Some miscellaneous geek announcements worth mentioning...
Apple has now unveiled the iPhone. Basically everyone was expecting something like this, but this is a whole hell of a lot cooler than anything that most of us were expecting. It looks very similar to an iPod, but runs a slimmed down version of MacOS X with a beautiful interface that covers most of the features from the iPod and then some. It is driven entirely by a touch screen interface, which is one of the reasons it is able to flip back and forth so easily between being a phone and other types of devices like a video iPod. Also, Apple has announced the iTV will now be called Apple TV, and should be available soon if it isn't already. It's a media hub that allows you to connect several computers to your TV seamlessly.
It's about time. EMI, one of the larger record labels, has finally called it quits on their decision to hobble some of their CDs with DRM. They've been screwing around with their customers long enough that maybe, just maybe, it's time to find a new way of protecting the products. You know, something like figuring out ways to cut down on the price and add value to them. Something so novel it might work.
A former Microsoft executive has finally come out and admitted what everyone has known for a while: that Microsoft generally regards its third party developers as mere pawns. I am not sure why this is even news, except for the novelty aspect of it, since this behavior has hardly been disputed before. Microsoft has a horrible habit of encroaching on other major markets, while not working hard enough to secure its existing ones. In fact, were it not for the Windows and Office business units, it'd be largely regarded as a corporate loser. Even their gaming unit is probably still fairly deep in debt, though that will probably turn around thanks to the XBox 360.
And for the anti-environmentalists out there, a MIT researcher has just proved that there really is no environmental benefit to using ethanol, giving current production technologies. Apparently, it takes about as much fossil fuels to make ethanol as it does to make real gasoline. Which reminds me of a funny thing that Rachel noticed. When we switched over to 10% ethanol around here, the gas efficiency of her Acura RSX dropped down by about 10% as well. Dead weight, gotta love it.
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