TidBITS#786/04-Jul-05
=====================

  This week's issue revolves around audio, but in two very
  different ways. First, Adam examines the recent Supreme Court
  decision against peer-to-peer file sharing companies Grokster
  and StreamCast Networks. Then Andy Affleck rejoins us for a
  look at the new podcasting support in iTunes 4.9. In the news,
  we cover the releases of QuicKeys X3 3.1 and Virtual PC 7.0.2,
  note the passing of grayscale iPods, and announce "Take Control
  of Tiger," our latest Take Control print collection.

Topics:
    MailBITS/04-Jul-05
    P2P Takes a Licking but Keeps on Ticking
    Apple Releases iTunes 4.9 with Podcasting Support
    Take Control News/04-Jul-05
    Hot Topics in TidBITS Talk/04-Jul-05

<http://www.tidbits.com/tb-issues/TidBITS-786.html>
<ftp://ftp.tidbits.com/issues/2005/TidBITS#786_04-Jul-05.etx>

Copyright 2005 TidBITS: Reuse governed by Creative Commons license
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   ---------------------------------------------------------------

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MailBITS/04-Jul-05
------------------

**QuicKeys X3 3.1 Supports Automator, Adds Toolbars** -- Startly
  Technologies has released QuicKeys X3 version 3.1, adding support
  for incorporating Automator workflows into QuicKeys shortcuts and
  bringing back SoftKeys, which provides a translucent toolbar with
  10 slots for holding shortcuts. Smaller improvements include a new
  option for the Open Items action that lets you specify on the fly
  which application to use, the Action Palette for providing faster
  access to shortcuts within QuicKeys Editor, and the capability
  to trigger shortcuts based on the mounting or dismounting of
  specific drives or network volumes. For more about QuicKeys X3,
  see "QuicKeys X3 at the Crossroads" in TidBITS-767_. QuicKeys X3
  3.1 requires Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later and is a 14.1 MB download.
  It's a free update for users of QuicKeys X3; updates from previous
  versions run between $30 and $70, and new copies cost $100. [ACE]

<http://www.quickeys.com/products/qkx.html>
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=07993>


**Virtual PC 7.0.2 Gains Full Tiger Compatibility** -- Microsoft
  has released Virtual PC 7.0.2, a free minor update that provides
  full compatibility with Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. In particular,
  the update fixes problems under Tiger with Virtual Switch,
  Zero Configuration Printing, and the Dock Start Menu. The
  update is a 17 MB download and will update versions 7.0 and
  7.0.1. Microsoft also announced that new copies of Virtual PC 7
  purchased before 30-Sep-05 would be eligible for a $30 rebate.
  [ACE]

<http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.aspx?pid=download&location=
/mac/download/misc/vpc7_0_2.xml>
<http://www.microsoft.com/mac/products/virtualpc/rebate/rebate.html>


**Apple Says Goodbye to Grayscale iPods** -- In conjunction with
  the release of iTunes 4.9, Apple merged its iPod and iPod photo
  product lines. Gone are the black and white screens that appear
  on most current iPods - it's all color now. The new lineup
  includes a 20 GB iPod for $300 and a 60 GB iPod for $400. Apple
  also introduced a 20 GB iPod U2 edition (black body, now color
  screen) for $330. At the same time, the price of the 1 GB iPod
  shuffle has been reduced to $130. [JLC]

<http://www.apple.com/ipod/>


**DealBITS Drawing: Audio Hijack Pro Winners** -- Congratulations
  to David Scott of mac.com, Mary Seiler of comcast.net, and Marian
  Petrides of earthlink.net, whose entries were chosen randomly from
  1,246 valid entries in last week's DealBITS drawing and who each
  received a copy of Audio Hijack Pro from Rogue Amoeba Software,
  worth $32. Even if you didn't win, you can still save $5 on Audio
  Hijack Pro through 11-Jul-05. Use the coupon code TIDBITS2 when
  ordering to receive your discount; this offer is open to all
  TidBITS readers. [ACE]

<http://www.rogueamoeba.com/audiohijackpro/>
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=08149>


P2P Takes a Licking but Keeps on Ticking
----------------------------------------
  by Adam C. Engst <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  On 27-Jun-05, the Supreme Court of the United States handed down
  a unanimous decision in the MGM v. Grokster case that dealt a
  blow to proponents of peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing technologies
  and gave free rein to the lawyers of the large media companies.
  Or did it?


