[MyAppleMenu] Jun 25, 2008

[applesurf at myapplemenu.com]

MyAppleMenu
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**** Assisted GPS And The iPhone <http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2008/06/25/assisted-gps-and-the-iphone>
by Iljitsc van Beijnum, Ars Technica
We know that the iPhone 3G will have "assisted GPS." But what does that mean? Unfortunately, there is no clear definition of this term, and of course it's beneath Apple to provide meaningful details. However, some understanding of how GPS works takes most of the guesswork out of it.

**** A Tale Of Two Apple Stores <http://consumerist.com/tag/apple-store/?i=5019440&t=a-tale-of-two-apple-stores>
by Consumerist
"Two Apple Stores, two ways of being treated."

**** Time Machine Bugs Raise Doubts About Reliability <http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/business/appleaday/blog/2008/06/time_machine_bugs_raise_doubts.html>
by David Zeiler, Baltimore Sun
I realize that no software is perfect, but Apple needs to be particularly careful with Time Machine.

**** SuperDocker <http://www.macworld.com/article/133921/2008/06/superdocker2.html>
by Rob Griffiths, Macworld
If you don't like Leopard's 3-D dock, SuperDocker offers a number of variations that you can implement with a few mouse clicks. You can switch to the 2-D dock, or replace the 3-D dock's background, separator, and active application indicator.

**** Adobe Releases Acorbat, Creative Suite Updates <http://www.macworld.com/article/134146/2008/06/acrobat9pro.html>
by Philip Michaels, Macworld

**** How Apple Is Blurring The Line Between Marketing And Service <http://adage.com/digital/article?article_id=127905>
by Pete Blackshaw, Advertising Age
Apple is introducing some important new lessons and questions for marketers.

**** MS Offers Open XML File Format Converter For Mac 1.0 <http://www.macnn.com/articles/08/06/25/ms.open.xml.converter/>
by MacNN

**** Virtualize Those Mac Servers <http://virtualizationreview.com/blogs/weblog.aspx?blog=2312>
by Keith Ward, Virtualization Review

**** MacBook Drinks Solar With Apple Juicz <http://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/1788/83/>
by Jaymi Heimbuch, EcoGeek
Fitting the MacBook, a foldable sheet of thin-film solar cells can charge up your laptop for free &mdash; well, after you shell out the big bucks for the product.

**** While Microsoft Fiddles, Apple Plans WWW Domination <http://www.smarthouse.com.au/Home_Office/Platforms/U9C5R2F8>
by Branko Miletic, Smarthouse
Apple now wants to remake the internet in its own fruit-flavoured image.
/To me, MobileMe seems to me to be just a (good) upgrade to .Mac, while Apple's internet strategy remains more or less unchanged. But, when timed together with iPhone 2.0, it really has caught people's attention./

**** Office 2008 For Mac Goes To 12.1.1 <http://www.macuser.com/updates/office_2008_for_mac_goes_to_12.php?lsrc=murss>
by David Dahlquist, MacUser
Issues fixed include charting problems, Entourage crashing when your Mac awakes from sleep, and issues involving the conversion of documents to and from the Open XML format.

**** The iPhone Has A Fingernail Problem? <http://weblogs.redeyechicago.com/iphoneblog/2008/06/the-iphone-has.html>
by Scott Kleinberg, RedEye
Let's hear from someone with long fingernails who /doesn't/ have a problem. Let's hear her solutions. Let's hear the other side.

**** Is AppleScript Under Siege? <http://blogs.zdnet.com/Apple/?p=1893>
by David Morgenstern, ZDNet.com
There are serious workflows in large companies based on AppleScript. But its longterm usefulness may be in question. Or not.

**** Why Are PCs So Hard? <http://blogs.nzherald.co.nz/blog/mac-planet/2008/6/25/why-are-pcs-so-hard/?c_id=5>
by New Zealand Herald

**** "The Dark Energy Of The Net" <http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_plank/archive/2008/06/24/quot-the-dark-energy-of-the-net-quot-take-ii.aspx>
by Dayo Olopade, The New Republic
Banning "poronography" or "illegal" content makes some sense&mdash;but quashing "unforeseen" innovations? Sinc ewhen is the unforesseen a bad thing?

**** Could iPhone Smoke The Kindle? <http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9976510-7.html>
by Greg Sandoval, CNET News.com
I know Apple said nothing about offering an e-reading application for the new iPhone. But what happens if Steve Jobs later surprises us or some developers turns the iPhone into a whiz-bang electronic reader? I'll tell you what happens, my Kindle ends up on eBay.

**** Even Apple Will Be Hated One Day <http://www.itworld.com/business/53292/even-apple-will-be-hated-one-day>
by Don Reisinger, ITworld.com
How long will it possibly take before the general public realizes that Apple's strategy of controlling its OS and iPhone with an iron fist are more of a money-grab than an attempt to "keep us safe"?
/I'll continue to buy Apple so long as its "iron fist" is giving me the best computer and best portable-podcast-player in the world, at a reasonable price. It doesn't matter to me if Apple is grabbing much money at the same time./

**** Who Will Be The Next Steve Jobs? <http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2008/06/24/who-will-be-the-next-steve-jobs>
by Charles Jade, Ars Technica
When you look at the records of the people who ran Apple, it makes you wonder how the company survived.

**** I'm Done With The MacBook Air (For Now) <http://blogs.zdnet.com/Apple/?p=1890>
by Jason D. O'Grady, ZDNet.com
I've come to the conclusion that the MacBook Air isn't the best Mac for me. At the end of the day I'm a power user and the MBA doesn't have enough horsepower to meet my needs.

