The Man Who Would Buy Apple;But Sun’s Chief, Scott McNealy, Probably Won’t Be Caught Overpaying – New York Times:

In the last week, Mr. McNealy’s tightwad tendencies have become painfully apparent to the top management of Apple Computer Inc. After months of discussion, Sun proposed an acquisition of Apple last Tuesday in an exchange of shares that would value Apple at $23 a share, according to executives familiar with the talks. That is well below the recent price of Apple shares, which have traded around $30.

Even at a higher reported bid of $33 a share, Sun, by the standards of most takeover deals, would be offering Apple a fire-sale price. Last June, Apple’s stock traded at more than $50 a share, though that was well before the Cupertino, Calif., computer maker announced its recent losses and layoffs.

For his part, Mr. McNealy has declined to confirm or deny that his company is talking to Apple at all. In an interview on Friday afternoon, Mr. McNealy insisted that any discussion of Apple was off-limits.

Fascinating blast from the past, good old 1996. I remember those layoffs well, they were truly painful (and in fact, I was on the layoff list at one time, and talked my manager into not laying me off. I still wonder if that was a smart idea or a stupid one, but I don’t regret it, because shortly after that, the severance package was changed and a layoff later would have cost me at least $30K from the previous package. A moot point, but.. And by staying with Apple, we were able to nurture and grow the mail list system that became lists.apple.com, which led to all of the other email stuff I built for them.

The joy of stringing together decisions. A decision made by Bob Fair in the Apple Business Systems unit in the 90′s made possible Apple being able to do New Music Tuesday and move much of their marketing and customer communication online in the 2000′s. Go figure.

But that’s not what I was posting this about (but heck, why not? old pharts get to remember the Good Old Days, although calling Apple in the mid-90′s “good” is a farce)…

More interesting to most of you might be this: I’ve heard, from various people I trust, that there was one key reason why this deal didn’t go through: Michael Spindler. It wasn’t the stock price, it was that Spindler was demanding a seat on Sun’s board as part of the deal, and McNealy simply wouldn’t allow it (good call, Scott!). That was the rumored reason why the Apple to Sony deal was scotched, too. Spindler was so intent on making sure he got taken care of he scotched the deal.

In retrospect, thank god. At the time, I was praying for the Sun deal to go through. Huge respect for McNealy — very few execs have been able to do what he did and have the run he had with Sun, and he might have been able to do interesting things if he’d gotten his hands on Apple technology. Not as interesting as Steve did when he came back. Stop and think for a minute just how different Silicon Valley — and our world — would be today if the Sun deal had gone through.

Not worse. Not better. But definitely different.

(and of course, I should probably remind folks that before my stint at Apple, I did four years at Sun. Employee 1200ish, still have my lucite block they handed out the day they went public in my office at home. Damn, I’m old…. And hopefully, Scott’s forgiven me for that little tstech oopsie by now…)

(hat tip: Daring Fireball for the pointer)

(Update: already been asked the “how would you know that?” question. Fair question, fair answer: I used to work out at the gym with someone who used to do aerobics regularly with the women in charge of making sure Herr Spindler got to his meetings on time and in clean shirts and at least somewhat briefed on what the meeting was about. There were three of them, they were not huge fans of Spindler (to put it mildly), and later on, some of the more interesting gossip would be re-gossiped around the bench press… Take that source for however you value it…)

Refunds And Trials In The App Store – Inside iPhone Blog:

Apple has complete control over the App Store and its component parts. I’ve bemoaned this control in the past, but it could easily be used to benefit developers and customers alike. Hopefully, as the App Store continues to mature, Apple will consider making it possible for developers to offer free trial versions of their software.

A number of developers are, in fact, already doing this.

They’re doing it by issuing both a “light” or “limited” version of the App for free, and then encouraging you to upgrade to the full, paid version.

A good example is Mighty Mighty Good Games Sudoku, which I decided to give a shot, and then happily upgraded to the full version.

(and am wasting a number of evenings with it right now…. highly recommended, if you don’t want a life)

So you can do this today, at least with some classes of Apps, and I’m not sure just how much a formal “trial version” set up might help the cause here; I don’t think it’ll make developer’s lives easier, in any event.

It’s not as convenience at the Xbox 360 marketplace download&activate model, but it’s actually workable and practical today.

