mac [dot] honan [dot] net

• "We hear you loud and clear" responded Steve Jobs when pressed about Apple's plans for making *THE ULTIMATE MEDIA CENTER*, Thursday at their annual shareholder meeting in Cupertino. Steve plays this event by the book, eventually going on to talk up the product pipeline at Apple as "the best I've ever seen in my life". Rrreally? Macworld has details.
  



• Primetime: Apple takes to the airwaves next week for a May sweeps assault. Jobs refused to comment on details of the coming television campaign, but assured nervous shareholders that it would be condescending, filmed entirely in a white room, and feature only smug looking people dressed in space suits.



• Observed: DLO's HomeDock Deluxe. Finished watching Apple ads? Browse and control your iPod from the comfort of your large buttocks.



• In the category of things I've been wanting to need, The Apple Blog tackles syncing your PSP with your Mac.

Hello Mac geeks. Apologies, but, I'm skipping out today and won't be updating tomorrow. Unless I can convince a friend to do so for me. Hint-hint. Who's my buddy?

• Wild-ass rumor watch: Apple to kick Aperture to the curb
  
• BADASS: Apple patents in-screen camera. Your display is the camera.
  
• The Jobsfather makes an offer Sony cannot refuse: Blu-Ray discs to include iPod formatted-movies, says CNN.

Hopefully, today will not remain such a slow news day, and we'll have a bit more to keep us entertained throughout the day.

• Piper Jaffray predicts iPod sales to hit 85m in 2006
  
• Write a plug-in for Endo. If you haven't used Endo, it's a great app. Highly recommended
  
• How Apple found room in Cupertino.
  
• Recycling: Not Apple's Core Value. Get it? Do you? Get it, get it? You know, Core, as in the center part of an apple left over after you much all the good part? And it also means the most important part, or the essence of something. So, it's, like, a pun. A very, very, clever, never before used pun! Oh, wit!

Every day, in every way, this blog gets better and better. Or, sucks a little harder. Either way, here's your news of the day.

• iTunes might soon come with ads. I have a hard time believeing these would be found outside of the store itself. I think the reports are wrong. But then again, I'm always right.
  
• Apple Expo is coming to Paris again on September 12 - 16. We'll see how Le DRM is played out by then.
  
• MecNealy steps aside as Sun CEO. Too bad. He was a funny guy

After a multitude of iPod strike-outs, the rumor sites right as rain this time Macworld: as Apple used NAB to roll out a 17-inch MacBook Pro:

Apple on Monday introduced the 17-inch version of its Intel-powered MacBook Pro. The new laptop computer will start shipping next week for $2,799.

The 17-inch MacBook Pro features a 2.16GHz Intel Core Duo processor. It has a 667MHz front side bus (FSB) and 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM expandable to 2GB.

The new large screen-equipped MacBook Pro makes its debut during this week’s National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) trade show in Las Vegas, Nevada. David Moody, Apple’s vice president of worldwide Mac product marketing, told Macworld that the 17-inch laptop is a good fit for the pro video market.

Like the 15-inch MacBook Pro, the 17-inch model features a built-in iSight video camera and Apple’s vaunted MagSafe Power Adapter, which disconnects from the notebook when there is strain on the power cord. It also includes Apple’s Sudden Motion Sensor, which protects the hard drive in case the laptop is dropped.

The 17-inch MacBook Pro features a display that’s 36 percent brighter than before — 300 cd/m2 brightness, according to Apple. It uses ATI’s Mobility Radeon X1600 graphics chip with 256MB of dedicated GDDR3 graphics memory. The laptop also includes an illuminated keyboard with ambient light sensor.

Follow the above link for much more spec-porn.

Dear reader, I need your help. I love my Last.fm/audioscrobbler account. But I have a dillema that keeps it from reflecting my true taste in music. You see, I prefer to listen to my music over speakers, and thusly, via my Mac Mini. It's where all of my new music lives. The problem is, it's also where all of THE WIFE's music lives, and THE WIFE, well, THE WIFE has a few songs in her playlists that are the suck.

