Apple

aTV Update Gives AppleTV FTP and USB Drive Support

Merlin — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 12:59:20 -0400

aTV Flash - Ver. 3.2 - Apple Core, LLC

The 3.2 version of Apple Core's patchstick for the AppleTV is out. And it's pretty amazing.

If you've never heard of the aTV, I'll point you to the product page for all the feature details that turn your AppleTV into a tricked-out media center that runs an assload of codecs without PitA transcoding. And, yes, you will need to read the detailed instructions on how to make this work -- there's a lot of them and it's not for the impatient or the faint of heart. For now, I just want to highlight why this particular release of this particular product has scratched such an itch for me.

New GUI installer - UNIX doofuses like me no longer have to fling their key drives against a wall in frustration; the product now ships with a relatively simple wizard for installing the aTV software on your 1GB or smaller USB drive. Much easier now. If you're even wimpier than me they also offer several options that get you the software pre-installed on an AppleTV.
Vanilla FTP access - I'm with stevenf in general on SFTP, but this latest release of aTV removes the requirement to force SSH1 (and, consequently use of the shell or [ugh] Fugu) in order to SFTP onto the AppleTV. With the introduction of old-school FTP I can use Trasmit for file transfer (yay!). Plus this has enabled me to create basic Automator folder actions for uploading files to the AppleTV automatically (here's what my Movie uploader looks like). Love this -- Transmit is such a nice friend.
USB Drive suport - Using the included NitoTV (and after a quick update with the 10.4.9 Combo Installer and a restart) your AppleTV can now see and access attached USB devices [howto]. Like, say, a Drobo. Yep. Just point Sapphire at your collection, and you suddenly have a pretty rich way to enjoy your legal backups of movies and TV shows. "Boom," as the introducer of the AppleTV might say.

The usual warnings and admonitions apply with this stuff. Apple Core says installing this product won't void your AppleTV's warranty; I have no opinion about that. I will say anything you do here is at your own risk. Don't blame me if your TV blows up. Also, don't "steal" anything; always pay retail...preferably at a really big store you have to drive to.

For a while, I was on the fence about whether to use my Mac Mini as a media center (and basically pitch the AppleTV). The power is obviously there with a Mini, but I also didn't want to deal with a keyboard and the other annoyances of using a proper computer as a TV device.

I've been very satisfied with the aTV over the past few weeks I've had it, and this new version just takes it to another level.

Even if the AppleTV ends up tanking as hard as everybody seems to claim it will, I'm grateful for the hobbyists and hackers who have made it easy for civilians like me to use this amazing device to its fuller potential.

”aTV Update Gives AppleTV FTP and USB Drive Support” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on July 25, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

DHH on iPhone 2.0's Glitches

Merlin — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 16:52:28 -0400

iPhone 2.0: The glory wore off in wash - (37signals)

[via DF]

While acknowledging the complexity of Apple's ambitious launch, David Heinemeier Hansson says iPhone 2.0 wasn't ready for prime time on a number of levels.

Combined, it’s a rather big disappointment. I’m surprised just how much impact the small griefs have when they add up to a lack of confidence in the system. It’s a great example of the cumulative effects of problems. They have an exponential damage on the experience. [...]

It feels a little like Apple got swept up in knocking down every single detraction point from 1.0 that they lost sight of what everyone loved about the first version. Yes, it got cheaper (not really), faster (some times), installable apps, and GPS, but it lost a bit of Apple soul in the process.