**The Case** -- The case was relatively simple. MGM and 27 other
  large media companies filed suit against the P2P companies
  Grokster, StreamCast Networks (makers of the Morpheus program),
  and Sharman Networks (makers of the Kazaa software), alleging
  that the three were responsible for copyright infringements
  that occurred as a result of the use of the free Grokster,
  Morpheus, and Kazaa software (hereafter, I'll refer to the
  three as "Grokster" for simplicity; in fact, Sharman's part
  of the case wasn't even included what went before the Supreme
  Court). The Supreme Court heard the case on appeal after two
  lower courts had ruled in favor of the P2P companies.

  Those rulings were based on the well-known Sony Corporation of
  America v. Universal City Studios case from 1984 that revolved
  around whether or not Sony was liable for copyright infringement
  because the Betamax video recorder could be used to infringe upon
  copyrighted works without the permission of the copyright holder.
  In that case, Sony was held to be free of liability because
  the Betamax recorder was "dual-use" in that it could be used
  for both infringing and noninfringing purposes. The court's
  particular wording was that the Betamax was "capable of
  substantial noninfringing uses." In the Sony case, the Supreme
  Court held that although Sony knew the Betamax could be used
  for infringing purposes, time-shifting (recording a program
  for later viewing) was a substantial noninfringing use.

<http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/sony_v_universal_decision.html>

  The fact that Grokster and Morpheus could be used for substantial
  noninfringing uses formed the core of the defense case, and
  the lower courts interpreted the Sony case fairly literally in
  agreeing. In disagreeing with the lower courts, the Supreme Court
  found that Grokster and StreamCast were potentially liable for
  copyright infringement because they actively promoted the fact
  that their software could be used to download copyrighted works
  without permission. In other words, intent is important, and the
  companies intended to create software that would enable users
  to infringe copyrights - they were inducing users to infringe
  copyright law. The Supreme Court based this decision on internal
  documents showing, for instance, that the companies created
  advertising aimed at picking up users from the original Napster
  service after it was shut down and that they planned to flaunt
  illegal uses of their software for PR purposes. More telling was
  the advertising-based business model used by each, since success
  in such a business model requires increasing the number of users
  and amount of usage, and both companies promoted the capability
  of their software to provide popular copyrighted works as a way
  of increasing usage. It's worth reading the full text of the
  decision to understand the full reasoning:

<http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/MGM_v_Grokster/04-480.pdf>

  With this decision, the lawsuit returns to lower courts, where
  the question of whether or not these P2P companies were in fact
  responsible for contributory copyright infringement will be
  examined. Given that Grokster and StreamCast did not dispute
  the fact that their programs were heavily used for downloading
  copyrighted works (between 75 percent and 90 percent of the total
  works available, according to an MGM survey given as evidence in
  the case), it seems unlikely to me that either will survive these
  subsequent cases unless they can somehow show that the Supreme
  Court's finding of inducement to infringe was incorrect. Sharman
  Networks claims in a press release that they never encouraged or
  assisted Kazaa users to download copyrighted works; we'll see
  what the court finds.

<http://www.sharmannetworks.com/content/view/full/310>


**The Subtext** -- As with many cases that reach the Supreme
  Court, this one isn't really about the specific fate of a
  few rather unappealing companies. The bigger picture is the
  battle between the rights of copyright holders as set down
  in the Constitution and radically extended by Congress many
  times under lobbying, and the chilling effect on technological
  innovation that the protection of copyright could engender.
  Put another way, if a potential technology could be used to
  infringe copyright, will technologists still invest the time
  and money into development given the likelihood of facing
  expensive lawsuits?

  On the face of it, of course, it looks bad for technologists.
  But the Supreme Court was fairly careful not to reinterpret or
  modify the decision of the Sony case, thus failing to clarify
  the situation further. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg touched on
  the topic slightly, by arguing in a concurring opinion that the
  P2P software made by the defendants was used overwhelmingly to
  download copyrighted works, thus implying that the Sony decision
  might not apply if the technology in question were overwhelmingly
  used to infringe, even if substantial noninfringing uses were
  possible. But Justice Stephen Breyer, in an opinion that concurred
  with the overall decision, disagreed with Justice Ginsburg,
  arguing that the noninfringing uses in the Grokster case were
  equivalent to those in the Sony case. He also pointed out that
  a key phrase in the Sony case was "capable of substantial
  noninfringing uses," and that the "capable of" part of that
  phrase was intentionally forward-looking, allowing for the
  possibility that there might be other noninfringing uses that
  would appear over time. That's tremendously important, because
  it underscores the entire argument - that the freedom to innovate
  must be protected because of future capabilities that are as yet
  unrealized. He summed up:

  "Of course, Grokster itself may not want to develop these other
  noninfringing uses. But Sony's standard seeks to protect not the
  Groksters of this world (which in any event may well be liable
  under today's holding), but the development of technology more
  generally."

