Firefox 3 'Download Day'

Don't forget to download Firefox 3 today and assist Mozilla's aim to set a Guinness World Record for software downloads!

This is the most Mac-like iteration of Firefox yet, mostly due to an extensive, and long overdue, rewrite of the code; to benefit from modern Apple technologies, such as Cocoa, and fix enduring bugs! Code optimisations, paving the way to a 64-bit future, aside. The 'most visited' bookmark feature "adds value" to the browsing experience!

The Firefox Release Candidates (RC) 1-3 rapidly replaced Safari as my default browser, which I hope is recommendation enough!

Moshi Monsters MoPods launch 'give-away'

Moshi Monsters launches and brings a virtual world of adoptable pet monsters to life

Mind Candy, the award-winning creators of global Alternate Reality Game game Perplex City, this week launch Moshi Monsters, their brand new virtual world for little kids and big kids alike. After 4 months in private beta, Moshi Monsters is opening up to everyone for free on April 16th at http://www.moshimonsters.com



Players adopt their own Monster and keep it happy by solving the daily puzzles that it sends them. Monster owners can interact with their pets in a wide variety of ways such as tickling, playing games, shopping, designing their rooms, and dressing up (coming soon). One of the core elements of Moshi Monsters is the emotional bond created between the user and their Monster which is achieved through sophisticated flash animations and a complex behavioural engine. Over time the Monsters develop their own unique personalities depending on how well, or badly, they've been treated.

There are many ways players can connect and communicate with others such as the Friends tree, visiting other Monster's rooms, and leaving customised Pinboard messages. During development child safety online has been kept at the forefront of the Moshi experience.

The more attention a Monster gets from it's owner and their friends, the higher its Monstar status rises. All Monsters start as Z-Listers and can rise through the ranks to become A-List Monstars.

Moshi Monsters is played in the browser and requires no download. The game is free to play, although a subscription feature for premium elements will launch in the future, as well a range of offline products.

Michael Acton Smith, CEO of Mind Candy said, “Playing games and chatting to friends are two of the most popular activities for children online. Moshi Monsters provides these experiences in a safe environment while also helping children learn through the puzzle games and educational elements”.

I was lucky enough to receive an adoption code, ahead of the public launch, and created my very own Moshi Monster! Meet iBoggy, named after The Legend of Boggy Creek (Wikipedia)! He's one cool monster with added Web 2.0 style: you can add your Moshi Monster to Facebook and bebo!

To mark the launch of Moshi Monsters, my fantastic friends at Mind Candy are offering readers a chance of winning three full sets (of six Monsters) of Moshi MoPods!



To enter for a chance of winning these really cool prizes, please leave a comment on this post. The competition closes May 31st 2008 and the winners will be randomly selected by me. My decision will be final! Good luck.

Special thanks to Mind Candy for supplying the competition prizes.

If you enjoyed reading this post subscribe by RSS! I'll be running further 'give-away' contests throughout the spring and summer.

Wii Board

Have you downloaded Wii firmware 3.0E, via software update, yet? If not, you're missing out on the following improvements and today's fix for the Opera browser and Wii LAN Adapter stability!

Channels:
*Digital Clock added to the Wii Menu right under the channel bar
*Forecast Channel now displays the current condition directly in the Wii Menu in the Forecast Channel box
*News Channel can now show 2 scrolling headlines at a time in the Wii Menu, 3 when you click on the button
*Message Board now has the "Today's Accomplishments" message as a white message which allows it to stand out from other messages
*Address Book entries can now be shifted around using A+B but only to empty spaces.
*Calendar in Message Board no longer shows "Today's Accomplishment"
*Scrolling messages in the Message Board now uses a different sound

Wii Shop Channel
*New Welcome screen detailing 4 Recommended Titles and the points they cost. The title bar can be clicked on to bring up a list of 20 recommended games.
*Titles You've Downloaded was moved to the main shop menu
*New ways to browse
*Popular Titles
*Newest Additions remains the same
*Search for a title which can use partial names
*Search by Category
*Search by Publisher
*Search by Genre
*System shows the different systems and how many titles have been released under each

Settings
Pre-system update warning details that technically modified consoles may cease to function upon being updated. Also the only way to not accept an update is to power down the console by holding the button for 4 seconds.

The most exciting unconfirmed development, specifically for peripheral junkies, is purported support for a USB keyboard within the Wii Shop! Time to connect my Apple keyboard to Wii.