David also has a laundry list of complaints on stability and performance. I went through his items and ticked off each of the ones I've also noticed (with a 01-10 for how big a problem it's been for me):

[ 0^ ] "Annoying delays all over the place." [MDM: Kinda. I guess that's how I'd describe it.]
[ -- ] "Changing to the SMS view can take more than 10 seconds at times." [MDM: Mmm. I haven't seen this. But then I hate SMS and avoid it like the plague.]
[ -- ] "Transitions between apps are being dropped entirely or cut short (the latter looks like a UI stutter)." [MDM: Nope.]
[ -- ] "It some times requires 3 clicks on the fast-forward button in iTunes to get a response." [MDM: Nope.]
[ 07 ] "The screen will freeze for 4-5 seconds not accepting any input, then replay ALL your feverous tapping when it finally returns." [MDM: Oh yeah. Feels like a page out.]
[ 09 ] "Some times the keyboard will not keep up with your input (and I’m not that fast of a typer)." [MDM: I'm a *really* slow typer and I get this almost nonstop]
[ 07 ] "I’ve had applications crash numerous times." [MDM: Poof. Multiples a day.]
[ 10 ] "The entire phone has crashed twice." [MDM: Closer to a half-dozen times for me.]
[ 02 ] "Restarting the phone kinda helps some of these problems, but not for long and it feels so dirty and Windows-like to do." [MDM: I guess. More opinion than observation.]

I'll also add a few of my own:

Wildly-varying response errors. Similar to the screen freeze I guess, I'm getting substantial lag time -- especially between ending a drag gesture and having the thing I was trying to change register the movement. I'm constantly selecting the "wrong" thing for example. Over and over.
The crazy-long Backup time in iTunes. Wow. Can I request a lot fewer of those?
Apps I've removed from the phone mysteriously reappear after the next sync
Hangs. Huge, old-school, everything freezes, hold all the buttons and wait til restart hangs.

Hm. I hadn't really thought about all these at once, but, yeah. That's a big bunch of broken. Let's hope an update is out soon that addresses some of these.

”DHH on iPhone 2.0's Glitches” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on July 23, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Apple's iPhone Battery Advice

Merlin — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:32:55 -0400

Apple - Batteries - iPhone

Apple has 11 tips for increasing battery life on your iPhone.

Turn off 3G

Minimize use of location services

Fetch new data less frequently

Turn off push mail

Auto-check fewer email accounts

Minimize use of third-party applications

Turn off Wi-Fi

Turn off Bluetooth

Use Airplane Mode in low- or no-coverage areas

Adjust brightness

Turn off EQ

In a nutshell? Use it as an iPod. But not too often.

NB: there’s appears to still be an instance of “Push” in there. Was the decision to pull that term just for the non-email stuff?

”Apple's iPhone Battery Advice” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on July 23, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Apple Device Security: Big Temptation to Dumb-Down

Merlin — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 13:42:33 -0400

Chairman Gruber recently discovered (via his sharp-eyed reader, Earl Misquitta), that the aforementioned iPhone Remote application can also be used as a virtual keyboard for entering search text, login information, and what have you on your AppleTV. Seeing the typed characters appear on the TV screen as you type them is simply magical. So, if, like me, you’re in the amazingly tiny sliver of the Venn diagram for people who own both these products, this is hugely convenient, and what a welcome trick it is.

As I’ve alluded to before, the AppleTV’s torturous keyboard entry (via the hardware Apple Remote’s 4-way joystick) is abysmal. In 21 uninterrupted years of using Apple products, it’s probably the most consistently frustrating and poorly-designed interface I’ve encountered. I literally hate using it.

The ability to enter text via the superior (but far from perfect) iPhone keyboard is wonderful but it doesn’t and can’t address a deeper problem with the keyboard-challenged devices Apple are focused on vending right now: assy and annoying text entry encourages the use of crap passwords. This is bad, and here’s why.

Sliding backward

We’ve all heard the lectures about not using your ferret’s name as The Single Password™ for everything you do, and my sense is that, over the years, a lot of us have tried to get better about password hygiene — especially as more of our stuff moves into an online cloud.

But my entirely anecdotal opinion is that the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and the AppleTV each tempts their users to slide back to dumbing-down their passwords in exchange for better ease-of-use. The most annoying device in your chain ends up driving the passwords you use for everything. Right now, it’s such a pain to enter a secure password on a device like the iPhone or the AppleTV, that I’m betting a few of you have already fallen back on your ferret. Or “pencil.” Or your ATM PIN.

This is an unbelievably bad idea, but what are the options if this is a device you need to use a lot?