  Again, I encourage anyone interested in this topic to read the
  full decision, which apart from some bits referencing prior cases
  in an abbreviated fashion, is in fact highly readable and truly
  fascinating.


**Where to Go from Here** -- Although I'm pleased to see the
  Supreme Court upholding the Sony decision even while ruling
  against Grokster, I remain troubled about the entire situation.
  My fear is that the Content Cartel - the large media companies
  that collectively control a vast quantity of our society's
  cultural products - will see this victory as license to file
  ever more lawsuits against any company or individual seen as
  infringing copyrights. We are talking about a particularly
  litigious industry: according to Cary Sherman, president of the
  RIAA, his organization has already filed about 10,000 lawsuits
  against individuals, with the average settlement being about
  $3,000. (If you were wondering, no, none of the settlement money
  ever goes to the artists who were in theory harmed. Cary Sherman
  told me that the RIAA applies all the money to legal fees, given
  that it loses a lot of money on every lawsuit.)

  On the other side of the fence, I expect we'll see many
  providers of file sharing programs removing their products
  from distribution, and those that remain being more careful
  about how they promote and target their products so as not to
  run afoul of this recent Supreme Court decision. We'll also
  undoubtedly see many more such products go completely anonymous.
  Given that the existing P2P networks can be used, totally
  legitimately, to distribute new software, there's no reason
  developers need identify themselves in any way if they're not
  interested in earning money from their work. In other words,
  I think we'll see an escalation in the arms race between file
  sharing proponents and the Content Cartel.

  In the long run, I like the EFF's suggestion of a voluntary
  collective licensing scheme. You can read the full details at
  the page linked below, but in essence, everyone would voluntarily
  pay (or have it bundled in ISP or other charges) some small fee,
  say $5 per month. A non-profit, transparent collecting agency
  roughly along the lines of ASCAP and BMI would then collect the
  money, determine how to distribute it, and send it to the artists.
  I say "roughly" modeled on ASCAP and BMI, which perform the
  collection and distribution function for songs played on the radio
  and in public venues, because there are plenty of criticisms
  leveled against them, including the fact that it's not unheard-of
  for artists whose work is played on air never to receive a dime.
  But voluntary collective licensing would generate significant
  revenue for artists while allowing individuals to listen to
  or view whatever they wanted, all while participating in the
  distribution of their favorite works via P2P networks.

<http://www.eff.org/share/collective_lic_wp.php>

  More generally, I remain troubled that an act as simple and basic
  as sharing is slowly but surely being turned into a bad thing.
  The 1980s may have started it all with the "Me Generation," but
  I think we're seeing the 21st century starting off with far too
  much power in the hands of corporate behemoths driven only by
  quarterly revenues. The news we read, the entertainment we enjoy,
  the food we eat, the clothes we wear... for many of us, it all
  comes from companies for whom we're nothing more than easily
  manipulated, salary-earning lemmings. The Internet is the greatest
  opportunity we've seen for diversity to flourish, whether it be
  in providing alternative news from abroad, music and video from
  independent artists, access to a vast collection of gourmet
  foods, or just the opportunity to find unusual clothes to wear.
  The Internet will never be a utopia where goodness and light are
  all that one experiences, but it's our last best hope to escape a
  future where our culture is spoon-fed to us by Sales & Marketing.
  Culture, by definition, is shared, and we should be investigating
  every imaginable possibility to help people come together around
  commonalities without everything devolving to a commercial
  transaction.

  I may not agree with them on every point, but I think the
  Electronic Frontier Foundation is doing some of the best work
  in protecting our ability to create technological innovations,
  and I encourage you to support them as I've done in the past
  and will continue to do.