Jedi Master of My Domain

We all know that new iMacs are on their way today. Therefore this post will be self-indulgent and focus on the very blog that you are reading!

Blogger introduced custom domain name support in January 2007! This blog has been online for over 3 years and, somewhat belatedly, I've finally registered a domain name:

http://www.generationstarwars.com/

Redirection from http://johnhood.blogspot.com/ is automatic (what's called a 301 permanent redirect). But apologies, in advance, for any technical issues in the short-to-mid term. I've not experienced any issues using the following browsers Opera, Safari, Firefox or IE 7 (in Windows Vista Home Premium).

Subscribers to my RSS feed - powered by FeedBurner - do not have to make any changes to their subscription! Matt Shobe, at FeedBurner, confirmed that my decision to change the source feed from

http://johnhood.blogspot.com/atom.xml

to

http://www.generationstarwars.com/atom.xml

was correct. RSS goodness is uninterrupted.

I'm feverishly working on ways to minimise the impact of a domain name change on my search engine rankings - old Google PageRank was 4 (on the cusp of 5), new PageRank is 0. However, I'd encourage anyone setting up their site, who intends to blog frequently and in the longer term, to register a domain name as soon as possible! Maybe even prior to your blog going live or increased marketing activities.

Lastly, remember to create a new sitemap for your new domain and remove the existing one as Google may remove your site(s) from its search engine - duplicate content is a no, no!

Wii A Minute

Amazon.co.uk's initial allocation of Nintendo Wii consoles sold-out within seven minutes yesterday!

The scheduled 9:00AM (GMT) start was delayed until 9:38AM (GMT) due to the sheer number of site visitors (all hitting browser refresh or using a clever Firefox extension). This unprecedented event has garnered considerable global press and television coverage.

"We expected a high number of people to visit the site but the response was phenomenal," said James Schall, videogame manager for Amazon UK. "It's the fastest-selling pre-order item we have ever encountered - even eclipsing Harry Potter and Coldplay."

I'd like to thank all my readers who purchased a Wii console, games and accessories via my Amazon.co.uk associate links. Your support is very much appreciated and, most importantly, at no additional cost to yourself!

Mario Warez

Amazon UK has confirmed dispatch of my eagerly awaited Polar Ice DS Lite. In anticipation of its arrival tomorrow and some quality time playing Mario Kart DS, Mario 64 DS and Metroid Prime: Hunters. Here's a Wii post!

Whilst I applaud Nintendo's decision to include the Virtual Console in its next generation games machine - the download service will feature classic titles from past Nintendo consoles (from the NES to the N64) as well as from formerly competing systems, such as the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis and PC Engine/TurboGrafx 16 - what impact (if any) will this have on the emulation market?

What intrinsic value (aside from legalities) is there for a paid-for download service, when ROMs and software emulators can be (relatively) easily obtained online? Yes, Nintendo (and third party companies) can issue suits (and have done so to protect their intellectual property).

In terms of mainstream consumers there's little doubt that the service will be a boon: finding and maintaining emulators and working ROMs is time intensive. And perhaps Nintendo will offer value-added features such as full screen anti-aliasing and extra levels for example?

Of course customization is part and parcel of emulators such as NESCafe and Genesis Plus. So, to the PokeROMs community there's perhaps zero benefit. I, for one, will support Virtual Console as long as the UI compares favorably with Apple's iTunes Music Store experience.

Is it too late to change the pervasive all you can eat (for free) culture?

Opera 9 has been announced and their DS browser debuts in Japan.

Introducing RSS 2.0

On Monday night I noticed that Blogger had soft launched RSS feeds in addition to Atom! This had been reported as early as May 31st! Until now RSS was only available to Pro Blogger users and via services such as FeedBurner.

In anticipation of new enabling technologies, from today I've switched (on both blogs) the FeedBurner Full and Summary Feeds source from Atom to RSS. There is no need for existing subscribers to resubscribe. Apologies for any transient service bumps, bruises, cuts and grazes.

At time of writing there is still no official announcement from Blogger!

Google adds another peice to the GooOS puzzle. Firefox users can now download Google Browser Sync! I'll soon be cancelling my .mac account and trashing Microsoft Office in favor of Writely and Google Spreadsheets!

Sony's Boombox

Sony continues to empower the PSP. As a member of SCEE Press Office I received the latest announcement with great interest.

Apply the update. Then grab the instrumental (MP3) version of Def Track's single Don't Judge A Book By Its Cover to play on the ubiquitous portable. I'll post a 'live' version soon.

