The scary advertising bogey man is holding your OS hostage, or so you've been led to believe.

Optimists hope that this patent will be used just to prevent other software firms from creating their own ad-supported operating systems. If granted, any company out to make a ad-supported operating system could be stopped by Apple patent-licensing fees. Noble, but if we can’t be bothered with ad-supported television will the market support an ad-based computer. *cough* PeoplePC *cough*

Seeing past the idea of Apple leveraging their iAds platform into Mac O$ XashGrab, there are some real opportunities for Apple to encourage growth. Take a look at the one diagram that the tech blogs aren’t bothering to post:

Advertising Component

The ‘Advertising Component’ sits alongside all of the other OS pieces. Notice, that it’s neither blocking any of the other modules nor are any modules dependent upon the ‘Advertising Component’.  So follow me on this one, ‘Advertising Component’ is a core technology.

Core Ads or Core iAds brought to Mac OS will entice developers to make apps for the desktop just as they did for the iPhone and iPod touch. Shareware won’t have to nag you to pay for the full version, it will just nag you with the well honed ads served up from Apple. The true beauty of this is Apple doesn’t have to put advertising on any of its applications to make money. Third-party application developers hungry for a slice of the ad dollars will use Core iAds and Apple makes money on the back end. You won’t be stopped by an ad going from AddressBook.app to Mail.app, but you may have to view a movie trailer in order to paste a form letter from your third-party clipboard app.

iAds just can’t sit on mobile devices alone. This patent is a peek into how Apple is going to make it part of our desktop computing.

I’ve been a closeted HTC Magic (T-Mobile G1) user for a while and though I have an iPhone on AT&T, I wanted to have a backup network. Dependent on WiFi to be of any use, I had to unlock my G1 and put it on the AT&T network. Although costly, AT&T is currently the only US Carrier that would allow GPRS/EDGE on a prepaid account.

T-Mobile is now opening up a dialog on prepaid data plans in its forums [link]. Now, I would like to see a cheaper plan for data, but I don’t even know what would be equitable to me and T-Mobile. I’m willing to pay $1 a day, but for only the days that I use my phone. I’m not against paying for a block of data, i.e  (n GB for $x) but it doesn’t seem fair that people who have contracts enjoy far cheaper data rates.

I don’t see T-Mobile coming coming out with a plan any time soon, but at least I can get back and running at 25¢ a minute per call, and .02¢ a KB for data.

Think about it… this home would be a pornographer’s dream. It’s a familiar place, it’s been on TV – so it’s practically got a fan base, and you can parody the name.

Jon & Kate Host 8
Jon & 8 in Kate
Jon & 8 Kates

All the wholesome people who would protest the sale and videos would only add to the marketing cache. All I ask is 2% of the sales and a 75K consulting fee.

Read about the sale and see photos in Luxist [link]

Mom’s lot in life is working in an inner-city county hospital.  In recent years, she’s noticed a shrinking amount of heart-surgeries in favor for “preventative” gastric bypass or stomach banding procedures, and increased cases of strokes an brain aneurysms.

“Get your headaches checked out. If there’s a clot and they can’t *coil that, you don’t have long to live.” — Mom.

She says this as I stuff another piece of chinese roast pork belly in my mouth, increasing the cholesterol that latches onto the walls of my blood vessels, thereby creating a perfect net to catch a blood clot.  Mom then passed her hand over my head, just barely grazing my hair as if to show me where the deadly blood clot will burst in my brain. This disturbing move is just like the time when she gently traced my ear to show where cancer would form if you talked on a cell phone for hours on end.

“I’ve seen young kids… with cancer right along here.” –Mom

Just as I get over mom’s spooky prophecy:

1. I developed a headache yesterday which continues today. [I'm writing this with the concern that I don't keep aspirin in my desk as an emergency blood thinner that will sustain me in case I need to be rushed to the hospital]
2. Someone forwarded me a chain e-mail of how to identify if someone is having a stroke.
3. My iTunes playlist played a podcast interview with Jill Bolte Taylor about how she, as a brain scientist, experienced her stroke.

My take away: the universe is agreeing with my mom, and I’m going to have a stroke… or it’s all in my head.

* coil = coil embolization

Me: “Las Vegas? How cliche.”
Snuff: “What do you want? She’s 100% Polish (American) and he’s 100% Italian (American) where else would they go?”
Me: “Austria?”

My money hang up is about pennies, they are a fun challenge to spend and paying cash helps me stick to a budget.  For those shops that I deem cash-only I make sure I have four pennies to ensure that I don’t receive pennies back as change.  Please, if you do not understand why I carry around four pennies or do not understand consumer math, you can stop reading this blog post now.