<http://secure.eff.org/saveinnovation>


Apple Releases iTunes 4.9 with Podcasting Support
-------------------------------------------------
  by Andy J. Williams Affleck <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  Apple last week released iTunes 4.9, adding extensive support
  for finding, subscribing to, and managing podcasts, which are
  audio files that are made available for anyone on the Internet
  download and listen to (see "Podcasting: The People's Radio"
  in TidBITS-766_). The new podcast support adds to iTunes
  functionality that previously required the use of separate
  programs such as iPodder, iPodderX, NetNewsWire, and others.
  With iTunes 4.9, Apple has made the process of finding,
  subscribing to, and listening to podcasts simpler than ever
  before, but notable confusions and oversights remain to be
  corrected in future versions of iTunes.

<http://www.apple.com/itunes/podcasts.html>
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=07986>


**Discovering/Subscribing/Managing Podcasts** -- Launch iTunes
  4.9, and you'll see a new Podcasts item in the left-hand column
  (the Source pane). This is the management interface for podcasts
  to which you've subscribed. Syndicated podcasts that you can
  choose to receive appear in the iTunes Music Store as a new
  genre when browsing.

  To view Apple's directory of podcasts, click the Podcast Directory
  link at the bottom of the screen. Or, you can click the Music
  Store link in the Source pane, and choose the Podcasts link
  to browse. As with music in the store, a glitzy page showcases
  podcasts. Select a podcast or a podcast category to see the same
  familiar views used to navigate and buy music. The podcast
  directory is haphazard, containing some moribund podcasts and
  lacking others that are current, active, and quite popular.
  Luckily, Apple provides a way on the main Podcasts page in the
  store to suggest new podcasts and also a way to request the
  removal of a podcast. Apple hasn't clarified how they will opt
  to follow suggestions for addition or removal.

<http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewGenre?genreId=26>
<https://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZFinance.woa/wa/publishPodcast>

  Once you find podcasts that interest you, subscribe to them by
  clicking a simple Subscribe button (which replaces the "Buy"
  button found on songs). The podcast is listed on your Podcasts
  page, and the most recent episode is automatically downloaded
  (more on this later).

  All podcasts currently in the iTunes Music Store are free, but
  there is no reason to assume that this will always be the case.
  Apple appears to be preparing for that day by featuring podcasts
  offered by larger media outlets, including public radio, while
  relegating the early initiators of the distribution format to an
  Indie category that appears at the bottom of the Podcasts splash
  page. (Of course, some podcasters will welcome a mechanism by
  which they can offer for-fee podcasts for premium content just
  the way that certain radio shows are sold via Audible, Apple,
  and others now.)

  You're not limited to Apple's list, of course. To subscribe to
  a podcast that's not in Apple's directory, you must first find
  the syndication link that includes podcasts on the site that's
  offering the audio downloads. Copy the link, which often ends in
  .rss or .xml. Then choose Subscribe to Podcast from the Advanced
  menu in iTunes 4.9 and paste the link. Click OK, and if the link
  is correct, the podcast appears in the Podcasts list via the
  Source menu.

  Unsubscribing to a podcast is a two-step process. First, you
  select the podcast in the list and click the Unsubscribe button
  in the bottom right of the iTunes window. This leaves the podcast
  listed among your subscribed podcasts with a Subscribe button next
  to it and retains all episodes you have already downloaded. To
  remove it (and all episodes) from the list you must Control-click
  on it and choose Clear from the contextual menu. If you perform
  this second step first, you can unsubscribe and delete all podcast
  files at once.


**Setting Podcast Preferences** -- In the iTunes 4.9 preferences,
  you can set the frequency that iTunes checks for new episodes,
  how many to download if there are more than one at the time
  checked, and how many to retain.

  Unfortunately, these preferences are global for all podcasts,
  lacking the granular control provided by other programs that
  specialize or include podcasts. For instance, NetNewsWire Pro 2.0
  allows you to set automatic downloads (but not the number of
  downloads or items retained) for each feed, as well as a global
  preference.

  A new setting in the iTunes preferences lets you choose which
  podcasts are synchronized to your iPod (all models except the
  iPod shuffle, to which you must copy podcasts manually, since
  Autofill ignores podcasts, much as it ignores audio books) and,
  of those subscriptions, whether so synchronize all, new, unplayed,
  or checked episodes. On the iPod, podcasts are also grouped into
  a single Podcasts playlist and do not appear in other playlists
  unless you manually put them there in iTunes. Click Wheel iPods
  display a top-level Podcasts menu item; podcasts on older iPods
  appear as a Podcasts playlist.

