This is a question I get every now and then, and I finally decided to look into it. As I outline in my latest Macworld article, it’s actually quite simple. This wasn’t the case in the past, as you can see by googling for this subject. You’ll find articles about doing find/replace operations in an XML file to make the move work. I tried it out with the latest version of iTunes, and it’s pretty much transparent.
If you live in a country where you can get Mezzo, the French classical/jazz TV station, there’s a great program tonight. Two concerts by Brad Mehldau, my favorite jazz musician. The first is a solo gig, and the second with his trio.
I have all of Brad Mehldau’s albums, and simply love his music and his playing. If you like piano jazz, and get this channel, tune in tonight.
…I can go through all my Grateful Dead albums and look at the last played date, and find which ones I haven’t listened to in a long time. Dick’s Picks 1, probably the one I listened to most on CD, being the first one of the series I bought back whenever, hasn’t been spun since 2004!
Apple had its annual shareholder meeting yesterday, and, among the other information the company provided was the amount of Apple’s war chest: $40 billion. Apple has long held on to a lot of cash, rather than giving dividends, something that allows the company to maintain share value, but also to take risks.
So that made me think. What kind of risks could Apple take? Would it involve acquisitions, maybe buying out a major company to fuel a new era of growth? Or could it be major new products that might require large investments? Here are some ideas on what Apple might or might not do with this money.
Buy Nokia: With a market cap of around $49 billion, Apple could easily afford to buy a controlling interest in a company like Nokia. While the iPad shows that Apple wants to expand into more mobile devices, it would make little sense for Apple to acquire a mobile phone manufacturer. Apple, at least since the return of Steve Jobs to the company, has always had a pared-down product line. Mobile phone companies, on the other hand, have dozens of different phones, and it would make little sense for Apple to take on that type of complication. Apple has shown that simpler product lines are more effective, so a mobile phone company is probably not what they have in mind.
Buy Sony: Sony has a market cap of only about $34 billion, so Apple could buy them and still have enough change for the toga party that Steve Jobs joked about at the shareholder meeting. But a company like Sony raises issues similar to that of Nokia: a very broad product line, across many categories, which would be difficult to corral into the Apple ethos. So this, too, seems unlikely.
If Apple is to acquire companies, they are more likely to want to pick up companies that will help them make the products they sell now, or will sell in the future. For example, the 2008 acquisition of PA Semiconductor for a mere $278 million, now makes sense. At the time, it wasn’t clear why Apple wanted to purchase this company, but it’s now obvious, with the iPad, that Apple was planning ahead to have its own chips for mobile devices. Also, Apple purchased the Lala music company, which offers streaming and online music storage, for a pittance (less than $100 million). We probably won’t see the fruits of this acquisition for some time, but one can imagine that iTunes will eventually offer a streaming music subscription. Read the rest of this entry »
Meet the Night Owl himself, the incomparable Gene Steinberg, best-selling Mac author and columnist. Get to know Gene, and discover his unique, thought-provoking viewpoints about the technology universe, from the always-fascinating happenings at Apple Inc. to consumer electronics, innovative products and overall trends in the tech industry.
On this week’s all-star episode, author and commentator Kirk McElhearn tells you why he’s working hard to banish Google from his Macs, as he regards the service as potentially harmful to your privacy. That very subject is also covered from a somewhat different point of view by Adam Engst, of TidBITS and Take Control Books. Adam also discusses the surprising success of Macworld Expo 2010, which was held without Apple’s participation.
In another segment, Lee Givens, an AOL Mac product manager, tells you about some of the service’s future plans, and describes their newest application updates for the Mac and iPhone, which include seamless integration with Facebook, Twitter and other popular social networking services.
Robert Richardson is a brilliant man, and an excellent writer. He is the author of three biographies that will stand for decades as the essential works on the thinkers he explores: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and William James. (These are three of the four American thinkers I appreciate most; I only wish he would write a biography about the fourth, Henry James.)
Richardson is especially attuned to the prose of Ralph Waldo Emerson, who might be considered America’s ur-philosopher. In this diminutive book, Richardson looks at Emerson’s writing, and uses him as an example for a style that some other writers may want to emulate. (I say “may”, because Emerson’s style is not for everyone, nor for all types of prose.) Using examples from Emerson’s essays and journals, Richardson gives suggestions about effective writing, but this is not a how-to book. It is more a brief overview (in only about 80 pages) of Emerson’s writing and thought.
This is an essential read for anyone who writes for a living, whether they appreciate Emerson or not. Understanding why Emerson’s writing works can help better appreciate many elements of writing in English. And, perhaps, it may help those who are unfamiliar with Emerson’s work discover his wonderful words and thoughts.
Just thought I’d share; this is how it looks here this morning (this is the view from my office window). It’s been a very snowy winter. We got a foot of snow yesterday, added to a packed foot of snow that was on the ground from a few previous snowfalls in December and January. In the ten years that I’ve lived in the Alps, this is the most snow we’ve had.
Kirk McElhearn is a freelance writer, specializing in Macs, the iPod, iTunes, digital music and more. In addition to having written or co-written a dozen books, he is a Senior Contributor to Macworld magazine, and contributes to several other web sites and magazines. He reviews classical CDs for MusicWeb and audiobooks for Audiofile, and is a translator from French to English. He lives in Guillestre, a village in the French Alps.
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