A real-world problem

I’m a fervent 1Password user and (unpaid) evangelist, so I don’t suffer from this conundrum quite as badly when using Safari on the iPhone. 1Password generates and remembers secure passwords for me, then lets me enter them on my phone in a few seconds via a password-protected bookmarklet. Imperfect, but a big step up over nothing.

Of course, I’m still SOL when the iTunes App Store wants me to (again again again) manually re-enter my password in order to download apps on my iPhone. I’m not made of stone. This sucks. I’ll even be the first to admit — solely on the basis of how vexing the AppleTV (and non-Safari on iPhone) password entry is — that I’ve been sorely tempted to move to a more trivial password. But I’ve held out.

If you’re using MobileMe, or Google’s apps like Gmail, or any of the other myriad cloud functionalities that store a lot of personal information, it’s just not worth assuming the risk in return for a bit of convenience.

”Four digits? What a pain.”

To make this nuttiness even more frustrating, every day I watch friends entering 4 or 5 character passwords over an iPhone that they don’t even bother to auto-lock (“Meh, I use it too much. It’d be a pain.”). Understand: this is a portable device on which all their email, contact information, and logged-in web accounts live. They’re one drunken taxi ride away from a potentially significant privacy crisis.

While leaving a phone unlocked in public does blow my mind, I think I understand how we got here. For 30 years now, banking customers have tolerated four-digit ATM PINs because a) they’re convenient, and b) our bank assumes some of the risk associated with replenishing a generic pile of money whenever anything goes wrong. After all, it’s not your money that gets stolen; it’s the bank’s electronic representation of your money. And that’s easy enough to replenish.

But is four digits (or a trivial password) enough to protect your irreplaceable private data? Are you willing to assume that risk? It’s unbelievable that the question even needs to be asked. But, I’m going to say, no. But, that’s where we are right now. In a place where ease-of-use is trumping the good sense we’ve developed to take this shit seriously.

Help a brother out, Apple

I think it’s time for Apple and its users to start treating a device such as the iPhone like the powerful little computer that it really is. That means having to risk introducing some inconvenience and complexity by looking at things like:

Default automatic iPhone locking - make the default an auto-lock of 15 minutes
Make iPhone unlocking easier - consider adding a complex gesture or other “secret knock”
Integrated password management - 1Password is great (I’d say it’s even essential), but Apple should step up to help with the heavy lifting from the moment a device is activated. They made the Keychain; they can make it easier to use on an iPhone
Look into novel text entry - Is QWERTY keyboard entry the only option people will understand? Are those alphabetical monstrosities on the AppleTV really the best they can come up with? Can the boffins in R&D not scare up some less soul-crushing options?
Empowering power users - Even if Apple’s devices ship with the current features exposed in the current default state, I’d love to see Advanced options that can be flipped on by nuts like me. I have to imagine that UNIX nerds, security gurus, and enterprise paranoiacs would welcome the introduction of tougher security. The best and easiest start would be the ability to allow an entirely user-configurable passcode for unlocking. Quick win.

How to Auto-Lock your iPhone

If you’re out and about right now consider doing this on your iPhone:

Go Home, then hit Settings > General
Hit Password Lock and Enter a memorable 4-digit code (then re-enter)
On the Passcode Lock screen set Require Password to After 5 Minutes (or whatever suits you)
Back in General hit Auto-Lock and set it to 5 Minutes (or, again, whatever you prefer)
You’re done; your phone will now lock itself automatically

At least now your screen door is latched. Go, moblog, and prosper with at least a bit more security in your life.

The Question to You

Has iPhone or AppleTV changed your practices around passwords? Any features you’d like to see to make your Apple device more secure?

”Apple Device Security: Big Temptation to Dumb-Down” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on July 22, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

How Hard is MobileMe Really "Pushing"?