<http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300558>
<http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=301880>


**Managing Podcasts** -- In iTunes, podcasts are grouped together
  into the Podcasts entry in the Source list on the left. In fact,
  they are listed only there; they do not show up in the main
  library, nor do they appear in any playlists. You can add them
  to normal playlists manually, but you cannot use smart playlists
  to manage your podcast listening, a major oversight on Apple's
  part.

  A blue dot next to a podcast name indicates an unheard episode.
  As with other songs in iTunes, a small speaker icon next to the
  name indicates that you are listening to, or were in the middle
  of listening to, a show.

  By opening the disclosure triangle next to each podcast in your
  subscription list, you can view all episodes currently listed in
  the podcast's syndication feed, which is usually the last five
  episodes. Download shows that have not been retrieved already
  by clicking the Get Show button.

  To find older episodes, you must visit the podcast's Web site,
  which takes some doing. First, you must click the right-facing
  arrow after the podcast's name (assuming you haven't turned these
  arrows off in your iTunes preferences.) If the podcast is not in
  the iTunes Music Store (that is, you subscribed to it manually),
  you will go directly to that podcast's Web site. If, however,
  the podcast is in the store, you will go to its page in the
  store where you will find a link to take you to its Web site.

  A welcome addition is the information button (an i in a circle)
  to the far right of each episode which displays the show notes
  for that episode. Show notes are information - metadata, more
  technically - about each episode provided by the show's creator.
  Now you can see what a given show is about before you download it.
  (This metadata is indexed by Spotlight, making it easier to find
  archived podcasts on a system running Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger.)

  As noted earlier, the TiVo-like options in iTunes preferences for
  choosing whether to keep All, All Unplayed, Most Recent, or 2, 3,
  4, or 10 episodes can't be set on a podcast-by-podcast basis.
  Some people may want to keep only the latest versions of podcasts
  rather than letting them pile up and filling their hard drive
  while others may be devotees of certain shows and want to hear
  every single one, no matter how far behind they may fall. I like
  to keep all the episodes of serials such as The Radio Adventures
  of Dr. Floyd regardless of whether they have been heard or not
  (my five-year-old loves them), whereas I'd prefer to keep only
  the most recent episode of news-based shows. The only workaround
  is to keep everything and manually delete older episodes,
  a tedious process at best.

<http://www.doctorfloyd.com/>

  In another oversight, iTunes could better refine how it manages
  podcast files. If I listen to an episode and want to remove the
  file from my hard drive, the only option within iTunes is to
  select the episode and hit the Delete key, or Control-click it
  and choose Clear. That action removes the entry from the list of
  episodes and, optionally, the file from my hard drive. But what
  if I later want to download it again for some reason? It no longer
  even appears in the list of episodes with a Get button. It's
  completely gone. The only way I can find to remove a file but
  leave the entry in the list is to Control-click on the entry,
  choose Show Song File from the contextual menu, and then manually
  move it to the Trash. Even then, the show is still listed as if
  it were still there and there is no Get button even after iTunes
  figures out that the file is missing.


**Listening to Podcasts** -- Listening to podcasts in iTunes
  is the same as listening to any music: double-click and listen
  (or select the podcast and click the play button). iTunes
  remembers at which point you left off if you stop listening to
  an episode, so you can easily go back to that point - regardless
  of file format, which is convenient and a welcome addition to
  iTunes.

  But iTunes 4.9 also suffers from a major bug in that a podcast is
  marked as played the instant you begin listening to it, as opposed
  to when you finish listening to it, as with songs. So, if you have
  iTunes set to keep only unplayed podcasts and you listen to the
  first 10 seconds of a podcast and then stop to save it for later,
  it will vanish the next time iTunes updates (according to the
  schedule you have set in iTunes Preferences). This bug also
  affects synchronization to an iPod if you base the sync on
  unplayed episodes. Apple should either create a new category
  called "In Progress" so you know which podcasts you are in the
  middle of, or they should treat podcasts like all other music:
  consider a file as played only within a few seconds of the end.
  Personally, I'd like to see both: consider a podcast unheard until
  the last few seconds (not the actual last second as the iPod does)
  and provide a way to see which podcasts I have started but not
  finished.