I mean, it's not that they're the suck. Not really. It's just that I'm not into all that meditative ambient stuff. THE WIFE's top-played track? His Royal Soul Has Flown Away from World Flutes. And since sometimes she'll hit the meditation playlist for hours on end, my audioscrobbler page would look like a New Age bookstore if I uploaded it from the Mini. I have a reputation to uphold, you know? Punk as fuck. Or at least folk as pluck, but you get my drift. I'm not on the Breath of Fire bandwagon.

So what to do? I wish there was a way to exclude certain playlists or genres from Audioscrobbler. Is there? Let me know.

In the meantime, I've been working on an iTunes toolbox story for a few weeks, and I thought I'd do a big ass link dump. So, in case you don't know, which you probably do, here are a few delightful diversions to enhance iTunes:

• Coverflow - Browse iTunes by album art.
  
• iTunes signature maker - this thing doesn't offer a lot of actual utility, but it sure is cool. I guess it's sort of like me in that respect.
  
• Hymn - De-DRM your iTunes Music Store files
  
• iTunes Catalog - I love this app. It creates a cool web-based catalog of your iTunes library that apes the music store look and feel
  
• Stop iTunes from updating your iPod. Useful.

I covered Apple v. Does for Macworld this morning, and it was a remarkably contentious event. It was a fascinating case, touching on what it means to be a journalist, what kind of protections journalist are afforded under law, and the nature of trade secrets. My gut feeling is that Apple is going to lose this round and the appeals court is going to reverse the decision of the trial court. I say that because two of the three judges seemed, well, openly hostile to Apple's position.

My other story is on Apple's conference cal yesterday. While it lacks the drama of a courtroom brawl, it's still a pretty interesting snapshot of a company in the midst of a major transition.

Apple's going to announce 2nd quarter results today in an analyst conference call, and yours truly will be covering that for MacCentral. So until the big news comes out later today, hopefully these tidbits will tide you over

• ExperCom is selling MacBook Pros preloaded with XP for just $2029. [via The C.O.M.]
  
• H20 Audio is selling its waterproof headphones sans case. Very cool.
  
• Macworld UK has More iTunes phone hooey and flim flam for you to finagle
  
• Drunken Irish Mac users angered by bank error. Actually, I just made that drunk part up becuase. Well. You know.
  
• Daring Fireball has two new shirts. I love the ring-neck one.
  
• Apple outlines "Leopard" sessions at WWDC
  
• Market researchers are noting that while demand for Macs is strong, the same can't be said of iPods. Maybe because everybody's already got one.Add a phone and watch it grow.

• Want a MacBook Pro, cheap? Refurbished models have already hit the Apple Store
  
• Cool how-to on creating custome CSS signatures in Apple's Mail.app
  
• Apple is atop BusinessWeek's list of The World's Most Innovative Companies. BusinessWeek always loves Apple.
  
• The Street notices what I've been saying and agrees: nobody's making any money from digital downloads
  
• The WP has a story on all those Apple products you see on TeeVee
  
• Macworld takes a first look at Roxio's Popcorn 2
  
• Skype Mobile is now MAc OS X friendly. Considering Jobs and Woz started off as phone phreakers; it's about phreaking time.
  
• Quake 4: it's universal

I've met and interviewed Woz before. He's a hell of a nice guy. Almost childlike. And that's why reading this interview with him in the Seattle Times made me incredibly sad. Now, I've never met or had anything to do with the yin to Woz' yang. The other Steve. You know. But I've oft-gotten the impression that he could be, oh, I don't know, a bit of an ass?

Q. What can we expect from the book [you have coming out soon]?

A. You can expect stories about what really happened, how things were really done, key elements of it. I was a little disappointed — Steve Jobs had indicated he'd write a forward. But he'd never written a forward before and I said, 'Just write what we were like back then.'