Notebook Event Rumor Wrapup: Winners and Losers – Mac Rumors:

With even more media attention on Apple and the rumors surrounding the latest release, more sites have gone out of their way to call out those who got things wrong. While this has given an opportunity for some to say that you shouldn’t listen rumors at all, I think it just goes to show that sources matter and not all rumors are created equal.

Amused to see referrers into my blog from MacRumor.com. turns out, they took a shot at me (not surprising).

The link to my posting was in this phrase: While this has given an opportunity for some to say that you shouldn’t listen rumors at all, which, while I was fairly critical of the rumor sites (with justification, since THEY WERE WRONG ABOUT KEY DETAILS AGAIN), that’s not at all what I said. What I said was this:

Chuqui 3.0: Thoughts on the new Macbooks — and the circus that preceded them…:

It’s not that you shouldn’t read the sites; they have their purpose. Just don’t take them so damn seriously.

quote, unquote.

So yes, Macrumors, sources matter and not all rumors are created equal, but accuracy matters even more, and if Macrumors can mis-interpret (or mis-spin, or simply misrepresent blatantly, choose your poison) such a clear and straightforward statement, well, doesn’t that call into question the accuracy of anything else they say?

Which is, in long form, the answer to the question “gee, Chuq, why do you read AppleInsider and not MacRumors?” — and why, if you feel the need to follow a rumor site, you ought to follow AppleInsider.

While I have my issues with AppleInsider as well (honestly, I get really tired of them writing in that “I am speaking in my adult journalist voice, so you must take me seriously”), they pretty much get what they exist for. And that authorial voice I really blame on a bunch of fan geeks growing up reading Mac the Knife in MacWeek. Gah.

Now that everyone has fallen quiet in the post-announce exhaustion of the masses….

Chuqui 3.0: Apple releases MacBook, MacBook Pro Software Update 1.2:

Chuck, I would be very interested in your opinion on Apple leaving the Firewireport out on the new MacBook. As for many others (see the forums) it is a no-buy for me. It almost feels like a slap in the face.

The answer here is pretty simple to me: USB 2.0 won the connectivity fight in the lower end of the market. Note also that the MacBook Pro now only has a single Firewire 800 port; Firewire 400 is now gone.

the implication to me is clear: low-end, the future is USB. If you want high end performance, there’s still Firewire. Although I wonder if we’ll see that move to eSATA or something down the road. That seems to make sense.

I’ll also note for the record that I started making sure all of my bus-powered drives had USB capability as well as firewire months ago. The writing was on the wall if you knew where to look (and where to look is the PC market, where firewire has lost out to USB).

Yes, USB 2.0 is slower. If performance is really that important, Apple’s telling you that the Macbook isn’t what you want. it is, after all, a large series of performance compromises for a hunk less money than a MacBook Pro.

Doesn’t surprise me a bit. I think this is the right move for Apple.

So, my thoughts overall?

I like the new machines. I’m amused at some of the “God, more expensive!” whines… The reality is that from a pure price/performance basis, the new Macbook has equivalent performance (including in video, where macbooks really lagged) to the macBook Pro I have that’s now about 2.5 years old; same performance, about half the cost, and we’re not even getting into the new features, like the new (nifty, I think) trackpad and the LED-backed monitor. The new Macbook pros just plain old toss my current one against the wall.

Too many of the fan geeks get so focussed on price, especially “low price”, especially “I want it for free, diamond encrusted, so I can complain about how slow it is”.

The fact is, and has been, and will be: Apple isn’t about price. It’s about VALUE. You don’t see BMW issuing cars that compete with Kia on price. But for some reason, some folks think Apple should compete with windows-PC’s on price, and are constantly surprised when they don’t.

Could Apple sell a box at $800? Sure. Would they sell a billion? Probably?

Would that $800 computer have the same margins that the $1200 ones do? Of course not. And would an $800 computer cannibalize more expensive computers? Absolutely.

So the end result of an $800 computer? Higher units, reduced margins, lower profit per computer, and a shift away from the higher margin computers. Sometimes, the “cut the profit, make it up in volume” idea makes sense, but the reality is, every time Apple’s tried it, it’s been a disaster (Performa, anyone?); they will sell every computer they can make at the existing price points; could they really scale up to 2X unit volumes to handle demand for a less expensive unit? Maybe.

Would Apple selling an $800 computer be more profitable than Apple is now? Doubtful. And it’s not about selling units (not directly), it’s about making money.

