[MyAppleMenu] Sep 8, 2004

Wed Sep 8 13:15:00 EDT 2004

MyAppleMenu Newsletter
Wednesday, September 8, 2004

MyAppleMenu
==================================================
<http://www.myapplemenu.com/index.html>
Mac News for Mac Users

[Top Stories]

*** MyTunes Returns For iTunes Song Sharing
<http://news.com.com/MyTunes+returns+for+iTunes+song+sharing/2100-1027_3-5349272.html?part=rss&tag=5349272&subj=news.1027.20>
by John Borland, CNET News.com
Tools that turn Apple's iTunes software into the core of a song-sharing network are multiplying, with the re-release this week of the previously defunt MyTunes.

[News]

*** Music Industry Warms To Downloads
<http://www.asahi.com/english/business/TKY200409080120.html>
by Asahi Shimbun
A Japanese version of Apple's iTunes has been unable to get started due to opposition from the local recording industry, which deems its copy protection measures to be inadequate and has refused to offer its music catalog.

*** Apple iPod Interactive Award Nominee
<http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/index.cfm?NewsID=9576&Page=1&pagePos=2>
by Macworld UK
Apple's iPod is up for an award, this time fromt he British Interactive Media Association, in association with Revolution magazine.

*** New iPod Ad For UK TV And R.E.M. For Free
<http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/index.cfm?NewsID=9580>
by Jonny Evans, Macworld UK
UK iTunes Music Store users can download a free three-minute preview consisting of snippets of tracks from new R.E.M. album.

*** Apple Releases Security Update 2004-09-07
<http://www.macworld.com/news/2004/09/07/securityupdate/index.php/?lsrc=mcrss-0904>
by Jim Darlymple, MacCentral

*** Newton Nuts Show How It's Done
<http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,64845,00.html?tw=rss.TOP>
by Leander Kahney, Wired News
A committed band of fans has done a better job of looking after the Newton than Apple ever did, believes a leading researcher.

*** Apple Bioinformatics Award Winners
<http://www.apple.com/science/profiles/bioinformatics/>
by Apple
Meet five people whose breakthroughs make the progress of science real.

[Opinion]

*** Why Yahoo And Google Still Don't Get It
<http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/5553>
by Nathan Torkington, O'Reilly Network
How will you get influencers to praise your product if they can't run it?

*** Online Music Buyers May Be Saved By... Microsoft?
<http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/techscience/story/0,4386,271526,00.html>
by Carl Skadian, Straits Times
Microsoft's MSN Music store has been running for a week and it is already available in parts of Europe, Australia, Korea and even Brazil. That's in addition to the United States, of course. I don't know if Singapore is on the list yet but the fact that Microsoft is going to so many places so soon after the launch means it will get here sooner rather than later, right?

*** Pining For Open File Formats
<http://www.macdevcenter.com/pub/wlg/5551>
by James Elliott, O'Reilly Network
I still seethe over all the extra work, and silly hoops I had to jump through, because vendors feel compelled to create proprietary formats for storing information, and make it hard for other people's software to simply read and write the information to achieve whatever goals their users might be pursuing.

*** A New Take On The Mac Tablet
<http://blog.ziffdavis.com/rothenberg/archive/2004/09/06/1985.aspx>
by Matthew Rothenberg, Ziff Davis
Apple's best movve is to leverage its own mad skills with industrial design and multimedia to create some truly innovative new hardware breeds based loosely on the current tablet concept. And that effort, I trust, is already underway.

*** The Goo,d The Bad, And The Ugly? First Impressions Of The G5 iMac
<http://www.cmug.org/articles/iMac_G5.html>
by Robert Velarde, CMUG

*** The iPod's Big Brother
<http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101040913-692893,00.html>
by Chris Taylor, Time
What you get is quite possibly the coolest personal computer yet created.

*** Mac OS X, UNIX, And The "Average" Mac User
<http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=20040907020858796>
by Ted Landau, MacFixIt
For better or wose, I beleive that effective Mac OS X troubleshooting still requires a familiarity with tbe basics of UNIX and Terminal.

