the left turn lane this morning.

1. People will continue to buy stuff. Some of the stuff they buy will be Apple-branded, some of it won't. There's stuff that Apple just doesn't sell that people have to buy – denture adhesives, 3-way light bulbs, tabbed notebook dividers, safflower oil mayonnaise. That will probably continue. On January 1, 2007, a lot of people who don't drink the rest of the year will spend the morning puking, moaning, and swearing they'll never drink again. A good number of them will be in jail, wearing clothes they don't recognize.

2. Somebody will win the Superbowl in a few weeks. That will seem really important for a couple of weeks. The day after the game, when people are cleaning up after all those Superbowl parties, the NFL champion will seem less important than the guacamole dip ground into the carpet and the wine stain that looks like The Fat Elvis on the living room wall.

3. After a few months – some time in March, probably – the weather will warm up noticeably. You know, to where you can go outside without a jacket. Many of us can finish raking leaves about then.

4. Pizza delivery will continue uninterrupted in most places, most of the time.

5. Baseball season will start. Basketball season will end. Someone will win the NBA Championship. I won't care. About this time the garage will have to be cleaned out. The lawn mower is under there somewhere.

6. No matter how the local baseball team is doing, "It's early in the season," until after the All Star Break. After that they just suck.

7. Apple will still be in business. This will continue throughout the year despite the predictions of woe and dirges being sung by idiots everywhere. That means there will be people buying iPods and Macs and downloading Elmo and Patsy's Greatest Hits from iTS.

8. All the other computer companies will also probably stay in business. Probably Microsoft, too. A lot of people's cars won't start because they forgot to turn off the headlights. Mostly, they'll be the people who don't have jumper cables.

9. Around October it will start to get cold again. Your team probably won't go the the World Series. Mine either.

10. Some people will do their Christmas shopping early. Some won't. Some will do all their shopping online, in their underwear. You really shouldn't visualize your parents, aunts and uncles sitting in front of computers in their underwear. You could be scarred for life. Then we'll start all over again.

Should auld aquaintance be forgot.......

No News Today

After thoroughly researching the internet (actually I went to Google news and spent about 30 seconds), I was unable to find a single Apple-stock-option, Macintosh or iPod tragedy to make fun of.

With that out of the way I am free to do whatever I want.

Cupertino --

Sources near the end of the bar where the story was first told report that Steve Jobs came out of the closet this morning.

He asked, "Are there any stains on this shirt?"

It was clear that he was quite prepared to go back into the closet for a different shirt should that shirt prove unwearable. That is the kind of leadership that makes Apple the company it is. As it turned out, there were no visible stains and there was no need to get a different shirt.

Unrelated item:

A recent Rip Ragged (unscientific) poll suggests that a lot of people would really rather not be bothered with polls. Especially polls by people who are obviously selling something while I'm trying to eat a slab of lukewarm meatloaf smothered in bottled brown gravy before it reaches room temperature. The consensus is that there has to be a way to backtrack those assholes so I can go to their houses in the middle of dinner and offer to "shampoo your carpet for free just for allowing me to demonstrate the superiority of a Kirby vacuum cleaner." Then just keep ringing the doorbell and getting the door slammed in my face until they have to call the cops to drag my Vitalis-and Old-Spice-reeking, plaid-polyester-suited smarmy ass off the front porch still yelling "It will only take 15 minutes. You'll be amazed."

The margin of error of this poll is too big to be bothered with.

Most of the sources used herein are unreliable, frequently drunk, and more fun to have around than the other kind – except when they don't have enough money to buy their own beer, which is most of the time.

The Stock Market is Weird

Weird.

I spent the whole day reading news about Apple. Well, not really the whole day. I did some other stuff, too. After all, I have to have a day job. Anyway, at the end of the day, there are three things you need to know that you might not have known at this time yesterday.

1. The Federal Government is investigating Apple about the stock options thing.

2. Steve Jobs hired a lawyer.

3. Apple closed up $0.01

Really. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of web pages blathering over meaningless details related to three basic facts. After disposing of all the chatter:

1. No shit.

2. Uh huh.

3. So what?

The internet sure has generated a pile of useless verbiage. If this blog isn't a case in point, I'll eat my mousepad. Be that neither here nor there, to abuse a cliché. Apple stock is going to continue up because that's what Steve does.

I'm willing to bet Rich Karlgaard (whose column in Forbes, 1/8/07 says "sell Apple") a fifth of single malt scotch and a box of cigars that Apple breaks $120 in 2007. ($60 after the split, that is.) Better than that, I'm not selling my stock, which – if I'm wrong – will cost me a hell of a lot more than a jug of hooch and a box of stogies.

Note (just in case Mr. Karlgaard gets ahold of this and wants to bet): Laphroiag. Henry Clay Brevas a la Conservas.

Vista may be vulnerable

This news just received from The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs. C|Net is reporting that there may be security flaws in Vista.

