TidBITS#798/26-Sep-05
=====================

  Do you have piles of old Mac stuff you don't use? Andy Ihnatko
  explains how to create your own version of his Prize Wonderland
  Auction to raise money for your favorite charity, cause, or user
  group. Also in this issue, Matt Neuburg unpacks Insider Software's
  Smasher to access old font suitcases. In other news, Apple updates
  its .Mac service and releases Security Update 2005-008, Microsoft
  releases Office 2004 Service Pack 2, and the Opera Web browser
  goes free.

Topics:
    MailBITS/26-Sep-05
    DealBITS Drawing: Dejal Simon
    Apple Posts Security Update 2005-008
    Apple Updates .Mac with More Storage and Features
    Insider Smashes Suitcases
    The Prize Wonderland Auction
    Take Control News/26-Sep-05
    Hot Topics in TidBITS Talk/26-Sep-05

<http://www.tidbits.com/tb-issues/TidBITS-798.html>
<ftp://ftp.tidbits.com/issues/2005/TidBITS#798_26-Sep-05.etx>

Copyright 2005 TidBITS: Reuse governed by Creative Commons license
   <http://www.tidbits.com/terms/> Contact: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
   ---------------------------------------------------------------

This issue of TidBITS sponsored in part by:
* READERS LIKE YOU! Support TidBITS with a contribution today! <----- NEW!
   <http://www.tidbits.com/about/support/contributors.html>
   Special thanks this week to William Harris, Steve Johgart,
   H J Heesakkers, and Tomoharu Nishino for their kind support!

* SMALL DOG ELECTRONICS: iPods of all types! <----------------------- NEW!
   New, used, demo, discontinued, refurbished
   U2 iPod - $259; 20 GB - $219; 40 GB - $339; nanos!
   Visit: <http://www.smalldog.com/tb/> 800-511-MACS

* FETCH SOFTWORKS: Fetch 5 is now available, with SFTP, Bonjour, <--- NEW!
   StuffIt, Unicode, Dock progress, AppleScript, and a simplified
   interface optimized for Mac OS X (including Tiger)!
   Download your free trial version! <http://fetchsoftworks.com/>

* Dr. Bott, LLC:  Swim with the Phish ... blasting in your ears. <--- NEW!
   The H2O Audio products let you interface your iPod in an
   aqua environment, if you catch my drift. Waterproof cases
   for iPod and iPod mini. <http://www.drbott.com/>

* Web Crossing, Inc: Site Crossing brings Web Crossing power to
   your small biz, family or club. Build a core site or bolt onto
   a current one for discussions, blogs, chat, polls, calendars,
   podcasts, and more. <http://www.sitecrossing.com/tb-305>

* Circus Ponies NoteBook: Never lose anything again. NoteBook <------ NEW!
   keeps your digital life organized. Take notes, clip content,
   share information. Find anything instantly with automatic
   index pages. Free 30-day demo! <http://www.circusponies.com/>

* Bare Bones Software's BBEdit 8.2 -- More than 100 new features & <- NEW!
   improvements including Subversion support, Text Factories,
   Codeless Language Modules, Documents Drawer, and much more!
   Demo or buy it today, visit <http://www.barebones.com/>.

* Rumpus 4: Redesigned for Mac OS X. <------------------------------- NEW!
   Rumpus now features a refined Aqua control application and
   Unix daemon server engine, fully optimized for Mac OS X.
   Visit: <http://www.maxum.com/Rumpus/>

* StuffIt Deluxe 10 from Allume Systems supports Automator,
   compresses JPEGs up to 30%, enables Spotlight to search in
   archives, can make self-extracting archives, and more!
   Upgrade for only $29.99! <http://www.stuffit.com/mac/deluxe/>
   ---------------------------------------------------------------