[Review]

*** After Effects 6.5
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.aftereffects.html>
by Helmut Kobler, MacAddict
Don't let the .5 designation fool you -- this is a major step forward for After Effects.

*** Call Of Duty
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.cod.html>
by Helmut Kobler, MacAddict
Call of Duty is the best re-creation of WWII we've seen yet. Even if you're not big on the history, this game's easily worth it for the furious action alone.

*** DVD Studio Pro 3
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.dvdsp3.html>
by Helmut Kobler, MacAddict
Even though Studio Pro 3's encoding tools could be sharper, there's no denying it makes the rest of the authoring experience a pure joy.

*** InEffects 1.0
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.ineffects.html>
by John Cruise, MacAddict
Though InEffects is definitely a must-have add-on for serious graphic designers, it's not exactly loaded with features for the price. However, if you currently use Photoshop to create lots of effects that you cold otherwise create with InEffects, it will pay you back in time saved.

*** Mariner Write 3.6.1
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.mariner.html>
by Niko Coucouvanis, MacAddict
Mariner Write is a fine alternative for home use or other situations where you need a capable word processor more than seamless compatibility with Word. But in a corporate setting, you'll likely want a word procssor with better Word compatibility.

*** Shrek 2
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.shrek2.html>
by Niko Coucouvanis, MacAddict
If you're not a Shrek-head, don't bother -- the game is short enough that by the time you warm up to the characters, it's over.

*** SightLight
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.s_light.html>
by Rik Myslewski, MacAddict
When turned on, the SightLight is an annoying presence, shining directly in your eyes. The light it casts gives your face a dim blue pallor, especially when supplemented by room lighting -- not flattering.

*** Smart Styles CS
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.sscs.html>
by John Cruise, MacAddict
It's easy to use, versatile, and saves time. If you work on highly formatted publications, such as newletters, magazines, and newspapers, make Smart Styles your new assistant.

*** Space Colony
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.spacecolony.html>
by Cathy Lu, MacAddict
Space Colony is definitely a decent way to pass time. It's fun and the universe is engaging while you're in it -- but once you come back to Earth, you won't necessarily feel compelled to go back to revisit the colony.

*** USB Server
<http://www.macaddict.com/issues/0409/rev.usbs.html>
by Tom Lassiter, MacAddict
Not everyone needs this type of widget, but it's a solid tool for centralizing a small workgroup's USB devices.

*** Homeworld 2
<http://www.applelinks.com/pm/more.php?id=2204_0_1_0_M>
by Kirk Hiner, Applelinks
If you're a fan of space battles or real-time strategy games in general, Homeworld 2 will be your world, your life.

*** Browsers That Aren't Browsers
<http://www.macdevcenter.com/pub/a/mac/2004/09/07/browsers.html>
by Giles Turnbull, O'Reilly Network
Thanks to the WebKit technology built into Mac OS X Panther, it's become much easier for software developers to create applications that are web-savvy. In this article, we thought we'd take a look at a few of them.

*** Help For Help Viewer
<http://www.macworld.com/weblogs/mac911/2004/09/helpviewer/index.php>
by Christopher Breen, Macworld
For reasons best known to Apple, Help Viewer tendes to be mor eprone to problems than other applications. Fortunately, there are a limited number of things that can cause such problems.

[Sidetrack]

*** Creative Performa MP3 Players 
<http://www.myapplemenu.com/2004/09/08/#20040908bg000002>
by Heng-Cheong Leong
Creative seems to be taking some hints from Apple's previous playbook: flood the market with many models<http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/techscience/story/0,4386,271524,00.html> of MP3 players and hope that some of these models stick. :-)

But seriously, Creative does have an advantage over Apple here in Asia: there's no iTunes Music Store. Now that Apple has showed the world how to run an online music business, the first-mover advantage in the rest of the world<http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/techscience/story/0,4386,271524,00.html> is ever more important. If Apple don't move fast, the Asia online music market will be dominated by Microsoft.

