Apple and Cisco in Talks on iPhone Trademark.

[Technical Note: The site had some “issues” last night so there was no Thursday post. To make it up to you, please accept this post which has been upgraded from “regular recipe” to “extra crispy” and comes with a free soda that you can collect at the Dell Direct Store in your local mall. If they don’t seem to know what you’re talking about, just keep demanding your free soda louder and louder until you get it. Or until mall security arrives.]

Apple and Cisco are reportedly in late talks attempting to salvage a deal on the iPhone trademark before the matter heads to court.

Crazy Apple Rumors Site has a transcript of the latest meeting that provides a heady look into the head-to-head negotiations between these two technology powerhouses.

APPLE: I have been forced to succumb to your childish attempts to get my attention and I now bring an offer I believe you cannot refuse.

CISCO: Unlikely, as your past entreaties have been as meaningless to my senses as the collected works of Rob Schneider. But speak.

APPLE: Hear now my words and witness your own undoing. $750,000, lunch at the fast-food establishment of your choice and the original cloak and blaster from a 1981 Star Wars Jawa collectible action figure. I know you have the action figure but are missing the cloak and blaster! Ah-ha! I have you!

CISCO: Ha! Again we see that there is nothing you have that I want, whereas something precious to you is in my possession. For I traded the Jawa for a cloak and lightsaber for my Luke Skywalker action figure last week!

APPLE: Blast! That would explain why Google approached me on Monday about the Jawa cloak and blaster.

CISCO: Well, if our business is at an end here…

APPLE: No! Wait.

CISCO: Ah, you have more shiny baubles to dangle before me, as if I were some country bumpkin fresh to the big city?

APPLE: Mock if you will, but consider this: $1,000,000, a case of Mickey’s Big Mouths and an original Major Matt Mason action figure, with his internal wires all still intact! Now, give me the iPhone trademark!

CISCO: Does he still have his helmet? And is there any paint chipping?

APPLE: He does have his helmet but there is some light chipping around the buttocks.

CISCO: Unacceptable. Clearly this means more to you than it does to me. You must do better.

APPLE: Very well. I have saved the best for last. $1,500,000, a huge bucket of delicious kettle corn and a 1978 issue of the Space: 1999 comic book pencilled by none other than the legendary John Byrne! Bagged and boarded! Let’s make a deal!

CISCO: Mmm. No. No. Byrne’s work has not aged well as the influence of Japanese anime has improved the medium. I grow tired of these discussions and wish to watch Adult Swim.

APPLE: No! It is I who grow tired and wish to retire to my fainting couch and have my feet massaged by bisexual Thai handmaidens!

CISCO: Ooh! I want that, too! And Adult Swim!

APPLE: Well, at least on this we agree.

CISCO: But I still don’t want you to use “iPhone”.

APPLE: Damn you to hell!

CISCO: Ha-ha! I’m the anthropomorphization of a soulless commercial and legal construct known as the corporation! I hardly think that’s going to happen!

APPLE: Still, your torments will be long and painful, wherever they are carried out.

CISCO: Oh, you say that to everyone who sues you.

APPLE: [sigh] Perhaps.

CISCO: Hmm. Well… let me see the Major Matt Mason.

APPLE: I… don’t have him on me…

CISCO: Oh, come on! It’s like you’re not even trying!

Apple and Cisco were reportedly last seen at a Shakey’s, arguing over what toppings to get on a pizza they were splitting.

Analysts Fear Jobs "Distracted".

Despite repeated claims that the Apple options scandal is distracting CEO Steve Jobs, sources close to him indicate that nothing could be further from the truth.

“Were that the case, said one source, “Were Steve to be so easily distracted, there are hundreds of other things that would have distracted the hell out of him prior to this.”

Crazy Apple Rumors Site has compiled the following list of the things that could be distracting Jobs, but are not because of his steely resolve, ability to focus like a laser beam and special boxer-briefs that give him an electric shock every time his mind wanders.