Latest Firmware Upgrade Available for Download Now

London, 25th April 2006 – Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) today announced that the latest firmware upgrade for PSP, available now, would dramatically enhance the capabilities of the PSP™ (PlayStation® Portable), with the ability to now playback most popular music file formats, stream podcasts to the PSP and save them to Memory Stick, and display Flash® content in the internet browser. The latest upgrade also prepares PSP to act as a receiver for Location-free TV, the exciting innovation in remote TV viewing to be launched by Sony in Europe in May.

As part of the continual upgrade and enhancement programme that ensures PSP owners are able to exploit the cutting edge of entertainment technology and functionality, the latest firmware upgrade (Version 2.70) allows users to enable Flash within the PSP browser and enjoy web content created with Adobe Macromedia® software. Mainly used for website content featuring multimedia and interactive applications, the Flash capability of the browser will significantly enhance users’ multimedia internet experience.

With the RSS feature enabled, the PSP system can link to audio content on Web pages that provide RSS-distributed audio content. When connected to the Internet via the PSP’s WLAN, the system will automatically update the list of audio content items that have been added to these pages, and you can then either stream and play the new content or, with the new firmware enhancement, save it to a Memory Stick Duo™ for playback later.

The latest upgrade also now provides PSP music file compatibility with the most popular music file formats, including MP3, ATRAC, AAC and WMA, providing the PSP entertainment system with one of the most versatile music players available.

With the 2.7 upgrade the PSP will also be prepared to act as a receiver for the revolutionary Sony innovation, LocationFree™ TV. LocationFree is a completely new way of seeing TV. Instead of going to the television set, the TV comes to you (via your home TV tuner) wherever you are. You can watch live TV, play back recorded programmes and even set up future recordings, all from your PSP. LocationFree will be available in UK, France, Germany, Belgium and Netherlands from May 2006.

Together with a wide range of free content to enhance the entertainment value of your PSP, the latest firmware upgrade can be downloaded directly to the PSP browser via WiFi or from www.yourpsp.com from Tuesday 25th May 2006.

Left To My Own Devices

The following chronicles my web exploration and site building exploits. The original article appears here.

Before Google
For anyone who maybe remotely interested. My online adventures began in the summer of 1995. A friend and I spent a leisurely Sunday afternoon in Bournemouth University's main library surfing the net using Netscape 3 Gold (back in the days before the advent of 'free' browsers and IE domination).

The first site I ever visited was Sony USA. And the first search (using Yahoo!) was for actress Winona Ryder. Does anyone remember this site from Eric Harshbarger?

http://www.auburn.edu/~harshec/WWW/Winona.html/

After graduation, and now in gainful employment at Reuters Business Information (RBI), I signed-up with AOL UK (1997).

Google Earth
In the spring of 1998 Macworld UK magazine carried a free copy of Claris Homepage on a cover CD.

Claris Homepage may have lacked the 'killer' features of GoLive and sexier Dreamweaver (the de facto WYSIWYG), but it was simplicity itself, and, above all, no hefty price tag if the medium left me cold. So, whilst off work and suffering from flu, I started to put together an inaugural web site: an eclectic mix of original work and pop culture commentary (Buffy, Party of Five and Dawson's Creek had captured the zeitgeist of the day). This went live on AOL within a week. The first 50 hits came soon after!

By 1999 AOL UK had all but alienated its Mac customers due to tardy application updates and lacklustre support, and I searched for an alternative ISP and web host.

Things That Make You Go Hmmmm
Regrettably this was a time prior to the wonder known as the SuperDrive (CD/DVD burner). Despite owning an Iomega Zip 100 Drive the notion of regularly backing up critical data (on my trusty Performa 5200) had yet to enter my design DNA. In a move that would cost me two-years of web development (including graphics, text et al), I accidentally deleted my offline site. For the record let it be noted that Microsoft's Outlook Express 4.x (for Classic OS) should take some of the responsibility too!

The next two years went by and I couldn't muster any enthusiasm to rebuild the site from scratch - work and the transition from Classic OS to OS X took their toll. Then a friend asked me why I hadn't setup a new site? The honest answer was creative apathy. Apologetically I loaded Adobe PageMill 3 (included with my iMac DV SE) and...

Step By Step
Adobe offered registered PageMill 3 users a free upgrade to GoLive 5! In the space of a weekend (burning the midnight oil as-it-were) I'd assembled a basic site and uploaded this to my iTools (.mac) iDisk after some trial and error (mostly the latter) - there were no tutorials explaining how to use original templates and requests (to other iTools webmasters) for help went unanswered. Where had the sense of community gone?

