Latest Posts in Editors' Notes
Eight steps to Internet unpopularity
After a particularly trying weekend moderating the Macworld forums, it occurred to me that there are a handful of ways to become an Internet pariah in a very short period of time. In the hope that you might not fall into some of these traps, allow me to enumerate those ways.
1. Troll Let’s start with the most obvious. Take up an unreasonably opposing point of view simply to get a rise out of people. This is most effective when you visit a site devoted to Subject A and then state that just about everything related to that subject stinks. For example, visit a Nikon forum and slam its cameras in favor of Canon. Trail over to the Huffington Post and gush over Sarah Palin’s first literary effort. Drop by our sister publication PC World’s site and let them know just how much you love Snow Leopard and despise Windows. Whether your comments are based in fact or not, they’re unlikely to be welcomed.
2. Passionate cluelessness Okay, we get it that you have very strong political/religious/hygienic views. Derailing a discussion of the benefits of a new computer graphics chip to present those views in inglorious detail may not be the best way to make friends and influence people.
3. Dispassionate cluelessness Several years ago a little something called “Google” rained down from the sky. This Google provides the means for finding answers to many, many questions. I’m routinely amazed at how helpful people can be when others need assistance, but it’s unwise to abuse their patience by clamoring for increasing amounts of help when the answer you seek is a simple Google search away.
The real genius of the Genius Bar
My wife and I recently purchased an iPod touch (8GB, second generation) primarily for our kids to use for games. After setting it up, however, I couldn’t get any sound out of the speaker—audio worked fine in headphones, but not at all when trying to use the speaker. So I made an appointment at the local Apple Store’s Genius Bar to have them take a look.
After a few minutes of blowing compressed air into the headphone jack, and plugging and unplugging headphones, the Genius gave up and handed me a new iPod touch with a functioning speaker. The whole process took about 30 minutes (including my wait time), and didn’t cost me a penny. Well, technically it didn’t cost me a penny.
In actuality, it cost me 17,390 pennies (that’s $173.90 in the more-common dollar units). That’s because I was sucked in by the real genius of the Genius Bar: it puts Apple’s customers in a store filled with desirable Apple products, and with some time to waste while waiting for their appointment at the Genius Bar. In my case, that time gave me a chance to purchase a spare battery for my 15-inch MacBook Pro, and a case and screen protectors for the iPod touch. These were all items on my “I need to get these at some point” list, but the visit to the Genius Bar was the perfect excuse to get my shopping done.
So while the Genius Bar serves an important function for customers (and a popular one—it was swamped the whole time I was there) by providing them direct contact with Apple, it also serves as an incredible sales engine for Apple’s retail arm.
After my time was done with the Genius Bar folks, I kept my eye on some of the other Genius Bar visitors. Of the five folks I watched, four of them had purchases in hand when they left the store. (I imagine that Apple tracks the revenue generated by Genius Bar visitors, and knows exactly how much money the average Genius Bar visit is worth. It won’t ever happen, but I’d love to see those figures!)
In short, the Genius Bar is simply pure genius. It lets Apple help its customers while helping its revenue at the same time.
One person's quest for faster broadband
Several months ago, I wrote about how pathetic my broadband options were in San Francisco and, in fact, how bad things are in the country as a whole.
Since then, I decided to make the switch to something faster. At 7,500 feet from an AT&T central office, the fastest standard DSL speeds I could get were 2.5 Mbps down (about 310 KBps) and nearly .5 Mbps up (about 60 KBps). For things like downloading giant Apple software updates and uploading photos and HD videos, that just didn’t cut it. Although I’ve had a great experience with my ISP, DSL Extreme, over the years, the company simply couldn’t offer me better speeds for a reasonable monthly fee.
After I wrote the original story, Comcast—our local cable provider—expanded its broadband options to our house to include several faster tiers. Although weary of the company’s 250GB-per-month bandwidth cap, I bit the bullet and ordered a 15 Mbps/2 Mbps plan for about $65 a month (I don’t have Comcast cable or phone service, otherwise it would have been less expensive).
What happened after I ordered was a tragedy of errors that reaffirmed my contempt for Comcast. After one appointment where the tech was unprepared to complete the job, a second that Comcast cancelled during my appointment window, and a third during which nobody even bothered to show up, I canceled my order and started the search again.