  • The almost rhythmic oscillation of Peter Oppenheimer’s doughy jowls when he talks.
  • Long-term project to determine the largest prime number using nothing but the Calculator app.
  • The chafing when his Brazilian wax starts growing out.
  • Prepping for the upcoming draft in the Apple fantasy baseball league.
  • The ass on that half-Japanese chick in accounting.
  • Putting the final touches on his grand Unification Theory.
  • Figuring out how they manage to dehydrate 8 ounces of pineapple to a weight of 1.5 ounces. It has something to do with removing the water… Think, dammit, Steve, think!
  • Own executive distraction team consisting of Bill Gates, Michael Dell, Rob Enderle and Kato from the Pink Panther movies.
  • That damn Guns N’ Roses the government keeps blasting in between entreaties to surrender.
  • Do the writers of “Lost” know where they’re going or are they just making it up as they go?
  • Why do they call it a nickel when it isn’t made of nickel?
  • Why do the boys in R&D only seem to be able to build male sexbots and why are they always playing the Dave Matthews Band really loud down there?
  • Asking self, “When I’m driving, why does the moon keep following me?”
  • Initiating letter writing campaign to the folks at Nestlé asking why they can’t make a decent vegetarian Hot Pocket. I mean, how fricking hard should that be?!
  • His torrid affair with Oprah Winfrey friend Gayle King.
  • Sleep, Restart, Shut Down? Sleep, Restart, Shut Down! SLEEP, RESTART, SHUT DOWN?!!!
  • President of Bolivia. That does sound nice…
  • Making sure the upcoming Apple Rubber Chicken is designed juuust riiight.
  • The free Wednesday waffle bar at Caffe Macs.
  • His long-term program to tag-and-release every squirrel on the Apple campus (rudely interrupted from 1985-1997).
  • Trying to figure out how to safely remove that deer tick the size of a grapefruit that’s attached to his back.
  • Leafing through the latest edition of Gentlemen’s Mock Turtleneck and Jeans Quarterly and wondering – again – when they’re going to interview him.
  • All those Cup-O-Puddins just sitting there in his mini-fridge waiting to be eaten.
  • The damn Wii that Joz put in the conference room.
  • Trying to identify that funky smell in his Mercedes. Is it an old yogurt cup under the seat? What the hell is that?
  • The time it’s taking to “mark his territory” on the award money that Apple has to pay those rumor sites before it gets sent out.
  • Finally being able to fully indulge his fetish for diapered astronauts online.
  • Looking for the “wow,” which is somewhere in “the social”… or… uh…
  • Drawing hilariously obtuse schematics for nonexistent products to leak to the rumor sites.
  • Gazing at pictures of Chris Breen’s luxurious hair.
  • Driving around trying to find a place to bury all those dead hookers in the back of his van.

Apple declined to comment officially for this story but did say “Dead hookers? Really?”

Zune Phone To Also Suck.

The technology world was rocked yesterday as news leaked that Microsoft is planning a Zune phone.

Today, as details of the Zune phone began to leak on the Internet, analysts quickly came to the conclusion that the Zune phone would suck as badly as the Zune itself.

According to sources, in another moment of Microsoft marketing genius, the Zune phone will be called the “Zellular Phone Call”.

“As ‘tune’ is to ‘Zune’,” explained blogger Robert Scoble, “‘Cellular phone call’ is to ‘Zellular Phone Call’. See, it’s all about the user scenario. In this case, making a zellular phone call.

“Oops! I mean ‘cellular’. Although, it’s quite possible that everyone will start calling them ‘zellular phone calls’ once the Zellular Phone Call takes off.

“And there I mean the Zune phone.

“Uh… it’s, um… well… uh…”

Scoble also said that if you add a “z” to the front of anything, it automatically becomes cool, edgy and hip, and it totally doesn’t suck.

People who are actually cool, edgy and hip, however, say that Scoble is wrong.

“No, that totally sucks,” said 43Folders.com‘s Merlin Mann. “And it also just doesn’t make any sense.”

Beyond just the name, however, sources indicate that the Zellular Phone Call will have certain limitations inherited from the Zune platform.

For example, all calls will be wrapped in Microsoft’s DRM and the end-user license agreement will state that the contents of each call will be the property of Microsoft in perpetuity. Also, the Zellular Phone Call will only allow you to call someone three times. After that, every time you try to call that person you will hear a recording of a representative of the Recording Industry Association of America calling you a thief and yelling obscenities and threats at you.

Despite these serious drawbacks, Microsoft apologists continued to insist that the Zellular Phone Call was an “iPhone killer”.

“The Zellular Phone Call is an iPhone killer,” said Rob Enderle of the Enderle Group.