Once I rolled out the site (2.x) the next phase was to promote reciprocal links, SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and consider affiliate marketing (pays the hosting bills and adds a high degree of editorial responsibility on my part).

American Idol
A cute recollection. I'd applied to join The Iconfactory's deskbase in 2003. That same afternoon I received a confirmation, from Mindy Weaver, warmly welcoming me to their extended family. At the time Kelly Clarkson's 'Moment Like This' was playing on the radio.

Express Yourself
By 2004 this site had come of age and I could no longer ignore the allure of the brave new frontier: blogging + RSS (Really Simple Syndication).

Although blog templates are often criticised for their homogeneity, ease of use and extendibility far out way any negatives. Critical code updates can be applied to an entire site sans the time-consuming tedium of modifying each page individually. This leaves authors to focus on 'content'.

Think About The Future
2006 and, now that the blog is well established (Buffy and Dawson have graduated out of our lives), it's time to revisit this site again replete with a new 'bag of tricks'! The incumbent GoLive has made way for the sassy Macromedia Studio 8 triple threat (Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Flash).

What "dreams" may come?

Forbidden Planet

Please checkout my Flickr photostream! A photogenic collection of mint movie and television memorabilia is now available for your perusal. From Batman to Clone Wars cartoon and Masters of the Universe. Justice League Hot Wheels and rotocasts to follow.

Flock me! You must try this new branch of the feted Firefox browser. Because this is a Developer Preview, bleeding-edge caveats apply.

The holiday promotion switches into high gear. Shop windows and television commercials are ripe with yuletide cheer! And I heard my first seasonal song Andy Williams' It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year in-store!

Geometric Gaming

The GameCube has clocked up a few miles in its first week. An interesting fact for anyone who maybe mulling over a purchase and requires Digital A/V support. The following is an extract taken from Nintendo's support pages:

The Digital A/V Output port was removed from systems produced after May, 2004 (these systems will have a model number of DOL-101). If you have a Nintendo GameCube without this port, and you wish to play your games in progressive scan, you may be able to obtain a system that was made prior to the removal of the Digital A/V Output port. Please call our Consumer Service department at 1-800-255-3700 to discuss available options.

Additional Information:

Why have you removed the component video feature from the Nintendo GameCube?
On newer models of the Nintendo GameCube, we opted to remove the Digital A/V out port from the system because we found that less than one percent of all Nintendo GameCube players used this feature.

Will future Nintendo GameCube games continue to have the progressive scan feature?
About one-third of licensee-published titles and over 90% of Nintendo-published titles currently have the progressive scan feature. We expect that most Nintendo-published titles will continue to support progressive scan. Each licensee will continue to make the decision of whether or not to include this feature in their future games.

In order to reduce costs and increase profit margins it is not unusual for consumer electronics companies to simplify production. Sony made changes to the PlayStation and my model lacked S-Video connectivity. The good news is that I can confirm that the Limited Edition Resident Evil GameCube has a model number of DOL-001 and not DOL-101. Incidentally, DOL refers to the console's codename. Dolphin.

My fiendish friends at The Iconfactory, are unleashing seasonal GUI ghoulishness in time for the season of the witch. Grab those disgustingly delicious icons, dim the lights and play the Castlevania and Resident Evil franchises.

The ultimate browser-based feed reader is to be found in Google Labs. A Gmail account adds further razzle dazzle.

A glutton for punishment. I'm already preparing a DVD review of Battlestar Galactica (2004) Season 1! "It's the things I do for you..."

"One more thing..." There is much speculation regarding next weeks Apple event. I'm going to go out on a limb (as is my duty) and suggest that there maybe a new product line introduced. A PVR based on Intel?

Street Smarts

After a nine-month wait European consumers can now enter the fourth space. Say hello to Sony PSP. Want one? You'll need to get in line, I'm afraid.



Photo reproduced with the permission of the copyright holders SCEE.

In keeping with the Sony theme. Lets focus on their music (software) group and a confession. I listen to Jessica Simpson! Before you flame me. In 1999 I received her debut CD (as part of a larger package) from a US-based friend: Jessica's vocal range and control impressed. Prior to this, Sony had included "Did You Ever Love Somebody" (performed by Jessica) in the first Dawson's Creek soundtrack compilation. So, I was already a convert. MTV's Newlyweds introduced us to her solipsistic lifestyle and has become appointment television (Pepsi floater optional).