We sent him the book and he said, 'Oh, I saw some excerpts, and I'm going to decline writing the forward.' I don't know why because I'm nice to him, so there must have been something he didn't like.

Q. Are you still close friends?

A. Not close friends. Even when Apple really got started we weren't close friends because he had a different motivation in the company, which was to run a company, and mine was just to be a top engineer that did clever, clever projects. So we almost never saw each other in the company."

[via macobserver

Today is tax day for me, because I procrastinate. It's not that I hate paying taxes, I just can't stand preparing them. Oh, please, won't you come be my free accountant?

• Great news, The Sims 2 goes Universal. Now you can not have a life much faster.
  
• DLO is shipping its HomeDock Deluxe. I have the predecessor to this, the HomeDock. It's badass, but the HomeDock Deluxe blows it out of the water.
  
• Apple updated Aperture and dropped the price. Now your pictures won't suck so much anymore.

• MP3.com has an interesting look at the iPod over time. [via largeheartedboy]
  
• Mark Gilbert of Blooomberg News thinks Apple should sell porn on the ITMS. Now I think I know more about Mr. Gilbert than I wanted to.
  
• Business 2.0 repeats the rumor that the new MacBooks will come in multiple colors I want a red one. Or magenta. Possibly muave.
  
• BMW announced a new iPod interface for its vehicles.
  
• So here's why they sued: The Beatles are finally putting their music online

I have a new story up on Playlist today. It's an interview with Doug Bresler of Doogtoons.:

Doogtoons is Bresler’s brilliantly idiosyncratic cartoon following the lives of two of his friends Nick and Haig. It’s one of a growing number of short animated podcasts to be found on the iTunes Music Store. The show is largely a collection of recordings of Bresler’s friends. Ribald, offbeat, and sometimes poignant, it’s the type of series that doesn’t lend itself to easy descriptions and would probably have been a hard sell had Bresler gone through traditional channels. Yet following the show’s success on iTunes, Bresler has inked a deal with G4 TV, where Doogtoons will begin airing in about a month, though it will continue to be podcast. We spoke with Bresler last week during his lunch break and, over the sounds of Los Angeles-area traffic, he told us the secret of Doogtoons success.

Michael Gartenberg points out something I never would have thought of about running Windows on a MacBook:

The MacBook delete key is actually what Windows thinks is a backspace key. There is no delete key on a Macbook and that means, there's no way to do alt-control-delete.

Don't fret. He has a fix.

I nearly choked on my damn bourbon this morning when I read the following sign of the apolcalypse in today's Times:

Fisher-Price will launch the “iTod”, its first MP3 player aimed at infants, this summer. The device comes with tiny volume-restricted headphones, while an iTunes-style online store will sell parentally approved songs for the player.

The Bratz dolls led the digital advance with a £40 MP3 player for six-year-olds, but younger children are now the target.

Fisher-Price, a subsidiary of Mattel, the top-selling toymaker, has been developing the Digital Song & Story Player, for children aged three and upwards.

The £45 device will come loaded with six songs and two spoken-word stories. Toddlers unable to read will rely on icons to symbolise each song, such as a star for Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.

I fluctuated from outraged to incensed to angry as I read about the iTod. (And is Apple really going to let them call it iTod? Well, it does reinforce the brand at an early age.) And then I tried to rememebr when I first began to be platy music on my own, and could not. I do remember playing Iranian bootlegs of Beatles tapes on a small, red Panasonic tape player on the floor of my room. But I must have been six years-old at this point. And it wasn't mine. And I'm sure it didn't cost $78.50. I digress.

My main point is that infants and small children should only be given scorn and derision as gifts. Not consumer electronics.

Oh, Tuesday. You are so cruel with your whole second day of the working week thing. If only there were new products from Apple to cheer me up. What? There are? Oh, joy, let's go The Apple Store; I'll call us a taxi! It's what? Remote Desktop 3? Oh. Um. Nevermind. Let's just stay here and watch the rain instead.

