Dear old powerbook

In 2003 I purchased a new 15 inch 1GHz Titanium Power G4 Apple Powerbook. I bought it the day after the new 12" and 17" aluminum PowerBooks were announced at MacWorld. It has been a great laptop, although I had to replace some components while under warranty.

Like many, I've been ogling the new MacBook Air. How can you escape the commercials and that great catchy tune by Yael Naim? However I decided, it is not a laptop for me: it's a bit pricey.

Figuring that Apple will probably do an update before the September school year start, I decided to consult AppleInsider and MacRumors on the rumor mill: when are the new laptops coming? June?

That's when I came across this nice chart of the different Powerbook models over the years. The Titanium powerbook is the second generation.

(Picture: Apple Insider)

Dear old powerbook, please stay a little longer. A least until the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros are around.

The kids of today

I discovered a box set of 3 DVDs with old school Sesame Street episodes at the library (review). These are the episodes I grew up on, with the same silly cartoons I remember.
The episodes are prefaced with an interesting disclaimer:

The early episodes are intended for grown ups and might not suit the needs of today's preschool children.

What?? I am not alone in my reaction to the Sesame Street disclaimer (Blogosphere). Virginia Hefferman in the NY Times summarizes it sarcastically: it is "certainly not for softies born since 1998, when the chipper ‘Elmo’s World’ started.”

Perhaps the kids of today might be missing contemporary geography or ultimate fighting exercises.

My kids have been enjoying Old School Sesame Street. Similarly, my son loves the old Popeye episodes (YouTube). They are definitely a lot little less PC as the children's programs of today. But if anything the Popeye episodes teach one to take things with a spoon of salt.

muxtape

Yet another music streaming site? That was my first reaction when I read on Jacob Lodwick's blog about Muxtape, a website for creating and sharing mixtapes. The site is stupidly simple - I love it! Muxtape allows you to make your own digital mixtape (with its very own URL to share with anyone you want). You can create your 12 song “mixtape” by simply uploading any of your MP3s. Unfortunately most of my music is in Apple's Advanced Audio Coding format, so I'll have to do one extra step to convert to mp3. The songs can then be streamed by anyone visiting your muxtape site.

I've been taking a break from Pandora and have been exploring great artists and music I've never heard of. A couple of my favorite muxtapes:

• http://pearlywhirly.muxtape.com/
• http://sip.muxtape.com/
• http://amberrico.muxtape.com/
  

There is of course the sixty-four thousand dollar question: is muxtape legal? (legal issues of mixtapes) It must be billing time for the lawyers for the record industry.