Ballmer smackdown continuation

As usual, Mr. Gruber does a better job than most at dissecting a topic, in this case Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s crude comments regarding Apple and the iPod:

I’d love to see his source for this. I have no source either, but I’d place a wager with Mr. Ballmer that the most common source of music on most iPods are unencrypted songs legally ripped from CDs. Most iPod users I know own hundreds of CDs; it’d take ages to bootleg the amount of music they already own on CD.

[…]

The point of all this seems to be that Ballmer is saying that Apple can’t lead the way here — where by “here” I’m talking about the convergence between the computer, entertainment, and consumer electronics industries — because the iPod allows for and even encourages the use of non-DRM-protected digital media.

But I would argue that Apple is already leading the way in terms of music — in large part because they don’t enforce draconian DRM measures.

Sticking with BBEdit, thanks

Michael, who is much more knowledgeable of such things than I, has an overview of MacroMates’ newly-released TextMate, which purports to be a BBEdit killer. I downloaded and took a look at TextMate, too, and I was fairly unimpressed. If I weren’t using BBEdit, I would likely go with SubEthaEdit. I’ve been using BBEdit since, oh, 1996 or so, and version 8 is the best version yet of the ultra-powerful text editor. Like mi amigo, I won’t be cranking up TextMate any time soon for my own needs, but more power to MacroMates for going after the switcher market.

Categories no more

So after deliberating over whether or not to eliminate categories–and thank you so much for all those comments with feedback–I have decided to can the categories on this and all of my blogs. (Seriously, I do thank those few who did weigh in on the issue, either through comments, e-mail, or instant message.)
I feel Raena summed it up best in an IM: “Seeing as how you have the uber blog empire, I wonder whether it’s worth using categories either. If you were using one blog for all that stuff, then yeah.”
After replying that she flattered me–while I’m running five separate public blogs, I in no way feel I have a “blog empire” a la my favorite n3rdling–Raena then stated the obvious, which I suppose I hadn’t really considered: “Seriously, though. You have separate blogs for separate interests, so I don’t see that categories are as much of a concern.”
She’s right. Initially, everything was posted under Retrophisch, and categories were a necessity. No longer, however. With the different blogs for different interests, categories within each blog seemed nitpickish and maybe even a wee bit obsessive-complusive. Yeah, I think we can do away with anything obsessive-compulsive…
While I will no longer be posting within categories, the old category pages are still there, if you know how to find them, or you previously linked to or bookmarked them.

Soyuz PowerBook Laptop bag

Dan rightly points out how wicked cool it would be to own a laptop bag made from parts of a parachute that has been in orbit around the Earth. Space junkies and NASA groupies will understand; all others need not apply.
Too bad I am so dirt poor right now due to unemployment. What are the odds of scoring one of these for a review, do you think?

Such maturity for a CEO

Lee points to another Silicon.com article which reveals Steve Ballmer is even more of a childish imbecile than was previously thought.

Memo to Steve Ballmer

Mr. Ballmer:
Despite your reckless and libelous statements regarding Apple and the iPod, please note that your 12-year-old is likely hiding stolen music in all kinds of places, given that your 12-year-old is likely much smarter than you are, having grown up with the technology your company had to steal copy “innovate”. (He’s also probably hiding a lot of other stuff he has found on the Internet.)
A challenge then, to the CEO of Microsoft: without any warning whatsoever, conduct a full-scale examination of the hard drive of every Microsoft employee, including every PDA, every digital music player, every MP3-playing mobile phone. Cross-check the findings of digital music with each employee’s personal CD collection. Report the findings of how much stolen music is residing inside Microsoft itself. That is, if you’re not too busy dancing around on stage like a fool and flinging your feces at your competition, monkey-boy.
(Via MacMinute)

Happy Tenth, Ric

Yesterday, Ric Ford celebrated the 10th anniversary of MacInTouch. MacInTouch is, to my best recollection, the original Macintosh news blog, from before the terms “weblog” and “blog” were coined. To quote Ric, “here’s to another ten years!”

A prettier Firefox?

There seems to be a movement afoot to pretty-up the Mac version of Firefox. Jon Hicks came up with some native-looking widgets, and Kevin Gerich has been busy with new button icons, as well as other widgets.
Not being a Firefox user–though I do plan to install the latest preview release–I am left wondering: why not just use Camino and all of its native Mac GUI goodness? It’s my browser backup of choice behind Safari.

Brain Bag trade?

Anyone out there with a black Brain Bag willing to trade for a sapphire (blue) Brain Bag? Mine is in like-new condition, was originally sent to me as a review item, and hasn’t been used in more than two years (mostly because I’ve been using other bags for review purposes).
I love the Brain Bag, but would like one in basic black, and cannot afford to buy a new one. If you’re interested in a trade, please e-mail me, and hopefully you’re savvy enough to know what to do with that e-mail address.

Fun with statistics 2

In the first 17 hours of October 2004, these are the Top 10 Search Phrases for retrophisch.com:
1. earthquakes in france
2. definition of a liberal
3. mac archives
4. www daddy yakee com
5. dilbert clone knickknack
6. zero intelligence
7. osan beanie babies store korea
8. citizen persona amex card
9. lrs2 blaser
10. directv jobs charlotte
I was a bit thrown with the “osan beanie babies store korea” phrase, until I dropped it in to Google to see that I was the fourth link returned. Yeah, I blogged about a beanie baby, okay?