• Apple rolled out Remote Desktop 3 today. It adds all sorts of features: 30 Automator actions. Spotlight searches across multiple systems. Lots more. Go check it out you networking geek.
  
• Rob Griffiths, Cyrus Farivar, Peter Cohen, and Jason Snell sat down for a roundtable iChat about Boot Camp and posted the results online. A lot of interesting stuff pops up, and I also have it on good authority that Peter was naked. Or at least wearing Daisey Dukes.
  
• Coinstar is now offering iTunes and other etailer credits in lieu of cash. This sounds incredibly dumb.
  
• Today's Fireball: long, grumpy, and correct.
  
• iAlertU, the awesomest awesome car alarm-style alarm for your Mac, is now out in beta. Go annoy your office mates.
  
• iTunes in airplanes. Good idea.

Happy Monday, how was your weekend? Mine was fantastic, I spent it drinking hairspray and shooting pistols down at the pier, training for Boot Camp. Although maybe I have the wrong idea about that. Either way. Pull!

• What happens when a multi-billion dollar company decides you need to STFU? Read about it in Apple vs. Me (No, not Me, me, but me as in not me. Him. That motherscratcher.)
  
• Adidas hired porn-star Jenna Jameson to star in the first of a series of new podcasts that have titles like "white" and "green." These are really cool, but didn't Krzysztof Kieslowski already have this covered?
  
• WOZ: The Book, due out this Fall I'm hoping it'll be called "Woz on Woz."
  
• AppleInsider says the iBook is dead. Finito. Done. AppleInsider is often wrong. But this seems reasonable.

Apple took the wraps off of its Fifth Avenue store in Manhattan. It looks, well, like a big cube. A big black and glass cube. I can understand all the fuss.

Hello Blogger users. My name is Mat and this is my web site. Well. One of them, at least. I cover Mac and iPod-related flim-flammery, and occasionally I post videos of myself weeping while driving. In addition to the quick hits you see below, I sometimes post longer form entries as well. These are a few of my favorites:

• Digital Sales - the Scooby-Doo Band-Aid covering your gaping wound
  
• Sprint Ambassador, meet your Mac Citizenry.
  
• Bluetooth: Innocent Danish-themed technology that might be coming to the iPod, or radio frequency of evil out to destroy America?

Please, come back and visit again soon! Next time, I'll make some spinach dip and we can discuss our feelings. Oh! And if you like what you see, you can subscribe to my feed here

Daring Fireball has a great post on Boot Camp:

Boot Camp is not about world domination or a direct frontal assault on Microsoft’s Windows monopoly. No matter how cool Boot Camp is, it’s not even going to make sense to most people out there, let alone actually get them to buy a Mac. You try explaining "boot loaders" to your mom.

But Boot Camp is inordinately appealing to the higher end of the market, the enthusiasts. Your typical civilian (i.e. non-enthusiast) has no need — or at least sees no need — for dual booting. They use email, they use a web browser, they want something useful to happen when they plug a digital camera into their USB port. Whichever OS comes on their computer is good enough for this.

But there are all sorts of uses for Boot Camp for nerds. Any sort of Windows-only software, for example, is no longer an excuse not to buy a Mac. Like, say, games. And for many of these people (i.e. the enthusiast/nerd/"into computers" market) using Boot Camp is free because they already have Windows XP installation discs sitting around.

I would add to this that Boot Camp now also make Macs much more appealing to households with different types of users. Though it will take time for word to spread, as households with both simple users who want something that "just works," and office drones who want a system that talks pretty with their corporate IT environment get wise to Intel Macs, you're going to see widespread adoption.

You know how awesomely effective car alarms are? How every time one goes off, you grab your Glock or call the cops and run to the window to thwart a felony in progress? Imagine that same degree of awesome crime-fightingness brought right into your own office, every day. Sounds awesome, doesn't it? Well, you don't have to imagine anymore, because iAlertU has made your dream a reality!

