Um. Ri-ight

Seriously, you can't make this stuff up. From Apple Insider.

Truly a Canadian Mac Moment

From Tod Maffin's Flickr Feed

F:

Are you using Vista or XP?

There's the question again from tech support for my ISP. About two months ago, Telus blew a line running into town and since then my internet has been up and down and down and up. A couple days ago while trying to trace some co-ax in my house, I thought I knocked something lose, as half the lights were out on my cable modem. When I got back from a wedding this weekend, though, it was back up and running. Or at least, it was up and running to the point of connecting to the ISP. But I couldn't get out onto the interweb.

So I called to tell them that their door was closed. Again. And of course, every time I do, they have to walk me through the typical tech support stuff: is it plugged in? Is there a router? Are you connected.

This time, after answering that I was on 10.5, and explaining that was, yes, Mac, I was still asked to open up my command prompt. You mean terminal, right? Yeah, right. Okay. Now type in ipconfig. Well, this is UNIX not DOS, so that doesn't really work. And no, it is not a virus.

Um. Okay, we'll schedule a service technician to come and take a look.

But the problem is at YOUR END. Everything at this end is working fine. Why do I need someone here to trouble shoot YOUR PROBLEM. Grr.

But it appears to be working now. Sort of.

So, what are you trying to say here?

The latest press release from Apple, touting Apple's 1 million iPhone weekend, featured a rather prominent quote from Steve Jobs.

Now, I'd have to go back and check the last few press releases, but I think this is the first release I've seen quoting Steve in months.

Which leads me to suspect that Jobs is back to work.

Update: Now Cult of Mac is saying that CNBC is reporting Steve might have come back today. Makes sense to me. So, when do we see that tablet announcement...?

Podiobooks: What a remarkable concept

I was listening to This Week in Media a few days ago, and they had as a guest Scott Sigler, a well-known horror author. He mentioned that he had just written a Sci-fi book called The Rookie, and it was available for free on his website.

So I, being the geek that I am, went to check it out, and discovered that it was available as an audiobook via iTunes, and were being put out through a company called Podiobooks.

Wow. What a great idea. I have only started listening to The Rookie, and haven't checked out any other books, but just from a conceptual point of view, I'm sold already.

While Scott's a good reader, he isn't on par with the readers from audible, but that's okay, it's still a great idea.

I'll give you more feedback once I've explored a little more, but at first glance, I'm so all over this.

How Green was my Apple

So, if you haven't noticed, Apple and Dell have been involved in a rather pointless pissing match. Dell's been accusing Apple of false advertising, going so far as to file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau.

Well, yesterday the BBB agreed with Dell, saying that Apple's advertising might be a bit misleading. But Apple says that they offer the greenest "Family" of notebooks, and on that, the BBB agreed with Apple.

Sure there are greener notebook models out there than any one notebook Apple produces, but they have made a commitment to green for all their notebooks, not just one flagship green model, while making the rest of their notebooks with arsenic and sealskin.

Of course, Green is a relative concept and much maligned and abused to the point of meaninglessnesss (this is a green blog; no trees were harmed in the making of this post). So take all this chest thumping with a grain of salt.

Steve Jobs had a liver transplant. It must be true, it was in the WSJ

So, the interweb is all abuzz with the rumour that Steve Jobs had a liver transplant.

Based on a story with no sources in the Wall Street Journal.

Okay, so it is the journal, that bastion of truth and all that's right with the media.

Still. They say Steve had a liver transplant, but offer no real sources to back it up. Which is a little odd. Knowing Steve Jobs, though, it could have been Steve himself who called the journal and told them to run the story, after insulting the reporter a few times for good measure, under the condition that no mention was made of the call, no references to a source, no nothing. Why? Cuz that's just the way Steve rolls.

The timing is perfect to have it be an deliberate plant by Apple. This sort of thing will get lost in the news cycle, buried by the iPhone launch. In a week, everyone'll say "oh, yeah, that's old news, but Steve's doing great and will be returning to Apple in a week or two."

The stock takes no hit, the investors are happy and everything is as it should be.

Or, it could just be complete and utter speculation. That's for Steve and his doctors to know and us to find out slowly and in sometimes contradictory pieces over the next few years.