tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-335225762008-09-06T00:25:09.748-07:00Ruminations on the Professional Macintosh Home Office, Small Office, and BeyondMarkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comBlogger226125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-34658680705855810052008-09-06T00:22:00.000-07:002008-09-06T00:25:09.756-07:00

Apple will hold a public event on September 9th to, presumably, announce new Apple gadgets and/or software. Speculation runs wild on the possibility of new iPods and other hardware. Stay tuned...

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-65176209272031028522008-09-03T20:10:00.000-07:002008-09-03T20:25:15.152-07:00

The standard work week in France is 35 hours in duration. French workers receive eight weeks of vacation. German workers also receive, on average, eight weeks of vacation. In the U.S. it's 40 hours per week and two weeks vacation. I'd rather be in France. The U.S. is the only "Western" nation that does not have socialized medicine, or what is also termed single-payer medicine. Why is this so?

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-56711516531271431422008-09-02T13:49:00.000-07:002008-09-02T16:20:31.168-07:00

From my progressive political perspective, getting excited about Obama is pathetically delusional. That's a corner of consciousness where corporations excel. They define the world in the mass media to suit their own narrow, pecuniary interests, forcing citizens to either face the reality of class warfare and exploitation, or to sink into the available delusions of democracy. The fact is this

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-68179267240671288462008-08-29T10:00:00.000-07:002008-08-29T15:23:53.224-07:00

Comcast has a monopoly on Internet bandwidth. Without any serious competition, the company can do much as it pleases. Cornel West? Well, I saved the best for last. Comcast announced that Internet access will be capped at 250 GB/month starting October 1st. "Customers who top 250 GB in a month twice in a six-month time-frame could have service terminated for a year." Although the cap is

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-59908821107917589282008-08-28T08:34:00.000-07:002008-08-29T12:21:12.317-07:00

Dear Professor, Fear of science is one of the frontiers of human understanding. Not just in the third-world, but here in the "West" as well. Colleges and universities want physics and chemistry, but they don't want scientists to connect physics and chemistry with human existence. Science is about speaking truth to irrational and illegitimate power. Science is democracy of information. Science

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-43986489526200063372008-08-27T22:34:00.000-07:002008-08-28T01:30:05.834-07:00

While the Democrats offer TV illusions of change in Denver, democracy is breaking out in Bangkok. People fed up with the corruption in Thailand have taken over the prime minister's compound, Government House, in Bangkok, Thailand. The future of democracy lies in Asia and South America, not the United States. This is where inspiring progressive movement creeps forward under the pressure of the

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-11235570285756390102008-08-27T10:26:00.001-07:002008-08-27T10:28:21.406-07:00

Naomi Kkein hits the proverbial nail on the head with an honest look at the moral corruption of the "establishment" American progressive organizations:

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-83483538503719628582008-08-21T10:24:00.000-07:002008-08-21T11:11:19.050-07:00

Wardriving: What you don't know about WiFi networks could ruin your whole day.

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-6444023665761899902008-08-20T07:55:00.000-07:002008-08-20T09:01:05.615-07:00

Calling them alternative news is a misnomer. Better that we label TV "news" as infotainment than as news. A recent report from the Pew Research Center identified several trends in American news access. Ranging from time-wasters such as Paris Hilton, to blatant corporate propaganda, TV "news" is still the major source of "news" for Americans, with trends in certain demographic groups as they

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-47275871983642328362008-08-16T22:05:00.000-07:002008-08-17T00:48:34.875-07:00

It is the responsibility of intellectuals to speak the truth and expose lies. ~Noam Chomsky I have been known to fix computers (and more explicitly networks), but I'm not a "computer repairman." Much of my adult life has been devoted to the search for truth--beginning with the painfully familial extending naturally outward to the local, the national, and beyond to the international, and I would

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-24752419793353293802008-08-15T12:45:00.000-07:002008-08-15T12:52:43.375-07:00

Today makes today easier to manage. This tiny tool does one thing and one thing well: it's a pop-up window on your Mac displaying your iCal schedule for today. Appointments, tasks, phone calls to make, lunch engagment? Today has today's meetings, greetings, and deadlines, with times, sitting on your Mac desktop. Cool Tool.