Last weekend Michael and me perused the shelves of MVC. The subject of Madonna's next album arose: I had no idea about the forthcoming release of Confessions on a Dance Floor! Madonna sagaciously appears in the new commercial for Motorola's ROKR iTunes phone. The new single "Hang Up" is also premiered during the advertisement. Does this mean that her back catalogue will shortly be made available on the iTunes Music Store? Madonna's lucrative deal with Microsoft (under the Windows Media brand) always struck me as spurious and inherently limiting. Maverick (co-founded by Madonna) artists were introduced last year.

Sweet syndication Batman! Last night FeedBurner got a face-lift and now my Flickr photos are spliced into the feed. The guys and gals at FB are a talented bunch. I'm delighted to have partnered with them. I urge all site managers, overseeing rich media feeds, to do the same. Incidentally, Flickr Uploadr is now at version 2.0.

Firefox fans are in for an early Halloween treat this year. Version 1.5 should bow on October 28th. For further information and news on the Public Preview Beta, point your browser here.

360° of Separation

Thursday was Mum's Birthday. So, we took her (with a care nurse) to Budleigh Salterton (an affluent Devon seaside town) and were treated to an ice cream courtesy of Uncle Allan. Next stop Dawlish.

For generations Budleigh has been favored by both sides of the family - my parents pencilled it in as a potential retirement destination. A most enduring memory was peering into the window of It's A Small World and spying a Speeder Bike, Biker Scout, The Emperor's Royal Guard, Leia Organa (Boushh disguise) and Jabba the Hutt Playset (1983).

Now that Microsoft has announced the price points of both Deluxe and Core Packs for Xbox 360, I'm in a consumer quandary! The proposition of a wireless PowerPC games console is most enticing; even one sourced from Redmond (just joshing Bill). The biggest pre-order hurdle is that I couldn't sell my original Xbox on eBay* (due to the 'fire' hazard) to offset the investment in new hardware. If Microsoft could broker a deal then Dead or Alive 4 may yet fall into my hands this upcoming holiday season.

Remember Super Cycle (1986) from hardware and software luminaries Epyx (creators of Atari Lynx)? The nearest the Commodore 64 got to Sega's Hang-On (1985). These days, whenever I'm in need of an arcade thrill ride (a la arcades at Britannia Pier, Great Yarmouth), nothing comes close to the exhilarating Super Hang-On (1987) courtesy of MacMAME. Asphalt-action ably underscored by Tangerine Dreams' theme from Street Hawk played really loud.

Roxio's Toast Titanium 7 debuts August 31st. Standout improvements include DivX HD and PSP encoding, Motion Pictures HD and iLife Browser. I'll be reviewing this updated application, which negates the need to purchase Roxio's Popcorn, in an upcoming post.

[*Since trading on eBay sales have been brisk. Thank you for your custom.]

True Lies

First day of a new month and I was invited to spend it, on Exmouth beach, with relatives. The endless sand dunes evoked memories of playing with (and inevitably losing) Action Force/GI Joe and Star Wars figures - Hyena Tank (Cobra H.I.S.S.) and AT-ST attacking a Rebel seashore encampment. The rock pools contained untold terrors that reached their zenith with the advent of 1984's The Bluebottle or Portuguese Man-of-War invasion. This became an infamous urban legend! Out to sea? You'd better ask Police Chief Brody, Quint and Hooper!

The above recollections jolted a childhood faux pas made at Budleigh Salterton. A friend lost his Muton action figure (a repainted Deep Sea Diver with the helmet resculpted to allow for the radar, gun, and eye piece to be stuck on.) after he'd carelessly left it in his bucket. This had become a temporary home for a dying squid! Thankfully, I had a spare Muton (in my toy collection) and the tears soon stopped. A close call.

Although my encounters with sharks have been limited to marine aquariums and a basking shark (face to face whilst boating in Spain). The weekend we were in Hayle, a mako was spotted in St. Ives shadowing a group of children who were undertaking a surfing lesson. The instructor took them to safety because the mako is a predator and is known to attack humans in shallow water.

Successfully bid on the rarest Masters of the Universe exclusive: a ToyFare 2003 Faker MIB. No, I didn't pay an extortionate price. The key is patience and track auctions.

