/dev/null/kevin

This cnet review of Lasonic i931 ipod "dock" is hilarious.  You can see the little ipod nano in the tape cassette bay.

Update: Link fixed!  Here is a second link in case that one goes bad.  No commercial, either.

One of my most popular blog entries (via google and comments) is one about how Apple's iTunes 7.0 broke the competing MusicMatch program (acquired by Yahoo Music).  On Friday I received a trackback comment from Tony Bove that iTunes 7.1 has now fixed the problem.  Yeah!  I verified the fix over the weekend and now have both iTunes and MusicMatch living together in harmony.

Not only is the fix cool, but the blogosphere is working as it should.

Tags:  apple | ipod | itunes | musicmatch

iMbarrassment - noun - The state of being embarrassed by your iPod.

As all iPod users know, to adjust the volume you spin the virtual control wheel.  There are no moving parts, just pressure sensitive pads that detect circular motion.  I use the feature to adjust the volume while leaving the iPod in its soft case or my pocket.

Today I had the iPod in my breast pocket.  For whatever reason I was having trouble adjusting the volume through my shirt.  I spent a good ten seconds making small circles on the iPod... in my shirt pocket...

...which is over my nipple.

Did I mention that I was standing in a public place?  I was.

Here's a tip: rubbing your nipples in public gets you strange looks, even if you really are just adjusting your iPod.  Taking a closer look at the iPod control wheel may reveal the real inspiration for the iPod's award-winning user interface. 

Tags: ipod embarrassment nipple

 Update [12 Mar 2007]: The problem has been fixed iTunes 7.1.  Thanks to Tony Bove for the comment!

 Someone is guilty of some bullsh!t.

Forgive the strong language (lest I become the next Tim Bray), but it's called for.  For many years I have been using Musicmatch Jukebox for playing music on my computer.  I prefer it as a player/ripper over WinAMP and iTunes.  You may disagree with that choice, but hopefully you agree that we should all have a choice.  I do have an iPod and was using iTunes 6 to update it.  iTunes and Musicmatch lived happily together without conflict.  If you don't know, Yahoo! bought Musicmatch and it is now part of  Yahoo! Music.

So, the problem: I recently upgraded to iTunes 7 and suddenly Musicmatch stopped working.  It just bailed with a very generic message to reboot or contact customer support.

Customer support's response was this:

Uninstalling iTuens did "fix" the problem, but it's not really a solution, especially when Musicmatch can no longer update an iPod.  For a while (2002-2003), Musicmatch was the only way to update an iPod on Windows (and in fact, was bundled with the iPod). 

And guess what?  This isn't the first time that this has happened.  Shortly after iTunes for Windows came out (2003) there was a conflict between the two programs.  Installing iTunes disabled Musicmatch's ability to update, or even see, the iPod.

So, who it to blame?  Apple?  Are they intentionally disabling a competitor's product, or just guilty of bad programming?  Maybe it's Yahoo!/Musicmatch.  Is there code to abort if it detects iTunes?  That seems less likely since the same version of Musicmatch was accepting of iTunes 6.

This is the kind of crap that we would have expected of Microsoft during the 1990s, using its market share to bully out the competition.  Has Apple sunk so low?  I want to like Apple.  I want to buy and use their products, but they keep pissing me off.  I don't want to fully convict Apple yet, but things don't look good.

Tags: apple, itunes, ipod, yahoo, musicmatch, monopoly