This comment was followed by a long pause as reporters waited for some sort of support for this contention.

“Uh, I got nothing after that. Usually that’s enough to get me quoted.”

Apple declined to comment for this story.

“Hey, it worked again!” exclaimed Enderle.

Apple Drops Pudding Rights Management.

In a sure sign that CEO Steve Jobs was serious in his challenge to the recording industry to drop digital right management (DRM) from digitally delivered music, Apple today dropped pudding rights management (PRM) from its iPudd Store.

While it is not generally known to many Mac users, Apple owns the distribution of pudding to your local grocer through its patented “pudding over IP” technology.

In in late 2005, in a rare move in the vertical market space and after some false starts, Apple created a codec that enables pudding to be compressed into a digital format for transmission over the Internet to a designated purchaser, revolutionizing the pudding industry.

“The pudding industry had long dreamed of transmission of pudding over the Internet,” said the Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg. “The problem always came down to how to properly protect pudding assets. You don’t want pudding that’s supposed to go to a Safeway in Seattle spraying out of some kid’s speakers in Larchmont, NY.”

But starting today, with the consent of pudding manufacturers, downloads from Apple’s iPudd Store will be PRM-free, despite some concerns.

While this may seem to only affect the market for creamy deliciousness, analysts believe it is yet another shot across the bow of the recording industry.

“If Apple is willing to free pudding, it must also be willing to free music,” said Jupiter Research’s David Card.

“Uh…

“Did I really say that out loud?”

Pudding futures were down in late trading today on the Chicago commodities exchange.

Friday Feature: Crazy Apple Help Desk.

Every Friday, the staff at Crazy Apple Rumors Site answers common help questions based on our vast experience with Apple products and our fervent belief that we know more than you do.

Q: I read recently that Apple had issued an enabler for 802.11n and I was wondering how I go about downloading and installing that.

A: Oh, you don’t want to do that.

Q: What? Why not?

A: Well, look, it’s one thing to be 802.11n. It’s another thing to be an 802.11n enabler.

Q: Ooh. Gosh. I hadn’t thought of that. I feel just terrible.

A: Yeah, I mean, it’s one thing for you to decide that you’re going to experiment with something that doesn’t even have a final spec, but to enable your Mac to get into the dangerous 802.11n lifestyle…

Q: I’m sorry! I didn’t think… Wait. What the hell are we talking about?

A: We’re talking about you and what a terrible, terrible person you are.

Q: All I wanted was a faster wireless network!

A: Pervert.

Q: I am not a… Well, OK, I am, but that’s got nothing to do with this!

Q: I was trying to install some RAM in my Mac Pro and, well, I kind of went a little crazy.

A: Oh. You mean you maxed it out?

Q: Oh, I maxed it out. I maxed the hell out of it.

A: Ooh! 16 GB?!

Q: Yeah. And then I got out the soldering iron!

A: You… what?

Q: I got some solder and I soldered a whole crap load more on top of it!

A: Huh?

Q: Yeah! So, I’ve got 64 GB, but the problem is I can’t access it all.

A: Uh, well, yeah, that’s because it won’t take more than 16 GB.

Q: What? Sure it will. You just have to get out the soldering iron and…

A: No. Look, you can solder it all day long and…

Q: Actually, it took me a couple of days.

A: …you won’t be able to access any more than 16 GB.

Q: Mmm. No. I think you’re wrong. I think I just need some more solder.

A: Well, you give that a try and let me know how that works out.

Q: Oh, hey, do you know where I can buy solder by the pound?

A: Nnno.

Q: I got a new iMac few weeks ago and I’m trying to do some web development work on it but I’m having trouble configuring MAMP.

A: OK. Where are you hung up?

Q: Well, I have Apache set up. And I have MySQL configured and running. And I have PHP running. It’s just that I can’t seem to get the Old High Latin language XML running.

A: The what?

Q: But that’s not really crucial. What I really want to dig into is diagonal class inheritance.

A: Diagonal class inheritance?

Q: Yeah! When you’re coding you can inherit from the parent class or the one next to it! Or any class diagonal to the one you’re coding!

A: What? I’m… pretty sure that’s not right.

Q: Sure it is. Oh, and I really think I could leverage the option to compile packages with pretty bows.

A: Uh… you’re not really a programmer, are you?

Q: I like pretty bows.

A: Of course you do.