While expressing my dismay at the unbelievable incompetence of Comcast on Twitter, I got in touch with local ISP Sonic.net. The company’s Fusion Broadband product promised speeds of up to 18 Mbps down and 1 Mbps up using ADSL2+ technology. But once I talked with Sonic.net’s CEO, I found out the company had even more ambitious plans to offer a bonded product that combined two DSL lines (two pairs of wires) to dramatically improve both download and upload speeds. I volunteered to be a test subject.
Read more…Opinion: Tear down those Office walls, Microsoft
My first reaction to Microsoft’s Thursday announcement that it will release a new version of its Office suite for the Mac in 2010 can be summed up in one word: Why? The very notion of a software suite like Office seems completely out-of-date.
Of course, I know perfectly well the reason Microsoft wants to keep pumping out new versions of Office across all the platforms it serves: The suite accounts for about 30 percent of Microsoft’s overall revenue. But as a buyer, I just don’t get it.
Read more…Introducing Macworld’s Digital Photography Superguide, third edition
Last weekend a friend stopped by for lunch and to show off his newest purchase—a shiny new SLR camera. Almost as soon as we sat down the questions started. What was the difference between the P and the green square, he asked, pointing to the mode dial. And was using the Portrait mode better than fiddling with the settings himself?
For all the work camera companies have put into making their cameras as easy to use as possible, many people still find the process of getting a good shot shrouded in mystery. That’s partly because, to take advantage of the full creative potential of your camera, you need to take the reins and make some decisions yourself. And that can be scary if you aren’t sure what is happening behind the scenes.
That’s why we regularly feature photography tips and how-to articles on Macworld. Each month we give you stories about the latest camera technologies, managing your photo library, and turning your snapshots into interesting projects—all from a Mac user’s perspective. But we know that digging back through all of those stories—some of which appeared only in print—can be a hassle, if not impossible.
In this 136-page book, we step you through the entire photography process, from shooting in difficult situations—including under water or in dim rooms—to importing photos quickly and safely, to adding valuable information like names, locations, and ratings to your files. We explain how to use iPhoto’s levels histogram to take the mystery out of correcting a photo’s colors and lighting. Once you’ve polished up your photos, you’ll even learn how to show off a bit by turning them into giant posters, printing them on fabric, or creating beautiful slideshows, calendars, books, and more. We also show you how to protect your photos from hard drive disasters.
If you’ve been wishing you knew more about your camera or feel overwhelmed by your photo library and aren’t sure where to turn, this book can help.
The Digital Photography Superguide comes in three convenient formats: you can download a PDF for $12.95 for immediate access. If you prefer to have something you can hold in your hand, you can get the PDF mailed to you on a CD for $12.95 or get a beautiful, full-color printed book for $24.95.
Want to take a peek before you lay down your money? Go ahead. You can download a 14-page, 2MB preview that includes the table of contents and a few sample pages.
Also available in our Superguide series are the iPhone & iPod Touch Superguide, Mac Gems: 240+ Softwarte Bargains Mobile Mac Superguide, Mac Security Superguide, Mac Basics Superguide Leopard Edition, Mac OS X Hints, Leopard Edition, Total Leopard, and the Digital Music and Video Superguide. We think they’re really great books, and we think you will, too.
Click here to get more information on how to buy the Digital Photography Superguide.
A not-so-deeper look at OS X 10.5.8
Most of the time when Apple releases an OS update—like Wednesday’s Mac OS X 10.5.8 release—I’ll usually spend that evening examining the update package, trying to find information on what’s included in the update that wasn’t specifically covered by Apple and its release notes. It’s become something of a tradition here at Macworld North—I’ve written detailed looks at 10.5.3, 10.5.4, 10.5.5, 10.5.6, and 10.5.7.
But no more, it seems—at least not for this update. Apple’s own notes do a good job at covering the big details of the items it updated this time out. I did take my usual dive inside the update package’s files to see what else might be hiding there. While there is a large list of files that have been updated, the majority of those changes seem to be minor, such as updates to language files.
I did manage to find a couple things that Apple didn’t mention that I think are worth sharing:
- The background of the Sharing tab in Address Book’s preferences now has striped rows for easier reading. This is big. Huge news. Just remember you read this earth-shattering scoop here first!
- The iDisk icon is now blue, instead of purple. I wasn’t too keen on purple, so this is a welcomed change.
- The following Dashboard Widgets were updated: Dictionary, iCal, Movies, Stickies, Stocks, Unit Converter, and Web Clip. I have no idea what’s changed, if anything—consider this a challenge!
