rare pattern thoughts in a blog

When the Apple Store came back up after revamping, somewhere around the WWDC this week, I went to http://me.com and was redirected to the Apple MobileMe page.

But for the past 2 days now, me.com has been down. DNS is hell.

Via my Lijit stats, I see that quite a few people are coming here searching for a solution of syncronizing or backing up Yojimbo without .Mac.

Alas I don't have an answer. I gave up and signed up for the .Mac service, despite their claimed "right" to snoop through or destroy whatever I put there. I'm using much more encryption on my entries now, that's for sure (and probably a best practice anyway).

I wish there were another answer. Alas....

After comparing many programs for my regular note-taking, I keep returning to Yojimbo. The tagging system and spotlight support are enough for me to find my misc notes. Syncing via .Mac has a nice wrinkle in that it will merge changes to individual files, so if you update a file on one computer, and another file on the other computer, when you sync them both changes are reflected on both machines. Still, while the tagging approach can be fast, creating more complex relationships is difficult, if not impossible. In the end, Yojimbo is not ideal, and I'm still planning on trying alternatives, but this is what I have.

What's worse, I'm kind of painted into a corner because BareBones has decided, in their wisdom, to provide no way at all to export your items except one at a time. There's also no way to export for backup, unless you want to manually back up the Yojimbo Application Support folder in your user Library.

This means that, out of the box, the only way to move files or back up your notes in Yojimbo is to use .Mac ... which is not ideal, when you consider the rather objectionable .Mac EULA, that includes such lovely items such as:

Subject to any specific license agreements for various .Mac software
features (including third party software), Apple may change, suspend or
discontinue any (or all) aspects of .Mac at any time, including the
availability of any .Mac feature. Apple may also impose limits on the
use of or access to certain features or portions of .Mac, or restrict
your access to any part or all of .Mac, in all cases without notice or
liability.

In other words, they can just kill your stuff without consequence. Oh sure, they would never do that! But if not, then why do they claim the right in the agreement?

And:

Apple reserves the right to terminate your access to .Mac at any time,
with cause or without cause, in the event of any breach of this
Agreement by you (or anyone using your account or any sub-account),
your infringement of Apple's or .Mac's or others' intellectual
property, or any other circumstances which, in Apple's sole discretion,
merit termination. Any such termination may, if Apple elects (and
subject to applicable law), be without any refund to you of any prepaid
fees or amounts.

Translation: Apple can arbitrarily cancel your account and keep your money, and you have no recourse.

And:

APPLE RESERVES THE RIGHT (SUBJECT TO APPLICABLE LOCAL LAW), IN ITS SOLE
DISCRETION, TO MONITOR ALL .MAC FEATURES AND CONTENT, INCLUDING BUT NOT
LIMITED TO A USE OF A USER'S MAIN ACCOUNT AND ANY SUB-ACCOUNTS, FOR THE
PURPOSE OF INVESTIGATING VIOLATIONS OF THIS AGREEMENT.

Translation: Apple can look at all your private files.

Why would I pay $99 a year, or more, for service under such terms? So this is now what I'm trying to avoid.

So does anyone out there know of a way to synchronize Yojimbo between machines without .Mac?

A few weeks ago, I started telling friends my wild and crazy prediction that Apple will own a majority share of the personal computer market within three years. Apple's biggest weakness is in their vertical monopoly over their own hardware. OSX is fabulous, but their hardware is crap, let's face it. You simply have to figure the cost of Apple Care into any Mac purchase because you can count on some sort of hardware problem.

Despite this -- and who's to say Apple won't change its tune regarding hardware? -- Apple's star is definitely rising, while Microsoft's is in a self-inflicted crash and burn.

Paul Graham, in is post, "Microsoft is Dead," has the quote of the month:

Microsoft's biggest weakness is that they still don't realize how much they suck.

The same could be said for a number of companies. Graham recognizes that a number of folks will scoff at these assertions.