All snarkiness aside, it's a decidedly cool concept. An alarm for your MacBook Pro that relies on its motion sensor. Check out the YouTube video here
[via DVK3]

Peter Cohen, the Mac gaming guru, takes a look at using Boot Camp to set up your Mac to play PC-only games.

So while Windows could be installed using the hackers’ method [to install Windows on an Intel Mac], it wasn’t something that anyone could do easily. It was a lot of work to manage. And it didn't provide fast enough performance for gaming.

All three of those roadblocks disappeared with Boot Camp. Installing the software is as easy as falling off a log; the performance is great; and what’s more, it’s non-destructive: You don’t have to reformat your hard disk to make it work.

I’ve been playing with Windows XP SP2 on a 20-inch Intel-based iMac. And it really works quite remarkably. I’ve thrown a bunch of game demos and full games at it, and I haven’t found one yet that doesn’t work.

BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP BOOT CAMP! Is there anything else happening in the world today? If so, I refuse to make myself aware of it. Your quick hits:

• Analysts say:Dual-boot strategy a bold move for Apple.
• Mossberg says: "All in all, Boot Camp works really well. Whether you want to run Mac or Windows programs, an Apple computer may be the only computer you'll need." Oh, Walt. You slay me.
  
• Guess what else you can slap on that Mac with Boot Camp? Linux. Oh, triple-booting grooviness. You excite me so that now I must eat some tape.

TUAW has a great post today titled "The Real Reason Behind Apple's Boot Camp". It argues that Boot Camp is going to help Apple pick up share in the education market.

Imagine a school budget that simply replaces all the computers campus-wide with new Intel Macs that can run anything we throw at them. Need to run Windows? Image the iMac with the WinXP image. Need to run Mac OS X? Image the iMac with the Tiger (or Leopard) image.

It's a quick and great read. Be sure to check it out.

My good friend and oft-tipster David Kerns just posted some images of his MacBook Pro booting Windows XP via BootCamp to his flickr account.

Seeing that XP startup screen on a Mac is absolutely surreal. As for this... words just can't describe. Apple just ate everybody's lunch with this one.

Apple introduced Boot Camp today. What is it? In a nutshell: Windows XP on Intel-based Macs. The site notes:

More and more people are buying and loving Macs. To make this choice simply irresistible, Apple will include technology in the next major release of Mac OS X, Leopard, that lets you install and run the Windows XP operating system on your Mac. Called Boot Camp (for now), you can download a public beta today.

My boss man Jim Dalrymple has a story with all the details over at Macworld.

This is, obviously, major news. Whatever arguments there might have been against buying a Mac in the past just vanished. Have your cake; eat it too.
[thanks for the alert DVK3]

Apologies, for my abscence yesterday. Woe unto me. But today I am back! And wetter than ever. Won't somoene please make the rain go away.

• The music never stops. Apple sells Red Hot Chili Peppers concert tickets on iTunes. No socks includded.
  
• They may have gotten there fustest with the mostest concert tickets, but Apple got beat on movies. MovieLink and CinemaNow are both selling downloadable movies, and neither support Macs. Come on, Steve. What have you got for us?
  
• Macworld UK reports that Atakan Cetinsoy, who created the iTunes recommendation features, has left Apple to join another firm. Is it too soon to point out that iTunes rucommendation features suck and hope they get better now? It is? Okay, I won't then.
  
• Forbes is rumor-mongering Intel iBooks will be here in June. My two cents? They'll be here in July, and they won't be called iBooks.
  
• Gruber had a great post yesterday. Please, people, shout it from the hilltops. THE WHOLE REPAIR PERMISSIONS THING IS A MYTH Or, well, not a myth like the Yeti or compassionate conservatism. But you don't need to do it regularly; only when something bad fuxxors your machine all up.

Toodles.