MailBITS/26-Sep-05
------------------

**Office 2004 SP2 Enhances Entourage, Fixes Bugs** -- Microsoft
  has released Office for Mac 2004 Service Pack 2 (SP2), which
  fixes bugs in all the Office programs and provides notable
  enhancements to Entourage, the email, calendaring, and contact
  management part of the software suite. Entourage 2004 SP2 features
  enhanced support for Microsoft Exchange Server, making it easier
  for Mac users to coexist in a predominantly Windows and Outlook
  environment. Specific improvements include better email and
  calendar management, enhanced public folder support, faster
  client-server synchronization, improved access (with full
  browsing) to the Global Address List, and enhanced delegate
  access that makes new setup possible entirely through Entourage
  without needing to use Outlook on a PC. Entourage 2004 SP2
  requires Exchange 2000 or later, and some organizations may
  need updates to Exchange.

  Although Entourage was the only program with significant new
  features, all the other Office programs received numerous bug
  fixes and security improvements. You can read the full list at
  the link below, but we're happiest about the promised performance
  improvements in Word 2004 SP2 and the fix for the bug that crashed
  Word when you updated Table of Contents fields contained in a
  table cell, the two of which had been forcing us to rely primarily
  on Word X for our Take Control ebooks. Many of the bugs fixed
  resolve crashes, so if you've had trouble with Office 2004
  applications crashing, be sure to install SP2. You can download
  Office for Mac 2004 SP2 via the Microsoft AutoUpdate utility,
  or from Microsoft's Mactopia Web site; it's a 57 MB download.
  [ACE]

<http://www.microsoft.com/mac/autoupdate/description/AUOffice20041120EN.htm>
<http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.aspx>


**Opera Now Free** -- Perhaps acknowledging the difficulty of
  selling a Web browser in today's Internet, Opera has freed its Web
  browser. While you can still choose to pay for Opera 8.5, which
  also features chat, contact, email, and other related features,
  that fee now covers support, not the software.

<http://opera.com/>

  Opera is offering one year of 24-hour-turnaround email support
  for $29; otherwise, the browser is free. Opera's browser is a
  bit quirky in how it renders CSS and handles JavaScript, but some
  folks swear by its fast rendering and certain subtle features.
  The company has increasingly moved into mobile and embedded
  browser development, in which revenue comes from licensees
  who pay a per phone, per customer, or per copy of software
  sold license. Adobe, for instance, embedded Opera's technology
  into Adobe GoLive CS2 product for better previewing of pages.
  Discussion on TidBITS Talk also points toward Opera earning
  sufficient money from ads shown along with search results
  from Google. [GF]

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2720>


**Adam Engst Speaking at MUG ONE on 04-Oct-05** -- For folks in
  upstate New York, I'll be speaking at the MUG ONE Macintosh user
  group meeting in Oneonta, NY on Tuesday, 04-Oct-05 at 7:30 PM
  at SUNY Oneonta. Initially, I thought the MUG ONE folks would be
  bored with learning more about iPhoto, given that I've talked to
  them about iPhoto several times in the past few years, so my main
  presentation will be about PDF. Whether you're just annoyed at
  PDF reading tools or perplexed at how to make a decent PDF for
  distribution to others, I'll be distilling our experience with
  the PDF-based Take Control ebooks into this session. But, since
  it turns out that MUG ONE can't get enough of iPhoto, I'll also
  be sharing some of my favorite iPhoto 5 tips and tricks, and
  answering questions about this latest version of iPhoto. [ACE]