Of course, and this is something the fan geeks keep forgetting, Apple is doing BOTH: unit volumes continue to scale, market share continues to go up, and Apple is making really nice profits. If it ain’t broke…

Will I buy one of the new machines? Probably, but not right away. Other priorities; they’re nice machines, but I stopped with the “gotta haves”. Heck, I was the last person in the universe to own an iPhone, far as I can tell… But I’d much rather spend my money on upgrading the laptop than upgrading to CS4 and paying the Adobe tax (but that’s a different whine…)

If I were to buy one, would it be a Macbook or Macbook pro? I’m honestly undecided. the new Macbooks look powerful enough to keep me happy, even in Bridge and CS4 and doing all of that photo geeking. The smaller screen, I’m not so sure about. Lack of firewire is a bit inconvenient, but only a bit; I’ve been seeing USB coming for a while and setting up my stuff so I can plug things into either as they exist. I’ve yet to use the cardbus, so I don’t miss that at all. And I don’t know yet whether I’ll want the more powerful video. So it comes down to “less money” vs “bigger screen” and “faster video”. and I don’t have a good sense of how I’ll factor those when I’m ready to buy.

But yeah, I expect to buy one of these. One of these days.

As to the rumors leading up to all of this, basically, John Gruber says what I would have said, only better…

Daring Fireball: Today’s Claim Chowder:

Jackass of the week honors go to Duncan Riley at Inquisitr, who a week ago launched the “$800 laptop from Apple” rumor. Worse than merely printing a bogus rumor, today he’s pointing to the new 24-inch LED Cinema Display as proof that he was somehow right.

If you look at where the rumors came from, there are two main leakers: the asian companies doing the contract manufacturing, and the retail sites once things start hitting their inventory systems. I find it interesting that a rumor popped up (and then disappeared) that Apple was going back to in-house manufacturing; the only reason to consider that is better leak management. Stay tuned, this may be something it’s working on, and if so, the fact that the brick stuff leaked so enthusiastically and so accurately might well get Apple to think in that direction.

And the retail? That’s where the rumor geeks blew it. When pricing info started leaking (from, it seems, tech geeks at Best Buy, as far as I can tell), they saw the $899 price point and blithely went running off into the swamp yelling NETBOOK! NETBOOK! not stopping to think maybe that product wasn’t a computer… oops.

and since that was really the focus of so much of the hype of the rumormongering, even though a lot of the details on the machines and the new manufacturing process were right — you have to give much of this round of rumoring a big, fat FAIL, because that was what everyone was yelling about, and they were wrong. A fact they’ll conveniently forget to remind you on.

(me? I got the blu-ray thing right, I wasn’t convinced “brick” was the new process, but maybe something else — and I wasn’t so good there. mostly I kept my mouth shut, because I find all of this rumoring silly, because too many of these “experts” take half a fact and run off into the swamp with it, and people blindly believe them, and then blame Apple when it doesn’t happen.)

These rumor sites are like the psychics that do new year predictions — lots of froth, little substance, if they get something right, they scream from the rooftops, and all the stuff they get wrong, they hope you forget. It’s not that you shouldn’t read the sites; they have their purpose. Just don’t take them so damn seriously. (heck, it’s not just you, the morning of the announcement, a CNET editor on KGO was talking about how he was expecting a $799 macbook, and how Apple was in trouble if they didn’t. Talk about not getting it — by then, even the rumor sites had things under better control than that. But then, I’ll read AppleInsider before I read CNET…)

Now, for some of the other coverage:

Gizmodo:

Steve Jobs Preparing His Farewell?: Is Steve Jobs Preparing His Farewell?:

Is Steve Jobs Preparing His Farewell?

Steve Jobs is leaving Apple. Not tomorrow, but probably very soon. That’s why he started to say good bye today,

Nope. Thanks for playing. Daring Fireball got it right here. Steve IS reacting to the “Without Steve, Apple is nothing” crowd by bringing forward people that will be part of the future of Apple — but this is the beginning of a long process of transition, not anything happening soon. I think there’s still so much Steve wants to accomplish, he’s just getting going!

Technovia: Who gained from the $800 MacBook rumour?:

Don’t you find it interesting that at a time when Apple’s stock price was going into the toilet (like everyone else’s), a rumour emerged about low-priced MacBooks? A rumour which analysts picked up on, and which thus protected Apple’s share price from falling any further at a vulnerable time.

And now it seems that rumour was not necessarily true, but as the whole market has gone up it doesn’t matter half as much.