Half the readers will say that Microsoft is still an enormously profitable company, and that I should be more careful about drawing conclusions based on what a few people think in our insular little "Web 2.0" bubble. The other half, the younger half, will complain that this is old news.

Graham still succumbs to the notion that all "applications will live on the web—not just email, but everything, right up to Photoshop." Such black-and-white thinking may provide a poetic flourish, or add drama to pronouncements on the future, but my own sense is that the general public is going to start noticing the pound of privacy flesh web companies, like Paul Graham's employer, demand for the convenience of the services they offer.

The desktop is not dead, but it is changing. So is the web (duh), and just as desktop übercompany Microsoft is feeling the heat for their business practices and strategic decisions, we might see the same thing happening to the übercompanies of the web before too long.

I have a new technological love affair: SpamSieve. 200+ fewer love notes in my in-box every day.

Alas, I'll just have to do without all that helpful unsolicited information. I'll miss notices that I need to go tell my bank my bank account number. I'll not see all those customer inquiries about my eBay items I didn't realize I'd put up for auction. I'll be oblivious to the fact that I've been approved for a $347,978 mortgage. Warnings to avoid enhancement pills will escape my notice. Forget about cureall [sic] stores and veiny illustrations of male appendages. And the Nigerian Minister will just have to find another lucky soul.

I never realized just how much baseline stress receiving so much useless and offensive crap was causing me. My email is clean, and it's quite a lovely day today.

After fighting to get back online after persistent connectivity problems, I've stumbled across the dummy solution: Network Diagnostics. Apparently that resets the connection more completely than simply trying to renew the lease within the Network settings. (One easy way to get it is to use Safari to call up a page. I know I know....)

Of course, if you're reading this, then you're online and not having any problems. Maybe you can pass this along to anybody finding themselves suddenly locked out.

(I'm sure there are more geeky ways to reset connections using *nix. Alas that's beyond me.)

This is hysterical!

[Hat tip to MacMerc.]

Since I wrote about it a few days ago, I've been spending what is starting to feel like way too much time searching for, researching, downloading and evaluating project management applications for OSX. One thing I find rather surprising is the virtual dearth of project management applications that can actually manage more than one project at a time.

FastTrack Schedule seems to have this capability, but only in a sort of one-way summary mode. You cannot change anything on the multiple project view that will carry back into the individual projects.

Meanwhile their GUI is a little stiff. I find myself repeatedly clicking on things, expecting to be able to edit or manipulate them, only to find out I can't. I realize this is a learning curve issue, and since FastTrack Schedule is up to version 9, I'm sure they are quite clear in their own minds as to appropriate work flows we're supposed to be using, but still I'm left a bit frustrated.

What's more, their help screen is a kludgy stale old browser thing that keeps popping open new windows -- and with my workflow in Firefox, that means a long array of tabs. If they can't even integrate that content into Mac help, I really wonder what their commitment is to OSX anyway.

I was hopeful of xTime, which is put out by a company that actually does develop directly for Mac, but their current version is a buggy affair, with incomplete line displays and frequent lock-ups, that hasn't been updated since March. I've had to force quite xTime more than I'd care to.

Now xTime does have a new version 4 coming out next month, but their current beta is available only for existing customers, and I don't have the luxury of waiting over a week just to try it out. When I wrote to ask whether I could evaluate their beta, I got a terse slacker-style response (no caps, no punctuation -- very professional, dudes!) that only existing customers get to try their new version's beta. So much for their wanting to draw in new customers. So xTime is going off the list.

Merlin2 is still on the list. It's relatively easy to use, but doesn't do all I want. Even though the beta I have has crashed a few times, which is frustrating, to say the least, the feature set seems to offer ease of use, and that counts for a lot. So I'm still evaluating there.

iTaskX shows some promise, but again fell short in the crucial area of multiple project management. Still, I love the clean nature of its Gantt -- very clean, with minimal (and optional) 3D effects (though I don't care for the squared-off path lines). The task list, though, is on the dry side, with few visual cues as to dependencies and hierarchies. The program seems to have an easy ability to share projects to a designated webserver, which is something that I'm sure will come in handy in the near future. Still, I'm not sure this is the one.