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


DealBITS Drawing: Dejal Simon
-----------------------------
  by Adam C. Engst <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  One of the stresses associated with running your own Internet
  servers is, frankly, knowing if they're running. Most people
  host public servers elsewhere, to take advantage of the massive
  bandwidth, secure facilities, earthquake-proof racks, and tech
  support of companies like digital.forest. But remote hosting means
  you can't just look in on your server to see how it's doing,
  and that's where server monitoring software like Simon from Dejal
  Systems comes in. It can pretend to be a normal Web browser or
  email client or whatever, all for the purpose of connecting to
  your server on a regular basis and verifying not just that the
  machine is running, but that your server software is doing what
  it's supposed to do. I've been using Simon 2 for some time now to
  keep track of various Internet services on my Web Crossing server,
  and it's been quite helpful in alerting me to problems ranging
  from local connectivity outages to severe slowdowns related to
  some particularly annoying mail loops. I could have had Simon send
  me email, or play sounds, or various other alerts, but I opted
  for it bouncing its Dock icon, which is obvious while I'm at the
  machine and won't wake me up at night. Overall, I've appreciated
  not feeling as though I should be manually checking in on my
  Internet services all the time.

<http://www.dejal.com/simon/?ref=tb>
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=08195>

  In this week's DealBITS drawing, you can enter to win one of three
  copies of Simon Standard (which supports up to 20 tests), worth
  $59.95. Entrants who aren't among our lucky winners will receive
  a discount on all versions of Simon, so if you need to keep a
  closer eye on your servers, be sure to enter at the DealBITS
  page linked below. All information gathered is covered by our
  comprehensive privacy policy. Be careful with your spam filters,
  since you must be able to receive email from my address to learn
  if you've won. Remember too, that if someone you refer to this
  drawing wins, you'll receive the same prize to reward you for
  spreading the word.

<http://www.tidbits.com/dealbits/dejal-simon/>
<http://www.tidbits.com/about/privacy.html>


Apple Posts Security Update 2005-008
------------------------------------
  by Geoff Duncan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  Apple has released Security Update 2005-008, which is available
  either as a standalone installer or via Mac OS X's Software Update
  feature. The update applies to both Mac OS X 10.3.9 Panther and
  Mac OS X 10.4.2 Tiger, with sizes ranging from 4 to 7.4 MB.

<http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=302413>
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/securityupdate2005008macosx1042.html>
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/securityupdate2005008macosx1039.html>

  Fixes in this update include changes to ImageIO, LibSystem,
  Apple Mail, QuickDraw, Ruby, SecurityAgent, securityd, and Safari
  (Mac OS X 10.3.9 only). Some highlights:

* Security Update 2005-008 fixes a problem where, under certain
  situations using Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, a "Switch User" button
  could appear even though Fast User Switching isn't enabled.
  The bug potentially exposed a user's Desktop without
  authentication.

* A bug in Authentication Services which enabled unprivileged
  users to grant themselves rights to manipulate files or
  perform other actions has been fixed.

* Mail autoreply rules no longer expose the contents of encrypted
  messages, and (under Mac OS X 10.3.9), the update fixes a bug
  in Kerberos authentication which may have appended uninitialized
  memory to a message. (Uninitialized memory would likely be utterly
  nonsensical, but in theory could contain virtually any data your
  computer has processed since startup.)

* A corrupt GIF image could potentially create a buffer overflow
  in ImageIO (an operating system component for rendering images
  used by Safari and other applications), which could enable
  an attacker to execute arbitrary code. No known exploitations
  have occurred, and Security Update 2005-008 fixes the problem.
  A similar issue with PICT images is fixed in the operating
  system's QuickDraw component. However, we've received reports
  that the latter fix may also be preventing legitimate PICT
  images from displaying properly.

* Maliciously crafted Web archives could potentially make Safari
  render the archives as content from sites that didn't serve them.
  Safari 2.0 (part of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger) introduced Web archives;
  Security Update 2005-007 solved this problem in Tiger, and this
  update (2005-008) solves it for the version of Safari used with
  Mac OS X 10.3.9.


Apple Updates .Mac with More Storage and Features
-------------------------------------------------
  by TidBITS Staff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  Ever since Apple switched its free iTools Web-based service to
  the subscription-based .Mac, many users have asked themselves:
  is .Mac worth $100 a year? Last week, the company attempted
  to sweeten the deal by improving .Mac's storage and bandwidth
  capacities, introducing new .Mac groups, releasing the Backup 3
  backup software, and adding French and German localization to
  the existing English and Japanese versions.