Merlin — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 10:43:26 -0400

Apple's MobileMe Lacks True Push Syncing - InformationWeek

According to many users, and as reported by numerous news outlets, Apple MobileMe's implied promise of instantaneous sync between between multiple devices (including, it had been implied, your desktop Mac) is not accurate. Since it appears that syncing from the desktop to anywhere else in "the cloud" can actually take as long as 15 minutes, many are questioning Apple's referring to this functionality as "Push" (as opposed to simply sped-up, automated "syncing"). Marin Perez of InformationWeek writes:

The gripe comes because data entered on their Macintosh or PC address books and calendars isn't immediately pushed to MobileMe's servers.

"Selecting Automatic in Mac OS X allows your computer to immediately sync and update when there are any changes on the MobileMe servers," read a support note on Apple's Web site. "Those changes come from your iPhone, iPod Touch, the MobileMe Web site, or another computer. Changes made on your computer will be synced to the MobileMe 'cloud' every 15 minutes."

You may have shared my slack-jawed gape and consequent fistbump when Phil Schiller's WWDC demo of MobileMe [free iTunes link] implied magically fast, truly instantaneous syncing. Because that's really hard to do well -- and implying MobileMe would enable such a thing suggested mighty technological leaps over the previous .Mac service, whose sync skills and reliability were famously uneven at best.

While most of us won't see our lives fall apart if true Push is not happening on MobileMe, it's still disappointing that Apple implied they were solving a complicated and thorny problem vs. simply speeding up the frequency of syncing via an existing method.

FWIW, this weekend I informally tested MobileMe's syncing skillz on two Macs, "the old iPhone," and via apps on the MobileMe site. Mostly this consisted of creating calendar items with unique date and time stamps and seeing how long it took for them to show up on the different devices. Let's just say the two Macs were, far and away, the pokiest syncers for both incoming and outgoing events.

Mostly I guess I'm just bummed that this wasn't the sufficiently advanced technology that it seemed. I'm sure there's room for improvements and enhancements to MobileMe -- and God know what it took to get that thing out the door in the midst of last week's shitstorm -- but I'm disappointed in Apple. I don't mind the RDF -- a lot of times, it's a fun place to hang out for an hour or two -- but playing fast and loose with terms that mean something in the market they're trying to penetrate is not cricket.

Elsewhere on this issue:

holgr.com » Blog Archive » Apple’s MobileMe - Push or in sync?

Looks like Apple has removed all mentions about push mail from their MobileMe site. It has been removed from the MobileMe Mail features list too. Now your mail is “in sync”. But they forgot the mentioning at their enterprise site, where they are talking about Exchange push mail.

MobileMe not so pushy - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)

That, to me, doesn't sound like "push," it sounds like "sync." The term "push" still applies, however, to me.com email, as that shows up immediately (in my experience, at least.) Calendars and contacts, though, not so much, apparently.

MobileMe's Push Services Detailed, No Mac to MobileMe 'Push' - Mac Rumors

The point of contention comes when changes are performed on your Mac. These changes do not trigger an automatic sync and instead waits until the next scheduled sync which is every 15 minutes:

Changes to Mac -> Me.com (15 minute sync)

Apple has confirmed that this is expected behavior in a Knowledgebase article which has generated some complaints in our MobileMe forums. Alternatively, users can hit the "Sync" menu option at any time on their Mac to trigger a sync at any time.

The Question to You

Was Apple playing lawyerball with the term “Push?” Is this just a marketing disappointment, or are you missing functionality that you were counting on? Is a 15-minute syncing adequate for your needs? And what had you taken away from the MobileMe demo at WWDC? Was Mr. Schiller’s explanation accurate of the service you received? Jump to starting around 1:07:00 of the WWDC Keynote to decide for yourself.

Update 2008-07-16 09:00:04 PDT

Excerpted from a Me.com customer email sent an hour ago:

Another snag we have run into is our use of the word "push" in describing everything under the MobileMe umbrella. While all email, contact or calendar changes on the iPhone and the web apps are immediately synced to and from the MobileMe "cloud," changes made on a PC or Mac take up to 15 minutes to sync with the cloud and your other devices. So even though things are indeed instantly pushed to and from your iPhone and the web apps today, we are going to stop using the word "push" until it is near-instant on PCs and Macs, too.