Microsoft employees who are allowed to talk to the media seemed upset. These officials announced that they are "monitoring the situation closely."

Also surprised by the news, Cyrus Thompson, a soy farmer from Normal, Illinois, said, "They should bench Grossman and put Griese in."

In other news:

The sun came up in the East, this morning.

Approximately 20% of the Earth's atmosphere is oxygen.

Seventeen is a prime number.

This Just In

Well, I wasn't going to post anything today, but I had to.

The big news is in. Apple Phone gets 70,900,000 results on Google. iPod Phone gets 56,200,000. That is over 127 million pages of the internet devoted, at least in part, to Apple's "soon to be announced" device.

Compare this to a combined total of 17 million hits for Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy, and 1,680,000 hits for Kansas Liberal.

Personally, I think they're going to introduce an in-bra device for women that senses when they see an attractive man. When triggered it will announce, "Thirty-eight. Dee," in a soft, yet firm tone.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas.

I'm not going to update this over the weekend unless Apple introduces a new product between now and Christmas.

I have it on good authority that Steve Jobs himself may introduce sauce, cider, and pie with the familiar Apple logo over the weekend. Also, he may introduce the ultimate management tool, the iDon'tgiveashit.

I'll be there if that happens.

If you're crawling to the eggnog, you've had enough.

Noel.

Apple Telephone Prediction Hotline

RR: Dumbass question hotline, how may I help you.
Caller: What is Apple going to call their Phone?
RR: What phone?
Caller: The one they're going to introduce.
RR: When?
Caller: At MacWorld in January.
RR: Really? Sez who?
Caller: Everybody.
RR: Everybody but Apple.
Caller: Suppose they do introduce a phone at MacWorld. What are they going to call it?
RR: They aren't.
Caller: What do mean by that?
RR: Nobody calls their phone. You use your phone to call someone else's phone.
Caller: I mean, what are they going to name their phone?
RR: I don't know. Fred? Muffy? What did you name your phone? I've never named mine.
Caller: Now that they can't use the name "iPhone," what will they call it?
RR: If it was me, I'd call it 3SS.
Caller: Why?
RR: Because I figure on three stock splits after Apple joins the wireless phone market. If they ever do.
Caller: They've patented stuff that looks an awful lot like it could be a cell phone.
RR: Yes they have. The same stuff looks a lot like a garage door opener remote control, a WiFi networked hand-held game device, or a Walkie-Talkie. For that matter it could be a remote controlled LED security light.
Caller: Everybody knows they're going to introduce a phone. Don't you read the papers?
RR: Yes. But I haven't seen a prediction in "Pearls Before Swine" yet, so I know it isn't real.
Caller: - - - -
RR: Not to be redundant, but are you an idiot or a tech journalist?
>click<

What does LMH stand for?

I'm looking for suggestions. Currently, I'm using Little Maggot Hacker while waiting for a better alternative.

Entries will be judged for originality, brevity, spelling, punctuation, and several other arbitrary parameters.

The winner will receive an authentic, original email from my .mac email address, and an all expense paid trip to anywhere in the United States within walking distance of your home. You'll be free to spend as much of your own money as you want to for six nights and two days.

A winner will be selected at some randomly selected point in the future.

Unlesss I forget.

That happens.

Month of Bugs

The month of January has been declared the Month of Apple Bugs by security researcher Kevin Finisterre and Madonna-wannabe LMH.

LMH won't give any other identification, which allows people with good imaginations and too much free time to speculate what LMH might stand for.

Little Maggot Hacker is my default, until I read one I like better.

Anyway, LMH is behind an effort to produce a previously undocumented Apple bug a day through the Month of January. Kevin and LMH have opined that tweaking all those smug Mac users will somehow improve Mac security in the long haul. Good thinking. Kind of like putting two-by-fours with nails through them in your driveway to improve your tires.

Mac users have demonstrated that they are idiots by buying a system that works more reliably and has less malware written for it. Further, after buying a system that works more reliably and has less malware written for it, they have the unmitigated gall and poor sportsmanship to announce that they have a system that works more reliably and has less malware written for it. Then they go so far as to suggest to others that they buy a system that works more reliably and has less malware written for it. Bastards.

I predict – based on a proprietary formula involving cosines, vincula, natural logarithms, and the volume of an average bathtub in milliliters – that for every Apple bug Kevin and LMH document, ten undocumented pieces of malware will be released into the wild for XP and Vista.

I further predict that LMH will be really distracted in January if both of his friends and Kevin start calling him Little Maggot Hacker.

Oh, that iPhone.

Yesterday Linksys, a part of Cisco, introduced Apple's phone. The iPhone does not live up to the hype surrounding the mythical phone Apple is supposed to announce. For example – unlike Apple's rumored yet unconfirmed feature set for their as yet unannounced and so far unacknowledged communication device – the iPhone will not:

Mow the lawn on alternate Saturdays
Cook spaghetti al dente
Babysit the kids
Call in sick with a believable excuse
Split cord wood properly
Remove plantar warts
Feed the cat
Make your clothes smell springtime fresh.

