How messed up is this? T-Mobile is "updating" the new color Sidekicks, using their ability to modify the device over-the-air to remotely remove a bunch of the games that had come pre-installed. Which apparently means that they can pretty much do whatever they want to your Sidekick, whenever they want to, something that our buddy Cory from BoingBoing, who owns a Sidekick, isn't particularly pleased about:

They still haven't delivered a synch tool that lets you download your PIM data (calendar, contacts, to-do) from your Sidekick to your PC, and what's more, this latest move shows very clearly what you can expect to happen when you stop being a T-Mobile customer: they will "withdraw their support" from your handset, erasing your personal info. Who owns your Sidekick? T-Mobile does, apparently, even if you spent full retail on it (I dropped $250 on mine). You need T-Mobile's permission to install software on their device. T-Mobile will, from time to time, decide to erase software from your device. And when you stop subscribing to their service, T-Mobile will delete all your data forever, without giving you any mechanism for moving it off the device (and without giving you the ability to design a tool that would let you do this).

11:13:08 PM  comment [];  

Well, I guess if my Mac had some sort of external burner I would be upset. Now the only thing that bothers me is I back up a huge amount of sensitive data to my iDisk. Hope that is OK.

The former version, 1.2.1, has been put back up in its place.

(Thanks to mbrzostowski for the tip on this story) [dotmac.info]
11:02:56 PM  comment [];  

Point-by-point dissection of Paul Boutin's claim that Linux's growing desktop market share hurts Apple. [Daring Fireball]

9:56:27 PM  comment [];  

Article on OS X "Panther"

9:27:06 PM  comment [];  

Over at MacSlash, a first look (somewhat literally) at Apple's new iSight camera for video conferencing:

The camera itself is maybe three inches in length and about an inch wide, the form factor is a basic cylinder with a spot on the bottom for the firewire adapter. Apple did some clever engineering on the base of the camera, as the firewire cable provided slips inside a locking adapter that attaches to the base of the camera, securing it to the post that you mount on your screen. The whole procedure took about 5 minutes. Getting it to work with iChat is a simple process. Plug it in. That's all. iChat AV picked up the ball and went with there.

12:58:36 AM  comment [];