Scenario 1

Bill:  $14.19  – I tender $20.04.  Expected change $5.85

Here’s the unintentional grift.  When handing the pennies over to the cashier, one penny manages to drop and fall into the checkout conveyor belt.  Feeling bad, the cashier fishes out a dime from his own pocket and enters that I paid $20.13. I received $5.94.  A profit of$0.09

Scenario 2

Bill $13.67 – I tender $20.02.  Expected change $6.35

This one is a just a bit more dishonest.  I originally handed over $20.02.  I then realized that I had $0.67 and thought of handing it to the cashier but since she was already going through the till, I said “never mind” unknowingly setting off the grift.

The receipt officially says $13.67 billed, $20 tendered.  $6.33 is handed back to me and I asked why I got pennies back.  The cashier assumed that “never mind” applied to the two cents I handed her.

Apologetically, she hands back the two cents AS WELL AS $0.35,  completely forgetting that she already handed me $0.33.  A total of $6.70, a profit of $0.45

The lack of sun plus the hard freeze leaves us depending on cold frame, hot-house, or imported produce.  Some of us don’t think twice about buying summer foods in winter like tomatoes, corn, and melon.  Others, who have a passion for eating seasonally grown food and patronizing local farmers are called locavores [ link ].  Failing that, those people who like the notion of eating local foods and are unable to find local growers, are encouraged to eat organic.

I realize that foods are most delicious at the height of their season, but ensuring proper provisions for the winter months requires canning.  The notion of fetching a jar of home grown something-or-other from the basement is delightful, but the last thing I want to do is give myself botulism.  As for practicing local or organic, take last night’s dinner:

Red-leaf lettuce and watercress salad (Mexico)
Mussels (Canada) with tomato (Florida hot-house)
Lemon (Chile) Spaghetti and Parma cheese (Italy)
Strawberries (Florida hot-house)

None of it local, none of it organic, and if we were counting the carbon food-miles, it’s a nightmare.

I don’t want to feel guilty, but therein lies the disorder.  We now have this responsibility laid upon us to eat well for ourselves, the well-being of the local economy, and the health of the planet.  Happily in the first world we can over analyze to think of a strategy for all of our neuroses and excesses.  The third world and industrializing nations have people out there are looking for clean water and food to buy let alone worrying about where it came from.

Food for thought? To me it’s food to agonize over… and don’t get me started on the politics of coffee.

When it comes to those people who launch into unsolicited advice I tend to pay close attention, not to ascertain new facts no but to find out what kind of misinformation is being passed on. While picking through a bin of lemons (8 for $1.00), I overheard a conversation with a mother and son.

Mom: “You know how to pick a good lemon?”
Son: “Why?”
Clearly, this kid is on a path for a cocktail-shunning beer drinking future.
Mom: “Well, when I’m not around, you may need to buy lemons. Pick one that looks good and doesn’t have blemishes. See? Smooth skin.”

I wanted to whip a lemon at the woman. Either she’s been really lucky with picking juicy shiny lemons or she has not had a good lemon. I shook my head knowing if I yelled across the bin, I wouldn’t be heard. A lemon could be dry and pithy on the inside. Like a lot of fruit, it should feel heavy for its size. The lemon should be firm, but not hard. Blemishes are okay and shine may be because of wax. Like many things in life, do not take it at face value.

It’s a quirky topic that can hook any straight man who mows their own lawn, “lawn-mowing shoes”.  There’s no such thing as new shoes for mowing lawns.  One starts with a pair of casual shoes – with use, the passage of time, and the purchase of new shoes there comes a point where these shoes are still viable albeit not presentable.

My trusty shoes that walked the halls of the Vatican, skipped along the canals of Amsterdam, and walked up an off-ramp on the Philippine National Highway after being dropped off by a PARTAS bus… now bear the green hue of lawn care. Though hardly the vision of the designer who labeled and marketed the shoes, it’s a testament to how versatile a fashion shoe can be. Though I doubt that the Milanese style houses realize where casual shoes go to die; I’m sure that there will come a time where a roughed canvas, grass stained rubber, worn-soled shoe will grace the glossy pages of magazines.

This afternoon, as I stood in front of the microwave waiting for my food, a woman walked in and retrieved her lunch from the refrigerator.  She produced a container of curried rice out of her lunch carrier then lined up the rest of her items on the table, I guessed to pass the time.  Visibly hurried she looked at me, looked at the countdown on the microwave, looked at her food, then back at the jicama salad I had in my hands.  She asked if I had to warm up the container that I was holding.  I shook my head, but before I could verbalize ‘no, this is just a salad’ she cut me off with both hands out like a mime feeling a wall.

Curtly, the woman said “Can you put this in the microwave for me?  Two minutes, I’ll be right back.” and hustled out of the room.

I wondered to myself, what is stopping me from messing with this woman’s food?  What is perfect revenge to being casually rude and assuming my benevolence?  Unfortunately, it’s not farting into the container or leaving any trace of vileness that could be submitted later for dna analysis. No the clear solution was blogging about the situation, learning to trust in people as much as they trust in me…  and putting bhut jolokia [link] extract on my shopping list.