Month: October 2006

C4 Reveals Seamy Underbelly of the Mac World.

[Crazy Apple Rumors Site sent its high society reporter Thor Samson to C4 over the weekend to cover the “it” Mac conference of fall 2006.

What Thor discovered about the conference celebrities may shock you.

Or not, depending on how jaded you are.]

I went to C4 with my mind as open as my expense account. These events are great because they allow the Mac community to showcase its stars in their element, right?

Wrong!

Many of these so-called “stars” of the Mac community are ne’er-do-wells at best and criminals at worst. Let’s take a look at C4’s “luminaries”.

John Gruber: Long considered the most respected Mac blogger, recent evidence indicates Gruber is addicted to online gambling.

Not a lot of people know this, but only descendants of the founders of ARPA can open online casinos, as they are considered Internet natives who have to put up with the rest of us yahoos who invaded their homeland.

Now, sources say, Gruber is in six large to these online tribes and is being forced to shill for online gambling to avoid having Daring Fireball repossessed.

Just don’t lend him any money.

Jonathan “Wolf” Rentzsch: The organizer of C4, Rentzsch actually is a lycanthrope as his nickname implies and must shave his face and hands six or seven times a day. By my reckoning, he devoured eight C4 attendees and a waiter at Jaks Tap.

Also, he seems to think it would be really funny if Mac users adopted goatse as their gang symbol.

Clearly, the pain of living with the knowledge of the havoc he has wreaked up on humanity has driven him insane.

Brent Simmons: Simmons’ dark secret is not so secret: he sold out to the man. Further compounding his guilt, however, he has also been accused of not keeping it real and a failure on numerous occasions to holla back, despite repeatedly being given the opportunity.

Drunken Batman: Drunk? Frequently. Batman? No.

So there you have it. The Macintosh community is full of gamblers, werewolves, sellouts and frauds.

…

OK, that sounded a lot more surprising when I wrote it on Sunday night…

iPod Turns Five.

Apple’s iPod turned five years old today, an event that has caused CEO Steve Jobs to wax effusive about “his baby.”

“When I introduced the iPod five years ago today, I couldn’t have been prouder of the achievement Apple – and I – made, Jobs said. “And here’s why.

“The iPod is a timely, innovative product that filled a need our competitors were not adequately filling, and still aren’t. We created an easy-to-use stylish product that spoke to people.”

Holding up an iPod nano, Jobs gushed “The iPod is such a perfect little princess! So smart and well-liked! And pretty!

“The iPod is my special little girl!”

Turning to the Mac – his child from his previous marriage (albeit also to Apple) – Jobs icily asked “When are you going to sell 8.7 million units a quarter?”

The Mac did not look away from the repeat episode of Charles In Charge it was watching while shoving fistfuls of Corn Nuts into its face and mumbled “I sold 1.6 million units. Get off my back.”

“You’re twenty-two years old!” Jobs yelled. “When are you going to move out of my basement?!”

The Mac only shrugged sullenly before turning the TV volume up.

Contrary to Jobs’ contention that his relationship with the iPod is all sunshine and goodness, there are signs of strife.

The young device has reportedly demanded a pony for its fifth birthday and Jobs – after initially indicating the request was excessive – has caved in.

“Well, if I don’t buy her the pony, she’ll throw a tantrum and then nobody’s happy,” Jobs said, sighing. “And I’ve got to keep my special little girl happy!”

The Mac shook its head and turned the volume up further.