So here’s the question: Who would benefit from a rumour like that being spread at that particular time? Someone started that rumour, after all…

The problem is it’s not a single-variable problem. The big players in the rumors aren’t people trying to profit from them (as in stock or investments), but i other things, like advertising/pageviews, or ego/reputation and geek cred. The rumor sites and other geeks falling over each other to out rumor each other aren’t trying to manipulate the stock as much as tehy’re trying to drive traffic or get people to pay attention to them (hello, Jason Calcanis! FAIL).

And here’s what I think is the best summary I’ve read:

WebWorkerDaily » Archive No Cheap MacBooks For You «:

There were some significant price decreases in today’s announcements, but they generally amount to reflections of the normal, continuing advance of technology, and not a decision by Apple to play in new markets. For example, the $1300 model of the MacBook now has an instant-on backlit display and a fast graphics processor – which yesterday you would have had to pay $2000 to get in the MacBook Pro line. And at the high end of the line, there’s a $2500 machine with 4GB of RAM, dual graphics chips including one with 512MB, and a 320GB hard drive – more power than you could have gotten in any Apple laptop before this.

Despite the fantasies of low-price MacBooks, it seems pretty clear that Apple knows its core audience well. Some of the statistics that came out at the event include that Apple sells more notebooks in education than Dell does (with 39% of the market), and that Mac sales have outgrown those of the industry for 14 of the last 15 quarters.

At the rate the market is going, Apple may need a sub-$500 laptop on Tuesday » VentureBeat:

Former Engadget editor Ryan Block more or less wonders the same thing in asking if the time is really right for Apple to be launching new expensive laptops. While, as he notes, the wheels for the new machines were set in motion long before Apple could have known the current economic situation, Block wonders if now wouldn’t be the perfect time for a netbook — a cheap sub-laptop computer — rather than new MacBook Pros.

A great example of why I stopped reading Block and Engadget.

First, he’s an Eeyore — no matter what happens, he finds a way to spin it so it sucks. (Me: “Hey, Ryan, Apple just dumped the NDAs on the iphones!” Ryan: “yeah, but they haven’t released the source code. they suck”). As they say in the newspaper business (what’s left of it), “good news doesn’t sell newspapers”. Ryan bought off on that mentality, in spades. It gets tired after a while, because there’s both a lack of balance and perspective. One wonders (a) how a company as incompetent as people like Block seem to see Apple (because everything sucks and is flawed) stay in business, much less flourish, and (b) if their products really ARe that bad, why they bother doing business with the company. Other, of course, than the fact they’re paid to write about them… (Erica Sadun is another one on my Eeyore list, although she’s not nearly as bad at it Block is and is actually worth reading some of the time)

Second, it’s typical Block-think. “I want a netbook”. “Economy is going bad”. “Therefore, Apple should release a netbook”. I’ve already talked about why I think Apple won’t do something like (or called) a netbook, but it’s kinda sad to see pundits like Block decide something (like “Apple should release a netbook”) and twist every argument around justifying that idea (Me: “Wow, tornados just obliterated half of Kansas City” Ryan: “Apple needs to release a netbook, so it can donate inexpensive computers to all of those people without homes”)

Having watched the Apple “fanboy pundit blogger analyst media wonk” people for years from the inside, it became clear which ones had a clue, and which ones were playing the “push my own agenda” or “I’m the real story here” games. Those two groups, I simply stopped reading, and life became a lot more fun…. you can guess what category I put Block and the Engadget guys in…

And while the concept of “being an eeyore” might be obvious to most, here’s my classic example of what it means to be an Eeyore:

Me: Hey, Eeyore. Look! It’s a Lamborghini!
Eeyore: They’re way too expensive…..
Me: I’m buying it for you! It’s a gift!
Eeyore: but insurance will be so expensive…..
Me: No, I’m paying your insurance, too!
Eeyore: yeah, but it’s red. I don’t like red cars.

Me? I stop wasting time with the Eeyores, because all they really prove is it’s never good enough. So why bother?

New Apple MacBooks at Oct. 14 event — good luck on airfare, East Coasters » VentureBeat:

Well, Apple sure took their time getting those invites out. As has been speculated for several weeks now, Apple is in fact holding an event on October 14 to unveil its new line of MacBook computers. The invite, which simply reads: “The spotlight turns to notebooks,” is expected to showcase a revamp of Apple entire line of portable computers.

Oh, thank god. It was getting rather frothy and silly. For instance, in the last 36 hours, I’ve seen:

A rumor site issuing a rumor that said a previous rumor it had published was, in fact correct. Of course, that rumor is still a rumor, so one had to wonder why they bothered.