*** Technical Notes For Dummies 
<http://www.myapplemenu.com/2004/09/08/#20040908bg000001>
by Heng-Cheong Leong
Jason Levine<http://q.queso.com/archives/001483>: "How to Pick Up and Carry Your iMac G5" might be dumbest technical note I've ever seen published by a computer manufacturer.

The Tomorrow Weblog
==================================================
<http://www.myapplemenu.com/tomorrow/index.html>
Emerging Technology. Innovative Applications. New Economy.

[Top Stories]

*** Learning From Accidents And A Terrorist Attack
<http://www.bricklin.com/learningfromaccidents.htm>
by Dan Bricklin
There are principles that may be gleaned by looking at Normal Accident Theory and the 9/11 Commission Report that are helpful for software development.

[News]

*** Vehicle-Profiling Technology Speeds Up Fast Food
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3914-2004Sep7.html>
by Charles Sheehan, Associated Press
Do you want fries with that? Never mind, we already know. A Pittsburgh start-up is testing technology at area fast-food restaurants designed to give kitchen workers a good indication of what customers want before the hungry souls even get close enough to place an order.

*** Information, Please: Wine Goes Digital
<http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/08/dining/08WINE.html?ex=1252382400&#38;en=37534efc20d26f4a&#38;ei=5088&#38;partner=rssnyt>
by Sam Perkins, New York Times
As with so many other businesses, wine stores are turning to computers to help. An increasing number are installing interactive touch screens to dispense information about wines, wine and food pairings, grape varieties, distilled spirits and more.

*** RFID Tags: The People Say No
<http://news.com.com/RFID+tags%3A+The+people+say+no/2010-1039_3-5332478.html?part=rss&tag=5332478&subj=news.1039.20>
by Michael Kanellos, CNET News.com
When it comes to radio frequency identification tags for humans, the people have spoken. They hate it.

*** Digital Music's Next Big Battle
<http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/04/09/wo_hellweg090704.asp?trk=nl>
by Eric Hellweg, MIT Technology Review
The arrival of software that lets you search for and record digital music off the airwavesw could raise legal issues that will make the P2P skirmishes look quaint by comparison.

[Internet]

*** Ads That Annoy Also Succeed
<http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,64807,00.html?tw=rss.TOP>
by Adam L. Penenberg, Wired News
One of internet users' most common misconceptions is that obnoxious advertising doesn't work. In reality, it works all too well, generating very nice returns for purveyors of spam and pop-ups at the expense of the rest of us.

MyAppleMenu Reader
==================================================
<http://www.myapplemenu.com/reader/index.html>
The other things in life

[Life]

*** The Homework That The Student Ate
<http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/08/fashion/08LUNC.html>
by Matt Lee and Ted Lee, New York Times
As the members of Generation X deliver their firstborn children into the school system, some resourceful parents have conspired to keep the bag lunch on the school grounds.

[Expressions]

*** Enormously Sad
<http://slate.msn.com/id/2106306/fr/rss/>
by Gail Mazur, Slate

SingaporeSurf
==================================================
<http://www.myapplemenu.com/singapore/index.html>
Life in the city

[Top Stories]

*** Spread Out Workers' Bonuses, Panel Suggests
<http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/topstories/story/0,4386,271467,00.html?>
by Sue-Ann Chia, Straits Times
With suchs taggered bounuses, more companies will improve their cash flow and boost their chances of staying afloat.

[News]

*** Singapore Studying KL's Plan To Keep Johor, Malacca Bird Flu Free
<http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/105407/1/.html>
by Walter Fernandez, Channel NewsAsia
Singapore is studying Malaysia's plan and if it is satisfied, will consider lifting the ban on Malaysian poultry and eggs from these states, even before Kelantan is declared safe.

*** Tough Window Law Floods Contractors With Calls
<http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/latest/story/0,4390,271432,00.html?>
by Joyce Teo and Tan Hui Yee, Straits Times