**** How To Protect Yourself From The New Mac OS X Trojans <http://db.tidbits.com/article/9665>
by Rich Mogull, TidBITS
The good news is that based on the nature of the vulnerability the risk is low, but the bad news is that this kind of attack could become more serious.

**** MacBook Air SuperDrive Hacked For Other Macs, PCs <http://www.macnn.com/articles/08/06/24/blogger.hacks.mbasd/>
by MacNN

**** Freeverse Offers Jeopardy Deluxe, Wheel Of Fortune Deluxe <http://www.macworld.com/article/134134/2008/06/freeverse.html>
by Peter Cohen, Macworld

The Tomorrow Weblog
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**** Nokia To Buy Symbian To Thwart Google, Apple <http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/Nokia-to-Buy-Symbian-to-Thwart-Google-Apple/>
by Clint Boulton, eWeek
With a wary eye on Google and Apple, Nokia will pay $410 million for the 48 percent of Symbian shares it does not already own.

MyAppleMenu Reader
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**** Sexual Antagonism <http://www.slate.com/id/2194232/?from=rss>
by William Saletan, Slate
A genetic theory of homosexuality.

**** Service With A Wink To A Japanese Fad <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/25/dining/25maid.html?_r=1&oref=slogin>
by David Hochman, New York Times
As tea services go, the one at Royal/T here is definitely of the down-the-rabbit-hole variety. In an industrial-chic cafe surrounded by Japanese pop art, an American woman dressed as an English maid recently served French tea in a style that was straight out of Toyko.

SingaporeSurf
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**** Foreigners Bolstering Singapore's Birth Rate: Report <http://www.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMolt/idUSSIN13347020080625>
by Melanie Lee, Reuters
Foreigners are providing a boost to Singapore's lagging birth rate, with one in four babies born to expatriate fathers in the last five months, a local newspaper reported on Wednesday.

**** Huh? We Absolutely Should Not Cancel Our National Day Parade <http://ian.onthereddot.com/2008/06/25/huh-we-absolutely-should-not-cancel-our-national-day-parade/>
by Ian On The Red Dot
Without it, what it means is we don't even have one day, one pivotal event on the calendar to stop and think what it means to be Singaporean and yes, feel Singaporean. We don't even have that once chance to generate goodwill in some of us that hopefully last through the year.
/A parade is expensive, cheap SAF labour notwithstanding. There are so many more better, and possibly memorable and heartfelt, ways to celebrate Singapore-ness. Take a look at U.S., for example, from fireworks on the July 4th to the lighting of the national tree during Christmas, all of which are grand traditions that bring out the patroitism in people &mdash; yet cheaper and less militaristic than the National Day Parade./

**** Electricity Tariffs Up 4.98% From Next Quarter <http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/356295/1/.html>
by Imelda Saad, Channel NewsAsia
Electricity tariffs will go up by 4.98 per cent or by 1.19 cents per kilo watt per hour for all households from the next quarter beginning July 1.

**** Need For "Fuller" Number Portability? <http://techgoondu.wordpress.com/2008/06/25/need-for-fuller-number-portability/>
by Alfred Siew, Techgoondu
Is it a technical problem or more based on what telcos think the market needs?

**** Sembawang, Woodlands To Get Cycling Paths <http://www.straitstimes.com/Free/Story/STIStory_251345.html>
by He Zongying and Daryl Tan, Straits Times
These two estates will be provided with 7.4km of cycling tracks. They will run parallel to the existing footpaths linking residential areas to the Sembawang and Admiralty MRT stations.

**** More Babies - So What? <http://extrascoop.blogspot.com/2008/06/more-babies-so-what.html>
by The Extra Scoop
Being the self-declared patriot that I am, I'm quite bent on starting on family in Singapore. But who is to say that 5 years from now, I would be feeling the same way?

**** Give Adequate Wages To Low Income Workers <http://theonlinecitizen.com/2008/06/give-adequate-wages-to-low-income-workers/>
by Tan Kin Lian, The Online Citizen
I believe that local workers deserve to have an adequate salary for a hard day's work. This salary has to be commensurate with the cost of living. It should be adequate for a worker to feed a family, at least in a frugal way. The worker should not be expected to work for 12 hours a day, and still not earn enough for the family.
/My suggestion is for Singapore to go down the "minimum wage" route, because the existing pro-business policies is failing and created a large income disparity at the expense of lower-income workers./

**** Wong Kan Seng Again? <http://feedmetothefish.blogspot.com/2008/06/wong-kan-seng-again.html>
by Feed Me To The Fish
How many more screw-ups do we need before the buck stops?

**** CC Singapore License Draft In Public Discussion <http://ramblinglibrarian.blogspot.com/2008/06/cc-singapore-license-draft-in-public.html>
by Ivan Chew, Rambling Librarian

**** Subsidy To Study At Foreign Varsity Here? <http://www.todayonline.com/articles/261479.asp>
by Tan Hui Leng, Today
Niche degrees, such as those in gaming and hotel administration, not offered by the three local universities could become more affordable - if the government takes up a recommendation to subsidise a small number of students in foreign varsities based here.

**** That Long Wait For The Bus... <http://www.todayonline.com/articles/261474.asp>
by Neo Chai Chin, Today
Singaporeans gripe about long waiting times and buses that inch slowly towards their destinations, but we are still better off than commuters in Hong Kong, London and Tokyo, according to data from the Land Transport Authority and the Belgium-based International Association of Public Transport.
/GDP and average income figures can mask income dispartiy; can similiar scenario be at play here?/

**** DPM Wong Appalled Over Passport Slip-Up <http://www.todayonline.com/articles/261372.asp>
by Today
Deputy prime minister and home affairs minister Wong Kan Seng said in a statement late last night that he was "totally appalled and flabbergasted at this slip-up".