- There’s an updated version of the Apache (web sharing) manual in /Library/WebServer/share/httpd/manual.
- The Ruby and Python frameworks were updated, for those of you who work with those languages.
There’s also the usual assortment of updated frameworks, changes to time zone files, and minor updates to many Unix programs and/or their help pages. A long list of system extensions are also updated, but trying to figure out what’s changed in those would be basically impossible.
Overall, I think Apple struck a good balance between providing too much information and not enough information about the 10.5.8 update; most consumers won’t care about the things Apple didn’t list, and those who do care probably have the tools to investigate the changes themselves.
I’ve installed the update on three Macs now, and all three are up and running just fine. If you’ve noticed any new behaviors, options, or (I hope not) bugs in OS X 10.5.8, please feel free to share in the comments.
The end of the road for a favored text editor
While setting up my new OS X-powered Dell Mini 10v mini-laptop, I wanted to install my favorite text editor, the open source program Smultron. When the Smultron site loaded, I was greeted by the message you may have just seen for yourself:
Hi!
First of all I’d like to thank you for your interest in my applications. But I have now come to a point where I don’t have the time to spend on the applications that they deserve so I have decided to not release any more versions for the foreseeable future.
Cheers,
Peter Borg
Needless to say, this was sad to read—I’ve been using Smultron for many years, and it’s never good news when something you enjoy using reaches its (apparent) end of life.
(In addition to Smultron, Peter Borg also wrote Lingon, a tool that makes it much easier to create launchd tasks, which (amongst other things) controls the launching of tasks on a schedule, much like cron does in other Unix systems.)
After downloading the latest version of Smultron (and stashing a copy of it somewhere safe, just in case the site vanished), I told a couple friends via iChat—and those following me on Twitter—about the demise of my favorite text editor. This led to several versions of “while it’s sad to see it go, there are lots of good alternatives. Why not just switch to XYZ?”
There are, indeed, a ton of great text editors for the Mac. BBedit and TextWrangler, TextMate, SubEthaEdit, skEdit…the list goes on and on. So why did I choose Smultron out of all of those? The answer is…that there’s not a good answer, at least not any logically good answer. So I spent some time thinking about what I need out of a text editor, and why it was that Smultron met those needs better than any of the other programs I’ve tried over the years.
Read more…Schmidt's exit from Apple board benefits consumers
The following article is reprinted from the Today@PC World blog at PCWorld.com.
The honeymoon is officially over, ending months of rumors—Google’s CEO Dr. Eric Schmidt is resigning from Apple's board of directors after three years.
But in an interesting twist, the announcement came from Apple and not from Google.
“Eric has been an excellent Board member for Apple, investing his valuable time, talent, passion and wisdom to help make Apple successful,” Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO, said in a press release issued by Apple today. “Unfortunately, as Google enters more of Apple’s core businesses, with Android and now Chrome OS, Eric’s effectiveness as an Apple Board member will be significantly diminished, since he will have to recuse himself from even larger portions of our meetings due to potential conflicts of interest. Therefore, we have mutually decided that now is the right time for Eric to resign his position on Apple’s Board.”
New NetNewsWire sync option isn't for everyone
NewsGator’s recent announcement about the NetNewsWire 3.2 beta (NNW from here on out) was a sad event for me. Despite a number of intriguing new features, there are a few key changes in NNW that mean I’m now looking for a suitable replacement.
You may be thinking this is a rant about the new space for advertisements in NNW, but that’s not the case. NNW is a terrific product, and the company is well within its rights to make money off the product. A future paid version of NNW will support ad-free viewing, for those who find the ads offensive. This is interesting, as it’s basically full-circle back to where NNW was a few years ago. (It’s unknown whether those people who bought a paid version of NNW in the past will be granted any sort of discount on the new ad-free version.)
The main reason I’m now looking to replace NetNewsWire is that, going forward, syncing across multiple Macs will only be possible via Google Reader. In the present version, sync was available via NewsGator or MobileMe (.Mac); after testing both services, I settled on syncing via MobileMe.
NewsGator has decided to get out of the sync business, so it’s obvious why support for that sync method has gone away. But why too must MobileMe sync vanish? Millions of Mac users have MobileMe accounts, which makes the removal of MobileMe sync from NNW hard to understand. The cynic in me would think it was purely monetary—unlike Google Reader, there’s no money to be made with MobilMe sync.