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=06883>
<http://www.apple.com/dotmac/features.html>


**Storage Catches up to 2003 Levels** -- $100 now gets you 1 GB of
  storage, up from 250 MB; you can allocate how much of that space
  is used by email and iDisk. This matches similar pricing from
  online storage services of a couple of years ago, and matches the
  email storage that Gmail, Yahoo, Spymac, and others began offering
  last year - sometimes for free.

  The new $180 Family Pack offers a total of five accounts and 2 GB
  of storage; the master account has 1 GB of mail and disk storage,
  while the other four accounts are assigned 250 MB each.

  Along with the increase in storage, monthly throughput has also
  been increased, according to Jonathan Seff at Macworld. Apple
  came clean in July that .Mac had a 3 GB limit of file transfers
  per month for standard account holders, a change from their
  previous "we're not telling you quite what the limit is" policy
  (see "Apple Discloses, Limits .Mac Bandwidth Transfers" in
  TidBITS-789_). Popular downloads of Apple-friendly software,
  for instance, weren't subjected to limits. Now, with 1 GB of
  storage in a standard account, users are allowed 10 GB of file
  transfers; if you spend $50 per year for an additional 1 GB
  of storage, you're entitled to 25 GB of file transfers per month.

<http://www.macworld.com/weblogs/editors/2005/09/dotmac/index.php>
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=08183>

  Seff notes that Apple, unlike most other service providers, offers
  no way to know how much bandwidth you've used in a given month and
  no way to pay for just additional bandwidth.


**.Mac Groups** -- New to the .Mac lineup is the Groups feature,
  which provides a virtual location for you and friends or family
  to keep in contact. Members of a group can share a single email
  address to send messages to everyone within the group, share files
  using iDisks (the contents of the group's folder within the new
  Groups folder is shared among all members of the group), maintain
  a group calendar via iCal, and post Web pages containing photos
  and movies.

  Apple's Groups FAQ points out that membership in groups isn't
  limited to .Mac members, though non-members must sign up for at
  least a free trial membership. However, after the trial period
  ends, they can keep their .Mac ID and continue to access the
  group. People with expired .Mac accounts and trial accounts
  can similarly join groups using their IDs.

  Be aware that creating a new group consumes 100 MB of your shared
  storage for use on the iDisk, and joining one or more groups also
  consumes a total of 100 MB. If you create or join groups, you'll
  end up with less storage space available for your personal use.


**Backup 3** -- Apple's Backup application has so far been a
  fairly weak tool that some people found helpful for backing up
  small amounts of data, but it didn't compare to more full-featured
  backup applications such as Retrospect. However, version 3.0 is
  a significant improvement, making the program worthy of
  consideration.

  Backup 3 has been given a new interface focused around "plans,"
  which are essentially backup scripts. A number of plan templates
  are included, such as options for backing up iLife data to CD or
  DVD on a regular basis and a plan for backing up music purchased
  from the iTunes Music Store (because if you lose your only copy
  of an iTMS track, it's gone; you can't request a new copy without
  paying for it). Better yet, Backup now supports incremental
  backups, which can copy only files that have changed since
  the last backup.

  You still need a full .Mac account to use Backup. However, trial
  accounts can back up as much as 100 MB of data to test the
  software. Backup 3 requires Mac OS X 10.3.9 or Mac OS X 10.4.2
  or later, and is a 4.3 MB download (look for the link on the
  .Mac home page).


Insider Smashes Suitcases
-------------------------
  by Matt Neuburg <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  What's the most important feature of Mac OS 7, 8, and 9 that was
  destroyed and never restored or replaced when Mac OS X came along?
  Okay, I'm sure you miss being able to collapse windows into their
  title bars, or to resize them without waiting for the computer to
  catch up. But I'm talking here about something far more
  fundamental - the capability to open font suitcases.

