MOBODOJO

If you need a feel good story (with some strong tech aspects) to sum up your week, here’s one you’ll enjoy. Son got sick of supporting silly Windows for Mom across the country, so he bought her a Mac. The article tells the story of how me found the perfect Mac (are there any other such Macs?), prepared it for her, and how she fell madly in love with it. So sweet!

As everyone who is familiar with me knows I LOVE Microsoft. In fact, I often make annual pilgrimages to the holyland, Redmond, WA. Just kidding! Had you going there… Anyway, MS has let loose with another mobile technology, this time from the Live Labs, the failure which created Live Search. Its called DeepFish, and true to form Microsoft coders have managed to take a fantastic idea and “option” it to hell. I love this quote from Neowin:

It’s free and available right now (but availability is limited) for any Windows Mobile version 5.0 and up device. “The code is actually written to be potentially cross-platform. But because we ship these rapid prototypes in live labs, we’re shipping it just for that operating system for now,” concluded Alex Daley, Senior Product Manager at Microsoft Live Labs.

First, they’re not giving it out any more. Second, if the code is already portable, then there shouldn’t be any reason why they can’t offer beta versions for other mobile OS now. Third, MSN Live Search sucks! Okay, so the last one is only valid if you’re me. Regardless, if Microsoft ever intended to be a cross-platform company, they would have worked a hell of a lot harder to do so already. This is lip service. Don’t expect versions for anything but MS products.

Mitch Ratcliffe over at ZDNet is writing a series of articles exposing Vista’s weaknesses against the subtle, sublime, and superior power of Mac OS X. No, I don’t love everything about Mac OS X, but I do feel it should have a few greater reach in the marketplace than it does now. Head on over and check it out.

I just love this quote I got off of AppleInsider:

“This not a statement about Media Center PCs. It doesn’t mean Media Center isn’t going to be successful,” claimed HP channel manager Doug Robert. “It’s just that we’re discontinuing development.”

That’s so funny! Untrue, but funny. If HP, one of the world’s largest PC makers, is dumping a technology it means that said technology is sucking. Of course, based on my year and a half as Director of IT at DISCover PC Gaming, I can tell you that the hardware sucked, too. Maybe they’re giving up because they can’t build a reliable PC to save their lives or maybe its because they can’t sell enough Media Center PCs to validate the expense. I’d prefer to think they’re jumping ship because the Apple TV simply rocks and Windows MCE doesn’t.

Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of Southpark, the wickedly funny, biting, and timely animated show featured on Comedy Central, did not participate in this article at the Apple site. However, it was very cool to find out that their studio is able to pump out a complete, airable episode in less than a week, and they do it every week! Not only that, but they do it on Macs! Sure, the render farm is Linux boxes, but MAN that’s cool!

Bad name. Cool idea. Shady limitations. Apple is now offering iTMS music buyers the ability to fetch the rest of an album at a discount if they purchased a few $0.99 tracks. Here’s an interesting quote from the PR piece:

“Complete My Album offers customers up to 180 days after first purchasing individual songs from any qualifying album to purchase the rest of that album at a reduced price.”

Note the use of the term “qualifying” up there? This may be a neato feature, but if it only works with Slim Shady, The Go-Gos, and Yanni we’re going to have a problem. Also, what would it hurt of offer more than a measly 180 days? Regardless, you get $0.99 knocked off the total price of the album cost for each track you previously purchased. Not like I care. I never buy singles. I’m an old school album guy.

I’m no fan of malicious cracking, but I love hackers. A real hacker is someone who takes something and learns as much as they can about how it works. They then pass that knowledge on to everyone else to do with what they like. Ignorant people like news people and the gullible are under the impression that “hacker” means bad person with m4d n3rd skillz who perpetrates evil.

Just so you know, its the real hackers who have already crammed themselves inside the 4-day old Apple TV to give you what you want; more codecs. What does that mean for you? Simply put it means that you can watch any video you like from most sources, instead of what Apple wants to limit you to. If you’re a n3wb13 (or can’t read the previous word), don’t try this yet, but keep an eye on it. If you’re 1337 then check this out.