Classy, well put, and mostly well-explained. Plus, as Dan Moren mentions in comments, they're tossing in a free month of service, owing to a .Mac -> MobileMe transition that was "rockier than we had hoped."

Thing is, it still doesn't help me understand how some of the most competent engineers (or is it marketers?) in California knowingly chose to call this functionality something that it clearly was not. That still bugs me.

”How Hard is MobileMe Really "Pushing"?” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on July 16, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Apple's Bad Day

Merlin — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 14:44:25 -0400

This is not the Friday Apple had wanted. There's a lot of frustrated people out there right now. A quick survey of the damage so far:

London launch of iPhone 3G marred by software problems

"It just goes dead," said would-be customer Mark Phipps, who left the store frustrated and without an iPhone 3G.

Macworld | iPhone Central | Crowds, activation delays hit iPhone launch

Problems with the iTunes server caused some enthusiasts who had waited in line for hours to walk out of the store unable to use their new iPhones, according to the disgruntled customers.

iPhone launch-o-mess-o-rama | The Macalope: An Apple blog - CNET News.com:

Also, the horny one is seeing reports that the iPhone 2.0 update is now available through iTunes, but it's effectively bricking peoples' iPhone since the Store is down. The update gets installed, but the phone can't reactivate. Probably want to wait on that one, too.

Today @ PC World iTunes Store "Unavailable": This iPod Touch Owner is Stuck in Update Limbo

I'm still locked out of updating my iPod Touch via iTunes. But one thing Apple has managed to do is bill me for Apple App Store software downloaded to my PC earlier this morning. I JUST received an e-mail confirmation my credit card has been billed.

MacNN | MobileMe problems continue, upset customers

Problems began when the company shifted its scheduled downtime for the .Mac/MobileMe transition, moving the end of it to 2AM Thursday. A lack of access continued throughout the day for many customers, however, and as of Friday morning in the US the service is still not fully functional.

And just wardial a few terms on Twitter:

I don't mean to pile on here; I'm just amazed at the perfect storm of issues Apple is fighting today -- and wondering what the hell went wrong. I wonder if it's all related to server scale in one way or another.

It's brutal to watch all this and, at least so far anyway, it feels like a pitiful way to introduce a bunch of enthusiastic new customers to a company that consistently earns its premium from customer experience.

My advice to anyone considering touching any part of this frayed wire today is to stay the hell away. At least until tomorrow or Monday. Wait for things to sort out, back up your .Mac data, and hang out until things start to settle down.

And, if you have a brick, don't play with it. Wait. Don't fiddle. People get weird at times like this and end up doing stupid stuff to make it worse. Just take a walk, have a drink or three, and let things calm down.

And, godspeed my Apple friends who are working on this today. Hang in there, gang. It won't be Friday forever.

”Apple's Bad Day” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on July 11, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

.Mac: Future of a sleeping giant?

Merlin — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 15:52:04 -0500

TUAW Interviews Merlin Mann

My tall, new friend Scott McNulty interviewed me yesterday for TUAW's Macworld coverage -- unintentionally providing me a fine bully pulpit from which to perpetuate my baseless theories and half-baked forecasts about how Apple might eat the lunches of about three different industries over the next couple years.

If they can pull it off, if they can fix .Mac, and if they have the vision to re-imagine themselves as the company who makes your entire digital world safe, fun, ubiquitous, and flawlessly integrated.

Anyhow, on with the motley, but stay tuned after the jump for value-added hand-waving.

So, exactly what the hell nonsense am I talking about here?

[Admission: This is a super-fast first draft of an admittedly far-fetched idea that's still taking shape, but I really wanted to get it out of my head while it's still fresh-ish]

As the record shows, I'm practically useless as a technology forecaster, but I can't help feeling that Apple is slow-broasting some really interesting changes over the next year or two, centering around the currently enfeebled .Mac service (cough, cough, cough).

In a nutshell, based on products and services -- both released and announced -- as well as opportunities presented in the marketplace, I wouldn't be surprised to see any or all of the following changes from Apple (roughly in order).

