Thursday, April 06, 2006

Windows or Mac? Apple Says Both- It's happening--We're going to be forced to use Windows one day

Windows or Mac? Apple Says Both - New York Times

Last year Mr. Jobs stunned the computer world by announcing that he would break away from his alliance with I.B.M. and recreate the Macintosh based on Intel microprocessors. It was the switch to Intel chips, long the standard in the Windows world, that opened the door to Mac-Windows harmony.

Through all of these moves, Mr. Jobs has managed to maintain his loyal base of customers. In fact the Macintosh religion can still be palpably felt among those who have remained loyal to the user-friendly computer even as its market share dipped below 3 percent.

"I love the Mac platform, I just hope I won't have to boot Windows even for Photoshop in a few years," Alexandros Roussos, a student at the University of Paris who is founder and editor of the MacCulture network, a group of Web sites for Macintosh enthusiasts.

Wednesday's move also won an important endorsement from Apple's other co-founder, Stephen G. Wozniak, who long ago left the company but remains a vocal Macintosh user and is idolized by the Mac faithful.

"It's a great thing for Apple," he told a reporter by e-mail. "I don't see the earth being rocked, but I can now recommend Apple hardware to a lot more people. One pitch is that if Windows gets too frustrating and unbearable and unsafe, then they can easily switch."

Okay, maybe I'm wrong, maybe it's a good thing. But I see a train a comin', and the Mac folks seem to have gone Hollywood with the IPOD...They can easily slip into selling hardware for Macs and using the Windows software, and cease development and support of the Mac OS.

Colorado State releases Hurricane Predictions for this summer

2006 Hurricane Season Prediction



"Today's 2006 hurricane forecast from the Tropical Meteorology Project at Colorado State University is unchanged from the forecast made in December. Today's report states that 'information obtained through March 2006 continues to indicate that the 2006 Atlantic hurricane season will be much more active than the average 1950-2000 season.'

The project team predicts that 17 named tropical storms and hurricanes will form this upcoming season, which lasts from June through December. In an average year, about 10 storms form in the Atlantic basin; in 2005's record-breaking season, 27 named storms (of which 15 were hurricanes) developed. "

Looks like an active year, but not as bad as last year in basic terms.

Is (Opry) Mills in Trouble?

Mills Cuts 70 Jobs, Trims Building Projects


This story has been developing for several weeks but gets very little press here in Nashville. (I refuse to pay for Nashville Post anymore--something has probably been on that site, but I think their rates are way too high)

The parent company of Opry Mills, the Mills Corp, is under formal investigation by the SEC and that usually means that more announcements and possible setbacks are ahead.

Here's a quote from the Washington Post article:

The cuts, disclosed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing yesterday, bring to more than 160 the number of jobs eliminated since January, when Mills halted work on 10 development projects and admitted accounting errors that will lead it to restate its results for the past five years. Since then, the SEC has launched a formal investigation of the company and Mills has lost billions in market value as doubts have grown about the quality of its accounting.


We've had enough drama out there in the Opryland area in the last 10 years. Let's hope this is nothing but a debits and credits issue and that the company is just in a little bit of a pothole right now.