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-34032988667082615752008-08-13T17:17:00.000-07:002008-08-13T18:38:13.956-07:00

Running low on Mandarin oranges was bad enough, but the absence of cat litter made a trip to CostCo imperative. Blithely stocking up on these essentials and a couple of non-essentials, I thought surely, this is where I can kick back and disengage from the larger world. Perhaps I've done too much for one day; too much for this week. What does it matter that I agonize over American foreign and

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-76031395173834967522008-08-13T13:48:00.000-07:002008-08-13T14:26:50.889-07:00

Serious People Have Serious Enemies ~ Maude Barlow If I'm not pissing off some corporate hack every day, I'm not living right. Power, money, and vast feel-good public relations campaigns does not a moral institution make. Each of us must decide whether to serve the interests of power, and the abuse of power, or to serve humankind. Biting the hand that feeds me is not easy. Nothing worthwhile

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-22090830685615879692008-08-13T11:31:00.000-07:002008-08-13T12:12:46.594-07:00

I do not recommend Western Digital hard drives for Macs. The WD My Book drives are sold at CostCo, Fry's, and many other outlets. AVOID THEM. These drives have certain incompatibilities with Macintosh computer systems. Maxtor One Touch drives are acceptable but you would be paying a premium for the useless One Touch gimmick. Seagates and some other hard drives are okay, but I recommend OWC (

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-83824087046536631462008-08-12T17:11:00.000-07:002008-08-12T17:14:56.463-07:00

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-18102860506963228092008-08-12T13:25:00.000-07:002008-08-12T15:26:24.644-07:00

Follow-up Notes on Near-term Availability: 1) I am challenging the management class that constitutes a significant segment of my consulting business. Education, particularly college education, is funded by the state with the principle goal of churning out a managerial class which buys into the maintenance of corporate power. The danger of post-secondary education is attenuated by exerting

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-90778118582786414902008-08-12T12:29:00.000-07:002008-08-12T12:34:32.834-07:00

Avoid MobileMe The new Apple syncing tool that replaced DotMac recently is to be presently avoided. I do not recommend the service due to the numerous bugs and outages since inception. iPhone YES, MobileMe NO The new iPhone is an excellent piece of hardware for the home office. No reservations here.

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-20910564871502247572008-08-12T02:02:00.000-07:002008-08-12T02:11:25.279-07:00

Please be advised: That you may have a task or two in your home office, in the near future--- I want to thank all of you for calling upon me to work on your home office computer systems. Your interest is greatly appreciated. I do want to note that I may be leaving the country for six months or a year. Teaching in Southeast Asia is a possibility. I will know definitively in about a month if I

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-5786142670477094202008-08-01T15:05:00.000-07:002008-08-01T15:20:34.580-07:00

Oil giants Chevron Corp. and Total SA wrapped up a string of gargantuan, record-breaking earnings reports Friday, a stretch in which six of the major international oil companies topped $50 billion in combined profit for the first time. AND... Thousands of state workers were told to stay home Friday under an order by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger aimed at cutting expenses for California's

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-50695352568527991772008-07-28T10:32:00.000-07:002008-07-28T19:15:37.664-07:00

According to a news story from the American News Project, the top one-tenth of one-percent, 14,000 families, of the population of the U.S. own 22 percent of the wealth in America. The bottom 90 percent, 133,000,000 families, hold 4 percent of the wealth. Tax rates for the wealthy are lower than for low-income citizens. A janitor in the Chevron building in San Francisco most likely pays a higher

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-12122457482962168642008-07-24T23:45:00.000-07:002008-07-25T01:02:38.108-07:00

Would we do well to think of the Constitution of the United States as an operating system? Apple OS 8.51 was one of the best things that ever came out of Cupertino. Mac OS 8.51, ahhhh, I remember it well, but it's dead and gone. Good OS, but good riddance. We've moved on. USA OS version 2.1: nickname Eagle, 1791 (version 1.0, Articles of Confederation, nickname Turkey; was quickly ungraded)

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-91335936781779427262008-07-21T15:50:00.000-07:002008-07-21T18:26:08.512-07:00

Corporate Media Headline Obama: Afghanistan Is Central Front in War on Terrorism There is no such thing as a War on Terrorism. It doesn't exist and could not exist. It's sheer nonsense intended to frighten the public with meaningless propaganda. Nonsense. The citizens of the US suffered the crimes of September 11, 2001 where a couple of dozen criminals killed people and destroyed property. Two

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-20256194639830345592008-07-17T12:55:00.000-07:002008-07-17T14:01:44.241-07:00

You won't hear about the invisible war on the TV tube. Iraq War, Afghanistan War, and the fearful but fictitious War on Terror are distractions worthy of a new chapter in 1984. The Domestic Economic War. The war on the American public is pernicious yet conspicuously invisible to the media. Globalization, deregulation, union-busting, privatization, and the absence of a single-payer national

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-38887946998712188662008-07-14T09:54:00.001-07:002008-07-14T10:25:12.101-07:00

Apple's new MobileMe replaces DotMac. "New and improved" is accurate, exhibited by sync services that work for email, contacts, and calendars. Sync crucial information across multiple Macs, and of course, your iPhone. Yet, no Safari bookmark syncing! This one is a mystery. For now, del.icio.us will do the job for both Safari and Firefox. A del.icio.us extension is available for Firefox

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33522576.post-4680978756678304882008-07-12T07:13:00.000-07:002008-07-12T07:23:41.159-07:00

Barack Obama breaks commitment to filibuster warrantless spying bill.

Markhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12110153820789231443noreply@blogger.com