Basic .Mac services will not only become free, but they may be required in order to take full advantage of future functionalities.
For the majority of .Mac power users who want more of whatever the offerings are at a given time, modest to crazy-expensive upgrades will be available.
.Mac will expand in several directions over time, to include:
- Order of magnitude more storage on pay accounts
- Automated backups (via something like Mozy)
- "in-the-cloud" hosting of all your Mac stuff, including "~/Library/" contents; music, photos, and videos; plus every document you ever make.
The Preference syncing in .Mac now will be taken to the next level, to a point where a tweaked window view here is also reflected there (ala Migration Assistant?)
In sum, .Mac will become your secure Home directory. Or, more properly, it becomes the master copy from which all your hardware, hard drives, and flash media will in some fashion be synced.

But, why?

Well, in essence, your Mac Pro, your MacBook Air, your iPhone, your iPods nano and shuffle, and your Apple TV would all become agents for using the stuff you've stored on .Mac. Heavy (invisible, background) use of rsync-like diffs-syncing (ala Time Capsule?) will ensure that all your devices have the stuff they need, and in the appropriate size and format; e.g., 720p version of Weekend at Bernie's 2 goes to the TV; more modest size goes to the iPhone, etc. The value and attraction to consumers strikes me as obvious; on the same day, your electronic world becomes ubiquitous, backed-up, and very easy to maintain or access from anyplace.

If this is anywhere near do-able, Apple would be taking the concepts behind Spotlight, Time Machine, iTunes, and Smart Folders to their logical conclusion, creating an environment where Apple sits at the center of all your electronic needs, contextually syncing and serving what you need, when you need it, in a totally seamless fashion.

In conjunction, I'll bet we're going to see an explosion in alliances with companies like Google (for online apps), plus a heavy push for companies like Amazon and Disney to build iPhone apps that will leverage access to both the cloud and your increasingly PayPal-like .Mac account. ("Buy the song I just heard on this Disneyland ride, deliver four sets of Mickey Mouse ears to our hotel room, plus show me the best vegan snack within 5 minutes' walk of where I'm standing").

Think about it: a new lightweight laptop with a small hard drive; an iPhone that's getting dangerously close to becoming a remote for your home and life; an Apple TV that doesn't even require a computer; an iPod Touch that (rather mysteriously) now needs your credit card info and a login to get new apps onto the device. Then, fold in a couple big spoonfuls of the company's clearly increasing interest in becoming the people who sell or rent you the entertainment media that goes on all the machines you bought from them. I dunno.

I suppose it's my (still congealing) contention that right now, Apple deliberately keeps .Mac a dim-witted, sleeping giant. It's so unsexy, broken, and behind-the-times right now as to seem like a product out of a less forward-thinking company.

But what happens when that giant wakes up, stretches, and then starts standing in the middle of every single product Apple (and its partners) have to sell? It's so mind-boggling to consider the implications, especially given that it stands as one of the few persuasive explanations for why such a smart company would stay so quiet for so long about allowing a premium pay service go to seed this badly.

I think something is up. Big time.

But, what do you think?

Am I high? Will Apple make .Mac the center of their consumer offering? Or will it just continue to frustrate its paying customers until Google replicates all its services for free? What did you see in the tea leaves after the keynote?

”.Mac: Future of a sleeping giant?” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on January 18, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

MacBook Air: Specific Machines, Specific Uses

wood.tang — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 12:03:12 -0500

The new MacBook Air announced at yesterday's Macworld keynote doesn't disappoint; it's pretty much the laptop I've wanted ever since I stupidly broke my 12" Powerbook trying to replace the hard drive. All things remaining the same, I'd buy it simply for the difference in weight, a full two pounds less than a MacBook. As someone who's put a lot of miles on his kicks with a laptop bag on his shoulder, that would make a world of difference.