  Apple introduced its own podcast, the New Music Tuesday Podcast,
  which demonstrates a new, exciting feature: bookmarks within a
  single podcast. Apple's podcast showcases a number of different
  artists, and as the podcast plays, the album art display on the
  lower left changes to reflect the current artist. In addition,
  a new bookmarks menu appears to left of the main track display
  to provide immediate access to each artist/segment in the list.
  Apple also released a beta command line tool called the Podcast
  Chapter Tool which helps power users build their own such menus
  for their shows. To download it, click Publish a Podcast in the
  Podcasts page of the iTunes Music Store, click Learn More about
  Podcasting on iTunes, and scroll all the way to the bottom of
  that page.

  Podcasts work on all iPods, but an updater released last week
  for fourth generation iPods - those with the click wheel -
  provides additional podcast support, such as bookmarkability for
  all podcasts regardless of format, the capability to display show
  notes by clicking the center button twice, and scrolling long
  podcast names in the main display. It's possible that older iPods
  may pick up these new features as well in the future, much as most
  of the new features of the Click Wheel iPods were rolled out to
  earlier generation iPods some months after the Click Wheel models
  were released.


**A Good Start, but More Work Needed** -- Apple's entry into
  podcasting is the first for a major company and quite well
  done for an initial effort. That said, there are a number of
  significant problems that need to be addressed. I suspect many
  power users will prefer to stick to their current methods of
  podcast management so they can continue to take advantage of
  smart playlists, better file management, and the like. But for
  the majority of users, iTunes 4.9 does the job and will help
  take podcasts further into the mainstream.

  Support for the popularity of the feature comes from early
  reports that major media sites, like KCRW, have had enormous
  boosts in their podcast listenership since iTunes 4.9's release.
  The L.A. Times reported that KCRW saw an increase from 3,500
  to 100,000 daily - yes, daily - downloads of its programs.
  Other reports noted that iTunes users signed up for a total
  of one million subscriptions in the first two days.

  That popularity is also revealing a few kinks in the system: at
  least some subscriptions are redirected through Apple's servers
  rather than downloaded directly, and some of the more popular
  shows have appeared as inaccessible for some people. Hopefully,
  these are just short-term glitches.

  iTunes 4.9 is free, and you can get it from Software Update
  or from Apple's Web site as an 11.1 MB download.

<http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/>

  [Andy J. Williams Affleck is a project manager for a U.S. federal
  government contractor and an expert in usable accessibility in
  Web design. He's long been fascinated by any tool to allow the
  individual to communicate to others, be it newsletters, email,
  weblogs, podcasting, or whatever comes next.]


Take Control News/04-Jul-05
---------------------------
  by Adam C. Engst <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  "Take Control of Tiger," the latest print collection of Take
  Control ebooks published in association with our friends at
  Peachpit Press, is now available! If you've been holding off
  on installing Tiger because you didn't want to print out hundreds
  of pages of ebooks, or if you would simply prefer to read about
  Tiger in a professionally designed, four-color book, you can now
  purchase the 350-page collection from Amazon for only $19.79.
  "Take Control of Tiger" includes the latest versions of all four
  of our Tiger ebooks, and customers are entitled to any future
  free updates of the included ebooks. (See "Take Control Expands
  to Print" in TidBITS-747_ for more details about our print
  collections.)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/032133017X/takecontroleb-20/ref=nosim/>
<http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/catalog.html#print_collections>
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=07820>


Hot Topics in TidBITS Talk/04-Jul-05
------------------------------------
  by TidBITS Staff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  The second URL below each thread description points to the
  discussion on our Web Crossing server, which will be faster.


**Multi-platform Backup Solution** -- A reader looking for
  software that will back up an environment of mixed operating
  systems finds that the options aren't simple. The TidBITS Talk
  community rallies, suggesting alternatives. (11 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2641>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/494/>


**Wearable GPS devices** -- Do you have a tendency to get lost
  when you go running? Or maybe you just like to know how far
  you've gone on each run. Either way, this thread offers
  suggestions for small GPS devices. (4 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2642>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/495/>


**Statistics software for the Mac** -- A continuation of an
  earlier thread reveals more solutions for good statistical
  analysis software. (38 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2644>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/224/>


**A TV Watching Monster**-- Following Adam's article about the iTV
  Link cable for connecting a computer to one's television, a reader
  recommends a similar product. (2 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2645>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/497/>



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