Which takes me back again to OmniPlan, which is by a company I admire. OmniPlan is on the basic side, and does not do what I need. But at least it's easy, and maybe I can just find some sort of workaround using iCal or something to actually try to coordinate our various projects into one time management workflow.

Since none of these programs actually does what I need, I'm at a bit of a loss as to what I am evaluating for, except for finding some way to work one of them into a minimally complicated patchwork of programs so that I can manage more than one project at a time.

But this leaves me very frustrated. Why the hell does this capability not exist? What am I missing? Am I the only person in the world who needs to manage more than one project at a time?

This is great news:

DailyTech and Engadget are showing off pictures from an FCC filing by Apple Computer of the new Mighty Mouse. It looks a lot like the old Mighty Mouse, minus the wire. It is being reported that the mouse will use two standard AA batteries and will be compatible with Tiger. However, the current Mighty Mouse works with Jaguar, albeit with reduced functionality, so it's likely that the Bluetooth model will do the same. In case you don't remember, the original Mighty Mouse had a few drawbacks, two of them being the cord and no Bluetooth, so that's two down.

And it's more than an FCC filing, it's here!

I love the Mighty Mouse because of its trackball, which is an order of magnitude better and easier to use than the big wheels other mice use. It takes a little practice to do the right-click thing, because the mouse is all one big form, so you have to really click over on the right side of the mouse to do things like view contextual menus, but that's an easy adjustment. I find the other mice to be archaic by comparison, just because of those big wheels.

The Mighty Mouse also has these side buttons that I confess I've not worked into my usage flow. But it's nice to know I have programmable power there.

I'm delighted that we can finally get rid of that darned cable, which is always getting in the way of my papers and such. But if it doesn't have a tail, shouldn't we call it the Mighty Gerbil?

Following up on what I just posted, it seems that Sony BMG is now being sued for damage their secret RootKit software has done to PCs:

Sony's now infamous decision to use system destabilizing DRM malware in order to "fight piracy" (despite it being shockingly easy to defeat) has earned Sony a lawsuit or three. A new class action suit has been filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, another is expected in New York this week, and there have been a handful of rumblings in other countries, as well.

In California, the class action suit alleges that Sony's DRM has caused harm to computers, and that the company failed to disclose precisely what the DRM technology would do to users' computers. According to sources, the suit alleges three distinct violations of California law, including violations of statutes relating to deceptive trade practices and obfuscated technological measures deemed to be anti-consumer. The suit seeks an injunction against the sale of the effected CDs as well as monetary damages for those who purchased the discs.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation also is considering legal action and is seeking information from affected customers.

What's more, now the "Stinx-E trojan" has appeared to exploit the Sony DRM software's code to open a back door to PCs.

And not only that, Mark Russinovich reports that the DRM software itself is harder to uninstall than many malicious viruses.

What's even more, Cory at BoingBoing links to Darren Dittrich's report that the Sony CDs also infect Macs:

I recently purchased Imogen Heap's new CD (Speak for Yourself), an RCA Victor release, but with distribution credited to Sony/BMG. Reading recent reports of a Sony rootkit, I decided to poke around. In addition to the standard volume for AIFF files, there's a smaller extra partition for "enhanced" content. I was surprised to find a "Start.app" Mac application in addition to the expected Windows-related files. Running this app brings up a long legal agreement, clicking Continue prompts you for your username/password (uh-oh!), and then promptly exits. Digging around a bit, I find that Start.app actually installs 2 files: PhoenixNub1.kext and PhoenixNub12.kext.

Personally, I'm not a big fan of anyone installing kernel extensions on my Mac. In Sony's defense, upon closer reading of the EULA, they essentially tell you that they will be installing software. Also, this is apparently not the same technology used in the recent Windows rootkits (made by XCP), but rather a DRM codebase developed by SunnComm, who promotes their Mac-aware DRM technology on their site.

