books

Buzz Out Loud 649: How the world ends

EPISODE 649

The eBook takes a page from Harlequin

Sony is really trying to outdo itself this Valentine's Day. Not only is it pushing its "Red Collection," but it's gone back to the well with its eBook promotion from last year. Fortunately since that campaign, which was decidedly unromantic, Sony seems to have gotten a little clearer on the concept. Instead of the stodgy leather-bound Dooney & Bourke version, this time it's going with a SkinIt "Cross Your Heart" cover--in pink, of course. But the real kicker is 14 free downloads of Harlequin romance novels. Now all it needs is some Fabio … Read more

Where do your blog posts go?

Wired has a great interactive info-graphic on the path blog posts take once you hit the "go" button.

You have a blog. You compose a new post. You click Publish and lean back to admire your work. Imperceptibly and all but instantaneously, your post slips into a vast and recursive network of software agents, where it is crawled, indexed, mined, scraped, republished, and propagated throughout the Web. Within minutes, if you've written about a timely and noteworthy topic, a small army of bots will get the word out to anyone remotely interested, from fellow bloggers to corporate … Read more

MacBook Air comes in for a landing

The usually quiet CNET offices were abuzz this afternoon thanks to a new visitor--Apple's MacBook Air laptop. Since its announcement at Macworld last week, this superthin 13-inch system has been conversation topic number one for Apple fans, and after getting our hands on one in person, it's easy to see why.

The Air is incredibly thin, about 0.75 inch thick, even though it occupies the exact same desktop footprint as a regular 13-inch MacBook. Picking it up, the MacBook Air feels a little heavier than you'd expect from looking at it, even though it's … Read more

Why the MacBook Air is a toy with no promise

Over the course of the past week, I decided to wait before making my final decision on whether or not I believed Apple's new MacBook Air would be a success or not. After evaluating the state of the ultraportable market historically (poor) and the specs Apple is doling out with this device, it seems almost too obvious that very few people will be willing to buy this junker.

Let's face it--the MacBook Air is nothing more than a gimmick to make people believe Apple is a trendsetter that knows the best way to bring "cool" products to the masses. But what everyone seems to forget is that this company already has a slew of "cool" products and there's no need for something that's underpowered and overpriced.

Suffice it to say, the MacBook Air is nothing more than a toy that has no promise and will flounder in stores. Why you ask? It's simple.… Read more

Rumor: A multitouch trackpad for MacBook Pro?

According to AppleInsider, the next version of MacBook Pro will be equipped with the same multitouch trackpad as the one on the MacBook Air.

Though this move is about as unexpected as the rising tide, it will be more interesting to see if their claims that the units will appear in a few weeks turns out to true. The new portables will also be based on Intel's latest Penryn processors.

(Source: Crave Asia)

MacBook Air Attack

The Macalope knows the MacBook Air isn't perfect, but the amount of silly punditry it's attracting is seriously out of control.

First, did you know that the MacBook Air Lacks Features, Analysts Say (tip o' the antlers to the Rat Boy)?

It's true! And, according to squirrels, it lacks delicious nuts!

Well, pardon the Macalope for saying so, but dur-hey. He'd have to scroll through keynote again, but he's pretty sure that you don't need analysts to tell you that it "lacks features" because Steve Jobs actually said so. That "lack … Read more

Apple and the rest of us

Is Apple's PR wearing thin?

Sure, there was the MacBook Air and the buzz around "thinnovation." But wasn't that--pun intended--too "thin" for a big media splash, especially compared with past years? Now that MacWorld is over, pundits are reviewing Apple's PR efforts, and when the expectations are so high (and a company is so good at it), it is not too surprising that some are disappointed with what they've seen this year. Frank Shaw, a PR professional at Waggener Edstrom, Microsoft's lead PR agency, is one of them, and you have … Read more

A defensive look at the MacBook Air battery

The new MacBook Air laptop has one killer feature, the non-removable battery. Killer as in deal-killer. As in why would anybody use a laptop that has to be shipped back to the vendor to replace the battery? It boggles the mind. Here's why.

Have any sensitive files on your computer? Files you'd rather other people not see. Many of us do. Do you like the idea of your sensitive files sitting in a package on a UPS truck? Or being in the hands of a company Apple sub-contracted repairs to? Of course not.

Remembering to remove all the … Read more