What the Microsoft-Yahoo-Bing deal means for you
The following article is reprinted from the Today@PC World blog at PCWorld.com.
So what’s it mean for computer users now that Microsoft and Yahoo today finally are announcing their long-anticipated marriage of Microsoft’s Bing search engine and Yahoo’s premium search advertising tools? Will this change our lives?
Actually, I think this partnership will mean far more for Microsoft and Yahoo and their corporate balance sheets than it will for those of us who are technology consumers, and here’s why.
- Will search get better due to the deal between the two companies? Now I don’t have a crystal ball, but I tried Bing, I played with Bing, I experienced Bing, but Bing, you’re no Google search. Yes, it has some cool features, like bringing up found items in new and useful lists that are highly targeted for users, but there’s this little problem that no amount of money and advertising can change—people’s habits. And my habit, like the habit of tens of millions of computer users around me, is to call up Google whenever and wherever I have to search, every time. It’s like a mother’s love—it’s there forever.
- Will Yahoo go to the dogs now that it’s linked itself in a partnership deal with the slow, hard-to-steer, behemoth known as Microsoft? I do think there are more risks for Yahoo here than there are for Microsoft. Remember when the huge cable TV conglomerate Time Warner merged with the original America Online (AOL) Internet provider back in 2000, thinking it was the wave of the future and all of humanity would follow in a sea of dollar signs and goodwill? And do you know where they are now? Time Warner is spinning off AOL, which has been struggling for years, as it continues to try to figure out just what to do with it. Before teaming with Time Warner, AOL was the king of the Internet, as we all clamored to have slow, software-laden Internet access at $2.99 an hour like the good consumer lemmings we were in those days. But then cheaper, faster access arrived with DSL, cable and all-you-can-use plans, but AOL and stodgy Time Warner couldn’t react quickly enough. There’s a lesson here. Bigger isn’t always better. I read that in a fortune cookie. I could have saved Time Warner and AOL a lot of money if I’d have told them that. Hey, Microsoft and Yahoo, are you listening?
- Are there privacy concerns I should be worried about from this deal? That depends on the fine print, and that we’ll have to have to check carefully to be sure what Microsoft and Yahoo want to do with all the consumer data they'll be able to collect from our searches. This is already an issue with Google and other search engines as we continue to make our way through this still relatively new global Internet adventure. When we use “free” services like search on the Internet, whether through Google or Yahoo or Bing or whatever, there really is no “free.” Someone somewhere is using the spoils of the search—our preferences about what we are looking for—for marketing, for potential revenue enhancement and to help them in their businesses. It’s an acceptable risk to us as consumers only when we know what the rules are. Somehow, though, we usually don't ask what those rules are ahead of time. Maybe we should get that information up front this time.
- Will this Microsoft-Yahoo partnership be enough to knock Google from its perch as the king of search for savvy consumers? I doubt it, and here’s why—I just don’t see Microsoft and Yahoo, even with the new Bing search engine as its mascot, coming anywhere near Google with the kinds of innovations that make us all excited and Googly. There’s Google Earth. Could Microsoft or Yahoo have thought of that? And there’s Google Voice. OK, it’s still a fledgling effort, but it is interesting and innovative, and users are lining up early to try to get a Google invite to test it out and take it for a ride. What always amazes me is how the Google tech folks are always introducing fascinating new technologies that they can bring to users in ways that no one has else has yet imagined. OK, they haven’t found an answer for world peace or the vaccine for swine flu yet, but you never know. I’m just not sure that Microsoft still has any of that kind of turn-on-a-dime mentality anymore. And that’s why this partnership may not help search-loving consumers or Yahoo as much as the new partners believe it will.
[Todd R. Weiss is a freelance technology journalist who formerly wrote for Computerworld.com. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TechManTalking.]
New E-mail and Internet Reviews
Best Prices on Networking & Connectivity
pcAnywhere 12.5 Host & Remote (Full Product)Price: $28.50
pcAnywhere 12.1 Windows Host, Remote & Gateway (Full Product)Price: $40.00
SmarTerm 32BIT v1.0 Dual W95 100U MULTIPKPrice: $119.95
Laplink Gold 2008Price: $78.84
IRIS Readiris Pro (Full Product)Price: $101.49
Everywhere 4 (Full Product)Price: $23.00
Latest on E-mail and Internet
