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About this site

For six years, the Internet Nexus served as my technology blog, but I've since started blogging at the SuperSite Blog instead. If you're looking for the blog, please head there. --Paul

Friday, August 13, 2004

Windows XP SP2 CD

In case you were wondering what it was going to look like...

[ Posted at 2:38 AM | Permalink ]

We have a winner - New Sunbird logo chosen

I really hate the kitchen sink: "A new logo and new icons for Sunbird have been chosen. The winner of the Sunbird logo and icon contest is Mark Carson. You can see his final proposals on the contest page. The winner was chosen by a community vote. Mark won the contest with 59.70% of all votes (40 votes out of 67). Close behind came Suslik with 37.31% of all votes (25/67). Last but not least was Jeff Hottinger whose proposal got 2.99% of all votes (2/67). Thanks a lot to all participants and congratulations to Mark. We hope to see much more of your work in the future. PS: New builds and possibly a first technology preview of Sunbird will be available by the end of August or sooner."

[ Posted at 12:24 AM | Permalink ]

Thursday, August 12, 2004

Airport Express crypto broken by DVD Jon

Boing Boing: "Jon 'DVD Jon' Johansen has cracked the Apple Lossless encryption used by the Airport Express to communicate with iTunes, so that programmers can write tools that use any application and any operating system to send audio to an Airport Express. 'I've released JustePort, a tool which lets you stream MPEG4 Apple Lossless files to your AirPort Express. The stream is encrypted with AES and the AES key is encrypted with RSA.'"

[ Posted at 10:34 AM | Permalink ]

Convergence Kills

Drunken Blog: "Microsoft makes money when people decide they need (and buy) new computers, and people don't buy new computers to be able to browse the web faster ... Apple is playing towards that exact same endgame, but with a twist: they're creating a new light-DRM platform that is riding on top of everyone else's platform. iMacs, Windows, mobile phones, everything. Google is also creating a platform riding on the backs of other platforms... except its based around becoming the access point for all things internet. Apple wants that, but for DRM content. They weren't kidding around with their vision of the computer as a hub for your digital life, they just forgot to mention that the hub will come with a lock. And guess who owns the keys?"

So this is a fascinating article, no doubt about it. It's like a John Gruber article in that it's very long and convoluted, but unlike John Gruber he actually makes some good points and doesn't just beat you up with so much information that you assume he's right (even when he isn't, as is usually the case with Gruber). However, the bit I quoted above is, sadly, a bit questionable. Microsoft and Real, and not Apple, have full DRM platforms. What Apple has is a way to protect music files. It's not a complete solution. It's not extensible. And I can assure you that they are modifying it specifically for Motorola's phones; that is, because Apple didn't build a platform, they will have go back and modify the code manually each time they add a device to the scheme. Anyway... that doesn't mean that this wasn't Apple's plan all along. It just means that its quickness to market with FairPlay will ultimately make it harder for Apple to adapt its scheme to new devices.

That said, there's also a follow-up available. I'll just add one thought as well: People talk about music companies not being able to make money and so on, but remember that the market for cell phone ringtones is the billions annually. This is serious business, folks, and it's pretty clear that when cellphones can store 2, 5, or 10 GB of data, iPods are going to be completely obsolete. And curiously, it is Microsoft, and not Apple, who is poised to participate in that market (thus, Apple's deal with Motorola). You know, maybe Apple not making a PDA (and the resulting PDA-based iPhone) was, in fact, a mistake.

Anyway. That day is some time in the future.

Thanks Matthew.

[ Posted at 10:21 AM | Permalink ]

Wednesday, August 11, 2004

No sales tax this Saturday at three Massachusetts Apple Stores open 24 hours

MacDailyNews: ":Live in or near Massachusetts? If so, you will be able to shop tax free for 24 hours at the Apple Store, Chestnut Hill, the Apple Store, Northshore, and the Apple Store, Cambridgeside. The Apple Store is participating in Massachusetts's Tax-Free Days all day Saturday. Come in and pay no sales tax on individual purchases up to $2500.* There are no exceptions, and there's never been a better time to shop at the Apple Store, according to Apple. The Apple Store will stay open for 24 hours at all three locations to make it easier for you to take advantage of tax-free shopping. So come to the Apple Store between 12:01 a.m. and 11:59 p.m. this Saturday and get a little tax relief. More info and directions to Apple's Massachusetts retail stores here."

[ Posted at 11:43 AM | Permalink ]

Meet the iPod's Intel

Business 2.0: "It isn't a major surprise that the recent initial public offering filing of semiconductor company PortalPlayer got lost in the shuffle. A chip company IPO? In this market? If Google is having trouble stirring up people's passions for tech then why should anyone pay attention to some small semiconductor firm? But PortalPlayer, which filed for its IPO on Aug. 4, bears watching over the next few months. Here's why. PortalPlayer gets most of its business from a Taiwanese company called Inventec. And Inventec is the company that makes this little device that you may have heard -- it's called the iPod. Now do I have your attention? "

[ Posted at 11:41 AM | Permalink ]

Tuesday, August 10, 2004

iTunes Music Store Catalog Tops One Million Songs

Apple: "Apple today announced that the iTunes Music Store now has over one million songs available for download in the US, becoming the first and only online digital music service to offer consumers a million song catalog. The iTunes Music Store features music from all five major record labels and over 600 leading independent labels from around the world. With more than 100 million songs downloaded and more than 70 percent market share of legal downloads for singles and albums, the iTunes Music Store is the world’s number one online music service."

[ Posted at 2:23 PM | Permalink ]

Monday, August 09, 2004

Doom 3 Tweak Guide

TweakGuides.com: "This [is] the mother of all Doom 3 Tweak Guides. Why? Because this one gathers all the known tweaks, and many new ones I've experimented with and documented, all in one place. I can confidently say that if you read this guide, you will find at the very least several major tweaks which you haven't tried before, which can help you improve your performance in Doom 3. The guide covers all the in-game settings in detail, but it also goes into lengthy coverage of many of the all-important advanced console and config commands which will let you eke out as much performance as possible from an already-optimized engine."

[ Posted at 5:38 PM | Permalink ]

Looking Glass Is Closer to Reality

eWeak: "With Sun's decision at the end of June to release its prototype three-dimensional desktop environment, known as Project Looking Glass, under the GPL, the flashy project took the first step toward being more than a fancy trade-show demo. After downloading and installing Release 0.5 of Looking Glass, I can report the project has matured enough to be a fancy demo right in my own cubicle. Following good instructions at [this site], I installed the project code on a machine running Fedora Core 2 and was able to pull up a mini-3-D desktop in which I could pan across the background and flip windows sideways instead of minimizing them."

[ Posted at 5:26 PM | Permalink ]

Apple nixes Mac Publishing's iPodworld name plans

Think Secret: "Mac Publishing LLC, the owner of Macworld magazine, has changed its plans to launch a special edition magazine entitled iPodworld after Apple Computer said it would not give permission for use of the name as a magazine title, sources close to Mac Publishing have told Think Secret. The decision to stop Mac Publishing from using the iPod name -- an Apple trademark -- came after Mac Publishing had already started promoting the magazine. In the August US edition of Macworld, the publisher promoted the magazine as coming to newsstands in August under the title iPodworld. Mac Publishing also promoted the forthcoming iPodworld on the back cover of the show program for Macworld Conference & Expo in Boston."

Yep. Just as I called it.

[ Posted at 5:11 PM | Permalink ]