EFF has a partial list of infected CDs:

Trey Anastasio, Shine (Columbia)

Celine Dion, On ne Change Pas (Epic)

Neil Diamond, 12 Songs (Columbia)

Our Lady Peace, Healthy in Paranoid Times (Columbia)

Chris Botti, To Love Again (Columbia)

Van Zant, Get Right with the Man (Columbia)

Switchfoot, Nothing is Sound (Columbia)

The Coral, The Invisible Invasion (Columbia)

Acceptance, Phantoms (Columbia)

Susie Suh, Susie Suh (Epic)

Amerie, Touch (Columbia)

Life of Agony, Broken Valley (Epic)

Horace Silver Quintet, Silver's Blue (Epic Legacy)

Gerry Mulligan, Jeru (Columbia Legacy)

Dexter Gordon, Manhattan Symphonie (Columbia Legacy)

The Bad Plus, Suspicious Activity (Columbia)

The Dead 60s, The Dead 60s (Epic)

Dion, The Essential Dion (Columbia Legacy)

Natasha Bedingfield, Unwritten (Epic)

Ricky Martin, Life (Columbia) (labeled as XCP, but, oddly, our disc had no protection)

Several other Sony-BMG CDs are protected with a different copy-protection technology, sourced from SunnComm, including:

My Morning Jacket, Z

Santana, All That I Am

Sarah McLachlan, Bloom Remix Album

They also tell you how to figure out if another CD is infected.

(Now I need to call my sister. I'd bought Santana's album, but didn't care for it and gave it to her. I'm glad I didn't pop it into my Mac first ... but she has a PC. Ack!)

David Berlind on ZDNet notes that the bands whose CDs are being sold with the crippleware are not happy about it:

Z isn't the only band that's upset with the latest DRM developments. Last month, CNN.com reported how a member of the band Switchfoot whose DRM-protected CD debuted at No. 3 on The Billboard 200 was equally disappointed. Said Switchfoot guitarist Tim Foreman, "We were horrified when we first heard about the new copy-protection policy…. It is heartbreaking to see our blood, sweat and tears over the past two years blurred by the confusion and frustration surrounding new technology."

Even more demonstrative of the control points afforded to any market leading or dominating solution, the CNN story goes onto describe how Sony BMG is aware of the problems when it comes to transferring music from its DRM-protected CDs to iPods and is "urging people who buy copy-protected titles to write to Apple and demand that the company license its FairPlay DRM for use with secure CDs." Even though Apple's Fairplay may not have a monopoly yet, the company is behaving very monopolistically, an issue I discuss in another blog entry that I posted today.

Molly Wood's CNET column last week expressed outrage at Sony's behavior:

But this--using the tactics of criminals to invade our PCs without our knowledge and to expose us to further attack, just so you can keep us from, say, burning a mix CD and giving it to our friends--this is beyond the pale. And as many news sources are beginning to point out, there's some reason to think it might also be illegal, under the U.S. Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

From the realm of unintended consequences, jasonn wonders if anti-virus companies could be prosecuted for removing the DRM software:

The logical question, regarding the Sony rootkit scandal and the upcoming removal tools from antivirus companies, is when will the DOJ prosecute antivirus companies for violating the DMCA? It's not a question of whether or not they violate the law when they supply removal tools for Sony's rootkit, aka Digital Rights Management software, which now exposes PCs to a virus threat. The question is whether or not the government will apply the law.

Isaac.Eiland-Hall is astounded by all this:

I mean really—I can’t imagine they thought they could get away with this.

I tell you what—if I had Sony stock, I’d be selling it like no tomorrow—because that’s what they might have.

Perhaps the simplest and clearest response comes from over By the Bayou:

Nice going. Do they just really hate their customers? As I said before: this is why I almost never buy CDs anymore.

At the very least, I think this is just another demonstration on why Cluetrain-clued-in businesses and open source approaches to technology have bright futures.