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: Oh my god! Dude! Did you see this?!
A: Oh. Yeah. That’s really nice. Microsoft is trying to retrain Columbian militants so they can return to civilian life as IT specialists. I think that’s great.
Q: What?! Are you blind? And stupid?
A: Uh… well, I’m not blind…
Q: You’ve got to read between the lines, man! Microsoft’s not retraining them! They’re recruiting them! Don’t be so naive! It’s game on, man! It’s Microsoft’s Columbian militants against Apple’s lesbian ninja sexbots!
A: Oh, no, no, no. That’s way off base. This is just something nice Microsoft is doing.
Q: Oh, man! Wake up and smell the military buildup!
A: Dude, no. Everyone, and I mean everyone, knows that Microsoft’s army… is all flying monkeys.
Q: Uh… oh. Huh. Well, now I just feel stupid. I mean… duh. Of course it’s flying monkeys. Jeez. Stupid. Stupid.
A: Well, your heart was in the right place. You were assuming the worst about Microsoft.
Q: Thanks. You didn’t have to say that.

Q: Hey, how did that poll you put up the other day turn out?
A: Well, not surprisingly, readers picked Gisele Bundchen to replace Steve Jobs.
Q: Oh, yeah! Excellent! When does she start?!
A: We were a little disappointed by the results as we thought frying bacon would have done better. Fourth? What is that? It’s bacon for crying out loud!
Q: Can we get back to Gisele and her possible start date?
A: Well, I probably shouldn’t get too wound up over the results. I mean, the whole thing’s run on some code we got from Diebold, so it was probably hacked by pro-Bundchen elements within about five minutes.
Q: Oh! Oh! Pro-Bundchen elements?! I want to be a pro-Bundchen element! Where do I sign up for that?!
A: I guess it really wasn’t fair to frying bacon. Boba Fett and Gigantor… that’s some stiff competition. Verdeschi never had a chance, of course.
Q: Oh, my god, could she do the Macworld keynote?! Could she?! Could she?! Could she?! Oh, my fucking god, could she?!
A: Uh… what? No. No. This was just a straw poll. It’s not binding or anything.
Q: … I… I hate you.

Q: I have an Apple portable that I’ve been having trouble with. I think it’s got that random shutdown problem I’ve been reading about.
A: Wait, wait, wait, wait. This isn’t one of those questions where your “Apple portable” is actually a Newton and the reason it’s shutting down randomly is because it’s ten years old, is it?
Q: No, this is one of those questions where it’s a product from the future and the reason it’s shutting down has something to do with aliens.
A: Ah. OK.
Q: Uh…
A: So… we’re done here.
Q: Well, I’ve got nothing else, so unless you want to talk about something…
A: Well… nah. Forget it.
Q: No. What?
A: It’s just… I mean… OK, it was a nasty pitch, but Beltran should have at least swung at it! I mean, two outs in the bottom of the ninth?! C’mon!
Q: Just let it go, man.

Apple's Quarterly Results.

Apple announced its quarterly results yesterday, easily besting the Wall Street estimates.

The company shipped an astonishing 1.6 million Macs in its best quarter ever. Analysts indicated that proved that the “iPod halo” effect truly is working for the company.

It’s easy to understand how iPod sales could drive Mac sales, as Apple shipped 360 million iPods for the quarter, with many customers buying 3, 4, even 10 iPods each, sometimes giving one to their pet.

While a low margin product, Apple moved over 1.5 trillion units of the Mighty Mouse, one to every third person on the planet. The company has not yet determined if these were evenly distributed across the globe or not.

“It’s possible India bought them all,” said CFO Peter Oppenheimer. “Or China. I don’t know why they’d do that…

“Party favors, possibly. We’re still looking into it.”

Oppenheimer also said Apple’s margin increased to 230%. The company sold 9 trillion copies of iLife, 180 trillion movies and television shows and 4.4 quadrillion songs on iTunes.

“We also renewed four .Mac accounts,” Oppenheimer said.

“That’s up 33% from last quarter.”

LIVEBLOGGING!

The staff of Crazy Apple Rumors Site is at Meconi’s Pub & Eatery in beautiful downtown Tacoma doing some Apple source development.

LIVE!

Uh…

LIVE!

Come on into the comments and we’ll prove it.

UPDATE: Here’s some proof. My date time was supposed to be in the bottom right but my camera phone washed it out.