A site pushing these “brick” photos with a “(unnamed site)” has unearthed these photos…” when in fact those photos have been on numerous sites (with varying levels of accountability for the source, most of it negligent) for days now. I’m sure it was a coincidence the site they pushed as “unearthing this information” was an affiliate blog in the same publishing network.

Yes, folks, Citizen Journalism at its best.

Fortunately, Apple’s ended the first phase of this idiocy by actually admitting they are going to do something, so now we get to watch everyone hyper themselves into a frenzy with increasingly insane fantasies about what Apple is going to announce, followed by the inevitable “what a disappointment” postings when Apple actually does what it always intended todo and didn’t announce any of the stuff these guys made up out of thin air…

I will bet that the nice guys at Piper Jaffray will do that — only they can’t hide behind the “we’re just fanboy bloggers” excuse, in theory, they’re supposed to know what they’re doing. hah.

Apple caught some flack last month for allegedly telling members of the New York media to fly out to San Francisco for its event. The event, which yielded new iPods, was perceived as underwhelming by some — many of whom were hoping for new notebooks as well. Today, Apple was kind enough to give those same East Coast media members 5 days to book their flights back out to San Francisco.

Perhaps because it’s the chosen way to limit the frothiness of the rumor sites? Once Apple admits it’s going to announce something, EVERYONE starts pointing at and legitimizing the rumor and fanboy sites, and the froth goes hyperbolic, so the best way to keep that kind of silly season speculating out of the view of the general public is to limit the time where Apple gives substance to the rumors in any form.

Does that mess up the life of the “professional” pundits? Yeah, but so? spend less time borrowing from the fanboy sites, with or without attribution. It’s all about managing the craziness folks; and when you join in it, you end up getting managed.

I won’t even get into the comments of the ex owner of Think Secret saying apple seems to have changed its handling of this stuff. Well, duh. Just noticed, did you? Apple was adjusting and adapting before I left. Nice of you to have figured it out, years later. (hint: apple is (a) not stupid, and (b) never stands still…. just saying)

I’ll make a wild prediction here: Apple will at no time use the word “netbook”, no matter what some of the pundits might think. A couple of reasons for this:

First, a netbook is still a niche, unproven market. Yes, there’s a small group of people thinking this is the next reality for everyone, but the netbook is still very much a future market (I think it’s a legitimate one, but it’s not soup yet). The numbers indicating that people are (a) buying Linux netbooks, (b) taking them home, and (c) in good numbers, taking them back and buying windows-based netbooks says all you need to know here, that the fantasy of “everyting I do lives online” is still that, a fantasy. Give it five years. Or three. Unlike tablet PC’s, the last “Apple HAS to do this” fantasy wish, I think netbooks are going to be a big market, just not yet. Don’t tell the early adopter echo chamber that, though, hate to interrupt their life with some realit.y

Second, a netbook is all about compromises. you’re giving up some functionality in favor of reduced weight and price. It’s basically a special purpose product (much like those tablet PCs, which as everyone now knows, is a market Apple just plain old missed and let Microsoft dominate. Oh, wait. Nobody’s dominating it, because there’s no market. Never mind). A core competency of Apple is ease of use and user experience; a core competency of a netbook is that the OS and what’s on the computer doesn’t matter as long as you have good connectivity and a browser that doesn’t suck (or something like that). Those core competencies are in conflict.

Now, lower -end computers? $800 laptops? that wouldn’t surprise me a bit. Call it a netbook? Make it a netbook? I’m just not convinced. Position it towards that space? definitely, but ultimately, it’s going to be a macintosh that focusses on portability and price, not a stripped down beast that’s “cheap”; instead, it’ll be “inexpensive”, but still a mac.

Me, I’ll tell you what *I* want. I want a nice, inexpensive laptop that I can carry around and use, AND I want a good, portable LCD screen to go with it. Give me a 12″ or 14″ laptop screen AND a 17″ screen that can live in my backpack and I can plug into in an office environment, and I’ll be thrilled. Best of both worlds, a handy, portable compputer, but god, I don’t want to do photoshop on my photos on a 12″ screen. That’s the kind of tradeoff windows “netbook” geeks might accept, but not me…

And the key missing piece there isn’t the computer, it’s the 17″ screen in a macbook format that you can fold up and carry in a laptop bag with your laptop. Now THAT is an innovation I could sink my teeth into.