Bye Bye Blockbuster?

At press time, reports of Apple’s imminent entry into the movie rental business via iTunes are all over the Web, filling pages galore with prognostications of the subsequent demise of Blockbuster and Netflix. Will the popularity of iTunes extend Apple’s digital distribution dominance in music to the towers of tinsel town?

Media stories indicate Fox and Disney have signed on for movie rentals through iTunes, but the lack of selection of movies for sale through iTunes, due to industry resistance to partner with Apple, has so far hampered Apple’s commercial movie distribution efforts.

Hello Expo

Each year at this time, anticipation of announcements during the keynote address at the annual Macworld Conference and Expo brings out the silly in many a Mac user. Expectations flow from the bizarre to the banal as the tickets for a seat in the auditorium for the Steve Jobs presentation become among the hottest items to have in Silicon Valley and San Francisco. While the story of Apple entering the movie rental business may have leaked before the big show, there’s plenty of talk of other major announcements. The conference opens its doors on January 14th with the expo’s keynote address scheduled for the following morning.

Apple TV 2.0

If the first edition of the Apple TV didn’t get you running out to an Apple retail store to make the purchase, there’s talk an anticipated update will at least get you walking fast to a Mac sales Mecca. Combined with a movie rental service, the Apple TV may finally find its niche.

AAPL 200

The week between Christmas and New Year’s Day treated Apple’s shareholders to a special holiday gift. Apple’s share price rose above $200 per share in intra-day activity. AAPL closed 2007 at $198.08 per share. December’s placid share price rise was a pleasant departure from the previous month’s ride and provided comfortable holiday travel for weary AAPL traders.

Rumors 101

It’s the nature of rumors that they become more weird the more frequently they are told. As Santa leaves the scene, winter elves busy themselves with Apple expo rumors. Many of these rumors sound like they dropped off the mythical sleigh on its return to the North Pole. We don’t wish to give rumors credence in our esteemed publication, but they are fun to follow. Watch for the rumors to heat up over the next couple of weeks. It creates its own form of global warming. By the expo keynote, even the elves at the North Pole might find it a bit balmy outside

Pre-Paid iPhone Pizza

Can you imagine driving around town looking for dinner and finding the location and menu of a local pizza parlor on your iPhone? Press a button and the pizza with anchovies and olives is pre-paid and ready for pick-up when you arrive. It’s the sort of imaginings traveling the Apple Web following the publication of a new Apple patent application. Just reading this might make some people hungry already. It’s another way the iPhone and other Apple products may continue to change the world, one pizza pie at a time, while keeping the company rolling in dough.

Innovation Keeps Its Own Time

2007 may be known as the Year of the iPhone, but creativity and ingenuity keeps to its own time. There’s no calendar for inspiration and new ideas but only a calendar for delivery of new products and services that encase or exploit them. January may be the month of new Apple product announcements, but each day, no matter the month, new and innovative ideas for enhancing the personal computing experience come to mind and eventually find themselves in products that come to market. ATPM chronicles how we use technology to better our lives and the world around us. Each issue of ATPM is one more episode in our chronicle of the personal computing experience.

Our January issue includes:

Mac About Town: How Did I End Up Here?

Mike Chamberlain explains why he decided to buy a Treo instead of an iPhone.

MacMuser: Sum Thing Dickered This Way Bombs

A short tale about FileMaker.

MacMuser: Where Next For iPods?

Mark Tennent muses about the future of iPods.

Segments: Grandma’s Life as a Video Star

What do you get when you mix one loving grandma, one video camera, great children’s literature, and a Mac? I call them the “Grandma Videos,” and they’re almost as much fun to make as grandma’s cookies.

Desktop Pictures: Cuba Buildings and Cityscapes

Reader Jennifer Curry offers this month’s desktop pictures from a 2006 trip to Cuba.

Cartoon: Cortland

Angie flashes back to 1984 as she and Cortland face off against Lisa in the Mudrix for a final showdown.

Review: Baseline 1.0.1

Where has all your space disk space gone? Use Baseline to get the answer and take the appropriate actions.

Review: BusySync 1.07

BusySync answers the longstanding lack of two-way calendar sharing in iCal.

Review: Fin Laptop Handle/Stand

A rugged metal stand/handle for recent Apple laptops that does a fine job of cooling down your ’Book.

Review: Iris 1.0.4

Almost like six applications in one, Iris brings features such as TimeLapse and Security Camera recordings to an iSight.

Review: Mellel 2.2.7.1

In spite of several shortcomings, Mellel excels in the control of text appearance, multi-lingual capabilities, and setting up footnotes.