Goodbye Steve
It was in the early 80’s when I was not even a teen that my father came home with an Apple ][ +, and that is when my life changed. In those days, computers arrived with technical manuals, circuit board schematics, and most importantly, programming guides. I spent hours poring over these manuals.
I quickly realized that if I could tame the computer, I could do anything, and that is when my love of programming began, in Apple Basic on the Apple 2+.
Shooting forward some 30 years or so, I work as a web and IT consultant, I have programmed in more languages than I can remember (off the top of my head, C, C++, Pascal, Java, Delphi, assembler, HTML, ASP/ASP.NET, and of course BASIC).
But it was the Apple 2 that gave me that first insight, and my love of working with computers. It was visionaries like Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Paul Allan and Bill Gates that make this possible. It is not an under-estimation to say that the Apple 2 profoundly changed my life.
Yesterday we lost Steve Jobs, a man who changed the computing world. The man who helped bring us the Apple, mac, iPod, iPhone and of course the iPad. More recently he has been a role model in my work with Toastmasters. He was one of the most inspirational speakers I have ever heads, and his use of slides and visual aids is legendary.
The world is going to be a little different without Steve, I am going to miss him.
Apple to remove DRM copy-protection from ITunes
According to CNET, Apple announced yesterday that they will be removing DRM copy-protection from their entire ITunes store catalogue.
This means that you will be able to purchase music from ITunes, and listen to it on any MP3 player, essentially decoupling ITunes from the IPOD, and making the store available to non IPOD users.
Since I firmly believe that the only future for the music industry is to make it cheaper and easier to legally obtain music than to obtain it illegally, I think that this is a major move in the right direction.
The pricing of music will change, whereby current chart songs will be more expensive and the majority of the catalogue will reduce to 79c per song (the price has been $1 since they start trading about 5 years ago). I am convinced that this is only the first step, and that we can expect further price reductions.
Now, if only Apple will open up the store to users in South Africa…
Apple’s shows distain for Internet Explorer
I received the below message while surfing one of the Apple websites – www.me.com. They are being quite clear about their disdain for Internet Explorer, aren’t they?
Considering that yet another security flaw has been found in IE, and we are being advised to switch to another browser while the flaw is corrected, it is not such a bad message after all.
















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