It will make telephone calls with VoIP. If you want it to, it will also make a regular "land-line" phone call.

Whoa.

What iPhone?

More has been written about Apple's iphone than probably any non-existent product in history.

As of Saturday, December 16, 2006, there is no such thing as an Apple-branded telephone. Or, if there is, nobody outside of Apple has seen it. However, it is festooned with imaginary features:

It's a PDA
It's a Cell Phone
It's a double boiler
It's an iPod
It makes espresso
It has it's own network
It has a GPS system built in
It has a built in corkscrew and paté knife.
It runs OS X

I can hardly wait.

Death of Microsoft

Here's a prediction.

Apple is killing Microsoft by tricking them into all kinds of different markets. It's working. The rumored iPhone will make piles of money for Apple while the press disses it. Microsoft will waste untold millions in development, then introduce another useless-feature-laden brick.

All the while their efforts to get a decent version of Windows – that doesn't work like Tiger on quaaludes – into stores will be moved down the priority list, hence underfunded.

You read it here first. Unless, like everyone else, you don't read this blog. In that case never mind.

Zune Question

Here's a Zune question ---

The whole world was screaming because Apple's AAC DRM won't play on other mp3 players, right? "Oh Apple's not playing fair. They have to let us all play stuff from iTunes on everything or they're violating all kinds of rules we're making right now."

Now Microsoft introduces a player that won't even play all of their own music. They just fucked every anti-Apple ally they had in the whole world to introduce a third-rate piece of shit mp3 player that already failed in the market once.

Where the hell is the outcry?

Is everyone afraid to offend the mighty Microsoft behemoth?

Nobody reads this blog anyway, so....

Dear Mr. Ballmer,

Your bloated top-heavy bureaucracy does not possess the ability to create a product that can compete successfully in a free marketplace. Zune and Vista are far better Apple marketing tools than Justin Long could ever hope to be.

xoxox

Rip

iPhone & Related Stories

Apple today did not announce the existence of the iPhone. Also Microsoft expects to sell one million Zunes by June of 2007, which is roughly the number of used iPods that will change hands on eBay this week, based on a formula using made up numbers and the square of e.

Apple stock dropped more than 3% today as a result of absolutely no news anywhere that is even remotely related to the company, its products, or employees' relatives.

John Dvorak and George Ou will soon release statements predicting the death of Apple -- again.

The Atomic Number of Uranium is 92.

Apocalypto Preview

Hollywood --

Apocalypto is Disney's most violent movie ever, but insiders say it shouldn't come as a shock. It is time, they say, for Disney to update its image beyond animated musicals. Bob Iger probably said, "Hey, it's 2006. We have to produce movies that have more than just simple object lessons and sappy lyrics."

Viewers were most disturbed by the image of Simba eating Bambi's entrails after a gory battle involving the seven dwarves.

"Did Dopey really deserve to die?" One viewer asked through tears.

At the opening, seafood appetizers were served under the title "Nemo and Ariel's Sushi Bar"

The iPhone

Amazingly, after 11172 days in business, Apple Computer has not only failed to introduce a wireless phone, they have failed to confirm that they are even developing one.

The company has recently applied for patents on things that are roughly the size and shape of something that could be a wireless phone, and possibly made out of materials that might be compatible with sending and receiving radio signals. Apple's strategy of being rumored to be developing something that might be a wireless phone seems to be paying off, as their stock price has reached all time highs.

One person close to the company who would identify himself only as "Al" said, "We do not comment on incidents and accidents, hints and allegations, Betty."

Over the company's existence it has also failed to announce the development of a tablet PC, a scientific calculator, a food processor, a wood stove, a lawn mower, and a line of interior latex paints. This has encouraged analysts to continue to recommend buying more of the stock, because, well, who the hell knows what they'll announce at MacWorld in January? Also, you have to be impressed with the preemptive first strike they scored with their Zune-killer.

Vista Released

Vista was released by Microsoft today in New York. The stench annoyed citizens as far away as Jersey City.

"Who farted?" One resident commented.

"A cross between baby-shit and hangover breath is what I'd call it," another resident, two barstools down from the first, offered.

Microsoft chose New York because it is the furthest city away from Redmond that would allow the release. An anonymous source within the company said, "We'd have been run out of Seattle. All those displaced California liberals would have had kittens if we'd have stunk up the place. The first choice was Miami, but the locals didn't want to upset the old snowbirds from Minnesota."

In its own defense, Vista said, "Hey. I didn't give a damn where they released me. I just wanted the hell out of Redmond. Five years of that crap, and do you think I got any better? Huh? Well? They dressed me all up like somebody else's OS, then gave me more useless and disabled features than a truckload of rusty Leathermen (R). I need a shower and some clean drawers."