Dream Arcades has announced an official licensing deal with the MAME™ developers to include MAME™ software! Fans of arcade classics will be able to order arcade cabinets (including StarROMS) in time for the holiday gift giving season. If anyone gets stuck for gift ideas, then you know what I want under the tree this year aside from an automatic transmission Mercedes-Benz Convertible!

Within a month or so SCEE will release the much vaunted PSP. This may sport the recent OS update and include the browser out-of-the-box. I'm really looking forward to reviewing the first clutch of software releases.

Bells & Whistles

Reburnt and resynced my FeedBurner Feed and added Feed Image Burner. This should display the following promotional GIF in popular RSS Readers.



iPodderX is now downloading and updating posts correctly again. Safari 1.3 (and above) and Opera 8.0x browsers continue to 'leak' hyperlink code into the RSS Reader sidebar (formerly Post Editor). The latter's page rendering is now comestically pleasing.

Looking forward. iTunes Music Store podcast publishing elements should be fully integrated as early as this weekend.

Andy Warhol

Last night I had a bit of free time and whipped-up a possible cover (based on iTunes recommended specifications - 170 x 170 pixels square at 72 dpi) for a podcast demo (taken from my video major December Duet, 1996).



The original December Duet video cover wasn't archived as a photoshop file (and, if so, it was deleted long ago), therefore I traced the original Frankenstein font (from Corel) and approximated the color.

To facilitate future podcasts, I've added FeedBurner and new content aggregators to the blog. On May 14 2004 my FeedBurner account was created and there was no impetus to incorporate the feature until now. OK, I was a blog newbie and the code was outside my comfort zone.

Thanks to those friends who submitted browser display feedback. Safari 1.3 (and later) leverages new WebCore frameworks, and this is causing cosmetic problems with the Syndication sidebar. I've sent a bug report to Apple. Please use Firefox.

Do you Yahoo! 360°?

GIF of the gab

Here's my new animated GIF banner. Subject to change.



This is the first animated GIF that I've created in Photoshop. Photoshop's GIF authoring tools are intuitive whether specifying transparency or frame delay in browsers (0.7 seconds). Isn't it great to be spoilt?

Web design is not ideally suited to hot summer evenings. But inspiration knows no such limitation and I've started tweaking my site (4 years old last Wednesday). This is to improve search engine optimization (SEO), safe in the knowledge that I didn't pay a consultant to add a few lines of meta code at a rate of $100 per character!

Reign Of Firefox

At the weekend a Mac-owning friend (thanks Jim) alerted me to an issue with Firefox 1.0.3 and my site. The browser will no longer access any page other than the splash! Unable to find a successful workaround, I filed a report at Bugzilla. The response suggests that the 'fault' is with the html encoding. However, all other browsers work fine! Further detective work revealed that this is an issue with iDisk, and the workaround is to turn off local automatic synchronization and manually mount - drag and drop files. Fingers crossed.

Online Operatic Society

Press coverage of the Abode/Macromedia merger appears to have overlooked Opera! Opera's rendering engine is licensed by both companies and version 8 was released this week. Coincidence? The Mac version is in beta. Page rendering is faster than Safari 1.3 (still stalls on my machine) and the RSS interface is impressive, although the cross-platform GUI is creative potpourri. In an ideal world it would be preferable to use only one browser (fits all), yet you could do worse than the triumvirate of Safari, Firefox (blogging) and Opera in your applications folder. Incidentally, I've given up on OmniWeb (for site development and testing). The developers find themselves in a cul-de-sac!

Always with an eye for bargains and price reductions, last evening I noticed that Amazon UK had dropped the pre-order price of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger from £89.00 to £74.99. To avoid being over charged (as with iLife '05) I cancelled and ordered at the new lower price. With the advent of Tiger, Apple is making greater emphasis on gaming. Could Microsoft's G5 Xenon Development Kit environment (for Xbox 360) be the catalyst?

Nowadays everyone and their pet has a Yahoo! Group. Here's mine.

iTiVo

Like FedEx, Apple, Atari and Google, TiVo has joined that rare echelon of companies with names that have become synonymous with their industry. Today, Americans "tivo" instead of "tape," and 2 million TiVo enthusiasts have forgotten what TV commercials look like. Christmas 2000 TiVo fleetingly took pride of place in my home cinema cabinet! To this day the ghost of 'suggestions' remains to haunt its temperamental successor sky+. So, Apple and Sony please release a co-branded media centre/server before next Christmas powered by Cell and featuring licensed software from TiVo. BTW I'll be one of the first in the queue to buy a PS3 if its browser is based on Apple's WebCore.