Friday, June 20, 2008 at 7:00AM Our friends at theiLife.com have put together a slick countdown widget for those of you waiting to get in line. You can download it here. Available in black or white, and the best part, unlike the iPhone, there's no extra charge for the white version.
Apple, iPhone 3G, theilife.com Permalink Thursday, June 19, 2008 at 8:00PM 
There have been some rumbling in the past about Apple having problems hiring enough engineers, which in turn caused delays with the release of Leopard and the iPhone apps. Now it turns out Apple's inability to hire enough people may be related to how much they are willing to pay.
$89,000 doesn't seem like an awful lot when you consider all the hours the engineers work, how little public recognition they receive, and the general high cost of living in Silicon Valley. With Google and Yahoo offering almost $20k more, it's understandable how the talent could be spread thin at Apple.
When myself and other TDL members worked for Apple the pay was definitely good, and particularly for retail. But near the end of my run, I was aware that new genii were making almost $15k less than me. We also went from having multiple full time Mac Specialist to almost none. Quarterly bonuses were removed and replaced with a one time pay raise, which was great for existing personnel, but didn't do squat for new hires.
Don't get me wrong, Apple is still a great company to work for, and I just hope it stays that way, and that their ability to consistently wow us isn't affected by their purse strings.
Apple, Bad Business Permalink Thursday, June 19, 2008 at 3:00PM Finally Apple has made to Australia, and TDL viewer C.Park was kind of enough to point us to his video of the event:
Thursday, June 19, 2008 at 11:01AM I just wanted to share a YouTube find with everyone. We're always fans of frustration best told through video. So here's an iPhone 3G ad parody pointing out some "shortcomings" compared to other phones. You know what's coming, but still worth a chuckle.
Apple, iPhone 3G, just for fun, parody Permalink Thursday, June 19, 2008 at 7:00AM 
So awhile back I posted about .Mac and the value for what you're getting. Apple has now announced .Mac will be making the migration to MobileMe. We lose some features in this process like iCards, but we get 2x the storage and we get push email, calendar, and address book.
I ask the same question . . . is it worth it??
The answer depends on what's important to you. If you don't care about push and don't need to live in a NOW NOW NOW world, MobileMe doesn't seem like a compelling offering.
If you do care about push and want/need to live in a NOW NOW NOW world, MobileMe is probably the best and least costly solution. You can get free push email from Yahoo! but you don't get calendar or address book with this offering. If you want to pay for exchange (push) hosting there are many offerings out there. The least expensive solution that specifically calls out support for the iPhone is about $11.00/mo. This totals $132 for just the push service.
The verdict: If you want push MobileMe is a great solution that also gives you online storage and Apple iLife integration. If you don't care about push . . . still not worth it.