Quarter Life Crisis

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Roundup¶

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• Haven't tried it, but there's a tool for making OS X boot CDs from our university. Nice to see they have Mac people working here as well. Also note that they have an AFP Server. Only the usual suspects of shareware offerings and updates. Yet one of the few AFP servers 'in the wild' that I know of. Sadly.
• The Register remains unenthusiastic about the iTunes music store. That's a good thing. I still consider that DRM crap to be very scary. Just so many things that can go wrong. How does it work anyway? Do you authorise your computer or only one account? How will it work in lab situations? What if kids use it and lose/delete files? All these things mean that you'll really have to think a little bit before starting to purchase restricted files as you may have manoeuvred yourself and the money you spent right into a cul-de-sac with those files you bought. I can still play the 7" inches my grandma bought in the 1950s. Will iPods, iTunes and Apple still be around in half a century's time?
• John Gruber analyses Microsoft's anti iTunes FUD. Tongue in cheek that is. John writes It’s fun to run all over town looking for a decent price on a CD, and we’re hoping Windows users are looking for that same experience when they pay for music online, which is apparently meant to be ironic. Although I have the feeling that Microsoft may know their clientele better here: The cheapskates, the people who think they 'saved' money if they surfed the internet for hours for a price that is a few pennies lower, the people who enjoy telling the story how they shopped around for their computer more than actually using it – those are probably Microsoft customers.
• And there are G4 iBooks. Very cool. Apple did it again – a significantly new product that we didn't read widely spread rumors about beforehand. And I think it's very cool. The main thing putting people off the iBook was the 'aged' feel of the G3 processor. Then you have up-to-date connectivity and the same restrictions as before which most people won't mind. Best thing, in my opinion, now you can buy the cheapest model without a problem. It's got a combo drive, slot-loading even, making the iBook more affordable and cooler at the same time. You actually don't want the more expensive ones anyway because they're 14" monsters now. – Just the 12" Powerbook looks very overpriced now...
• This gives a wholly new and, at least for me, unexpected twist to the discussion on Apple's line up that John Gruber and me started a while ago.
• via 2lmc: a cool photo that's somehow iPod-esque, something about blog-spam and the broken desktop metaphor. I still like my desktop and the mess that I make on it, though. I also like keeping the right bit of the screen semi-free to access stuff there easily. We'll see how well Exposé will do at coercing me into cluttering all of the screen's area. I'm not sure that will happen as the direct access I have now will be hard to beat.
• Why Mac websites suck, via Juha Haataja. Although my impression is that the regurgitating of press releases and rumors isn't exclusive to Mac websites but very common all through the web and even creeping into the real press™.
• We went to the streets today to protest against the latest cuts in the university budget. €12 million seems to be the figure for next year. It wasn't too great. There weren't many people joining in. Perhaps a thousand or so. Quite embarassing. Particularly as all the freshers should've been easy to motivate. Allegedly, the right-wing jerks who represent the students this year spent almost €10000 to put a huge banner up one of the university buildings. Spending the same money on beer would surely have attracted more people – or bought three or four more of the much needed supervisors for our department. Nobody in the university wants these cuts of course but as the people in government come from other university towns they'd rather have the most cuts made over here... [a report on this and others - funnily the report by the police seems to be the most unbiased one: a few skirmishs but nothing serious, most police were needed for redirecting the traffic. Sadly, our leftie friends embarass themselves: While they have good points such as saying it's not enough to fight against cuts in our budget - but we have to keep an eye on the larger picture and trends, they presented themselves in a somewhat noisy and destructive way. Did I mention that there were loads of poor public speaking skills exhibited during the event?]

October 22, 2003, 22:44