Freaky Friday News Tips From The Mac Kingdom.

You gotta be impressed with the state of Mac affairs these days. All the news pouring out of Cupertino, CA seems to be good and going Apple’s way. Stocks up. Prices are down. Chips are fast. iPod is loved by all. All good news? Nope.

There’s news and then there’s the creative news. Apple’s stock price keeps climbing as everyone but the competition climbs on board the iPod train. Then there’s that anal-lyst who says Apple will be coming out with a non-hard drive, flash-based iPod soon.

That’s creative. Forget the fact that more people are hoarding more songs than ever and that 4-gigabyte hard drives are still not enough space for many users (we did a poll). If there’s not enough news you like, I guess it’s OK to make it up, right? After all, that’s what USA Today and the New York Times do.

Note for example, that Apple owns about 90-percent of the hard-drive portable music player market. iTunes Music Store owns about 70-percent of legal song downloads. So what does Microsoft do? Open a store, provide music that runs on all the players but iPod.

Do you hear the news folks talking about how bad Microsoft is for not following the “standard?” Apple is the standard, of course. No. They don’t say squat. What they do is not report the news as news reporters used to do, they make it up.

For example, Jack Schofield, a writer for the Guardian, says this: “"When Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates spoke at the launch of Plays For Sure in Los Angeles last week, he showed a range of players including Creative Labs, Dell, iRiver and Samsung models. The Plays For Sure website also highlights the fact that consumers have a choice of download services, such as Napster, MusicNow, MusicMatch and Wal-Mart, not just MSN Music.”

Color me pink and kiss me, I smell an agenda, not news. Here it comes. Go Jack: “Apple still has time to license its system, and make companies such as Virgin friends rather than foes. If it doesn’t, it is probably just a matter of time before Microsoft’s system has enough support to become the de facto standard, just like Windows.”

Whoa. Apple has sold about 5-million iPods to Macdom and Windows-dumb, and now the press is telling those users that a 70-percent or 90-percent market share isn’t enough, their stuff will be outdated soon because iPod loving Pedro Martinez has a new daddy?

Where’s real news when you need it?

Here’s another one. Rolling Stone, New York Post, and other big name news organizations are reporting that Apple “will” release a new iPod next week at the Apple shindig music event. It’ll be a black iPod. Buyers will also get the latest from rock group U2. What? Nothing from JoJo or Hilary Duff, or Counting Crows or the Old Crow Medicine Show?

Is that news or a prediction?

More news? Apple reportedly will launch the iTunes Music Store to the rest of Europe, Canada, Australia. Since it hasn’t happened yet, why not add Honk Kong, China, Japan, and West Virginia to the list.

No new PowerBooks until next year? That’s news. Apple said so. Besides, they’ve got plenty of the current models and need to move ‘em at year end special prices. No, wait. That’s not news either. It’s me, dreaming.

The point of all this is that Apple lives in good times and is doing well. By almost all measures. Products are good. Prices are good. Stock price is good (unless you haven’t bought yet). Reviews are good. Steve Jobs’ health is good. The balance sheet is good.

What’s there to write about? The real news is boring. So media web sites, in an effort to drum up the clicks, resort to speculation innuendo, prognostication, futuristic planning, and day-dreaming while using the keyboard.

Worse, we lap it up like we’re in a cult, or surrounded by some kind of reality-distortion field or something.

Hmmm. Scratch that.

Worse, I’d like to have more news of what is and what was. For what isn’t I’d like to be told it isn’t yet.

I still want me 60-gigabyte videoPod tablet with wireless video streaming, though. I hear it’s coming in January.

Check out the daily list of our 9 Word mini-Reviews at NoodleMac, and Kate's daily in-depth Mac software reviews at PixoBebo.

Off Topic #72 - Need to save a few dollars on Mac software? Click Here to save almost $10 on the new version of Photoshop Elements, and almost $20 on the new Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac from the Mac360 Store (it’s really Amazon). Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Entourage and more-- barely $50 more than Apple’s iWork ‘08.

Off Topic #58 - Do politicians use personal computers? Of course. We’ve heard Barack Obama prefers a Mac, while Hillary Clinton uses a Dell, though, apparently neither of the candidates can bowl. Does Obama’s potential vice president use a Mac? Even Clinton acknowledges Apple’s brand power but says she can’t afford a Mac. Maybe she’d win if she used a Mac.