What's interesting though, is what the MacBook Air isn't: it's not simply a sexier MacBook Pro on Jenny Craig, it's a different class of machine. John Gruber rightly points out that it's clearly designed as a secondary machine for people who do their heavy lifting on a desktop. Without another machine standing by at home or the office, only a select group of geeks could really get by without an optical drive, not to mention the diminished overall specs of the MacBook Air may not please a power user without reinforcements (a.k.a., the folks willing to spend upwards of $2000 on a laptop).

What Apple seems to be increasingly good at is designing machines with a specific purpose in mind. Rather than differentiating their products on matters of style or incremental horsepower like so many PC manufacturers, they make you look at their stuff and say, "I want one of those, and I want to use it for this." In the case of the MacBook Air, it's made for travelers, commuters, and other wandering souls who want a slim machine for checking email, web browsing, writing, and maybe some lightweight coding while they're away from the mothership. For the people who want to use a laptop as more of a primary machine, there's an obvious choice in the clearly differentiated MacBook Pros, or even MacBooks.

The same goes for the Apple TV, which I was glad to see get a new lease on life. I love mine, and I'm happy that it won't be relegated to the ghetto of second-hand eBay trading and parts hacking, at least for another year. Apple could have chosen to discontinue it and market, say, the Mini + Front Row as a multimedia computer suitable for attaching to a home entertainment system, a la Windows Media Center, but instead it chose to put its money a device that is specifically designed for doing so, not just a general purpose computer with a few remote control-friendly screens pasted on front.

To return to the same note I always manage to hit here, the key is simplicity. Apple makes it easy for people to simplify their computing environment--"I use my iMac for this, I use my iPhone for this, I use my Apple TV for this," etc, etc. I made a promise to myself that I'd stop buying computer gear without a specific purpose in mind for it, and I'm not currently in the laptop market because I rarely stray from my home office. But damn if they aren't making me rack my brain for a reason to need one again.

”MacBook Air: Specific Machines, Specific Uses” was written by Matt Wood for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on January 16, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Back to MacBreak Weekly with Episode 70

Merlin — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 12:40:51 -0500

MacBreak Weekly 70: Happy Life Day!

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Alex Lindsay, Andy Ihnatko, Chris Breen, Merlin Mann, and Scott Bourne

It's the Macbreak Weekly Year Ender!

Here's a direct MP3 download of MBW 70.

And here's linkage to a few of the things I mentioned (adapted from this episode's show notes):

MenuCalendarClock from Objectpark Software is a a handy and functional way to get at your iCal task list from the menu bar. ($19.95)
Remote Buddy at IOspirit.com looks like a very cool way to run your Mac from your iPhone. I was chickenshit to finish the install after seeing something about "Kernel insertion". Anybody tried it? (19.99 EUROS)
FlexTime from Red Sweater Software is a swell multi-timer that's an awesome tool for procrastinators (from 7/2006: "2 OS X timers to watch: Flextime & Meridian"). ($18.95)

And, of course, here's the full, 2-hour version of the truly unbelievable Star Wars Holiday Special.

Happy Life Day, indeed.

”Back to MacBreak Weekly with Episode 70” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on December 26, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Amazon launches sale of DRM-free MP3s

Merlin — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 17:35:30 -0400

Daring Fireball: The Amazon MP3 Store and Amazon MP3 Downloader

Given the Amazon MP3 Store’s audio quality, prices, and user experience, I can’t see why anyone would buy DRM-restricted music from iTunes that’s available from Amazon. And given that Amazon is quite a bit cheaper than iTunes Plus, you might as well check Amazon first. I plan to.

I'm with Gruber -- this is a welcome and fan-friendly addition to the marketplace. And, frankly, I'm glad there's finally somebody out there who can really give Apple some competition in this area.

One thing: I'm surprised that MP3 sales links aren't yet mixed into regular CD sales pages. That must certainly be high on their TODO list. Because Amazon's Google juice is strong as hell, and on the day they put "Buy This Track Now" onto a few dozen thousand PR5+ music pages? Well. That may be the day Apple gets to really see what competition in this space looks like.

”Amazon launches sale of DRM-free MP3s” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on September 25, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"