  A font suitcase, as you probably remember, is what we used to keep
  fonts in. They originated deep in the history of the Macintosh
  system, but starting in System 7 it became possible to open a font
  suitcase as if it were a folder and move font files in and out of
  it. Font suitcases were the normal way to present a font to the
  system (by putting them in your Fonts folder); they let you keep
  together multiple fonts, or various forms of a single font, such
  as a font and its italic and bold variants, or a TrueType font
  and some bitmap versions to improve rendering at small sizes.

  With the advent of Mac OS X, font suitcases suddenly became
  opaque. In Classic, there is no Finder, so features that appeared
  as aspects of the Finder such as desktop printers and openable
  font suitcases unceremoniously vanished. Font/DA Mover, which
  preceded Mac OS 7, is ancient and clunky and can't deal with
  the contents of more modern suitcases. So my suitcases have
  essentially sat immobile for the past several years, mysterious
  and taunting.

  Now Insider Software's Smasher has come along at last, to bust
  open your suitcases like so many recalcitrant walnut shells.
  It lets you see right inside font suitcases, telling you what
  types of fonts they contain and what their typefaces look like.
  Hand Smasher a folder and it shows you all the TrueType and
  PostScript fonts in all the suitcases in that folder. (OpenType
  and Windows TrueType fonts are ignored, but these were not in
  suitcases to begin with. More disappointing is that bitmaps are
  ignored; these are not valid on their own under Mac OS X, but
  they are still fonts, they still exist in suitcases, and you
  still might like a way to manipulate them.)

<http://www.insidersoftware.com/SM.php>

  Once you're seeing inside your suitcases, you can recombine
  their contents into new suitcases containing individual fonts
  or families or styles. Smasher can also convert .dfont files to
  old-style TrueType fonts to make them available to your Classic
  system. As a bonus, Smasher also helps you delete your system font
  caches or the font caches of certain troublesome applications,
  such as Microsoft Office, or the AdobeFnt.lst files that can
  spontaneously appear all over your hard disk; eliminating these
  and then restarting has often solved mysterious misbehaviors on
  my machines and those of many others.

  The Web site and the manual are full of spelling mistakes, which
  suggests rather a rush job on this release. Still, the program
  seems to work well and is worth trying out. The unlicensed
  version lets you view fonts in suitcases but not recombine or
  convert them. Smasher costs $50 (or $25 if you already own an
  Insider product such as Font Agent Pro), and is a 3.8 MB download.
  Mac OS X 10.3 Panther or higher is required.

<http://www.insidersoftware.com/DL_index.php>


The Prize Wonderland Auction
----------------------------
  by Andy Ihnatko <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  I should mention right at the top that this piece begins with
  desperate self-pity but ends with an opportunity for you to
  acquire fabulous merchandise for pennies on the dollar and raise
  money for hurricane relief at the same time. So, do stick with it.

  I once read an interview with some freshly minted international
  pop superstar (the sort who doesn't realize that her continued
  international pop superstardom is only secure if she can somehow
  manage to make sure that every other girl that can sort-of-sing
  dies in a boating accident or somesuch the moment she turns 17).
  "The trouble with owning three vacation houses," she said,
  gravely, "is that every time you see a pair of shoes or a top
  that you like, you have to buy three of them. Otherwise, every
  time you want to take off for the weekend, you'll have to travel
  with baggage!"

  I mean, we all have our problems, but she's really slitting
  her own throat by leading off with a complaint like _that_ one.
  You're so _totally_ not on her side. For the first time ever,
  you're actually looking forward to an upcoming episode of
  "The Surreal Life." Because it's pretty clear that in two years -
  three, tops - this woman will hit the skids to such a desperate
  extent that she'll leap at the opportunity to spend a month living
  in a condo with Ray Parker, Jr., the best friend from "Blossom,"
  and any cast members from the Budweiser "Wazzuuuup?!?" commercials
  that haven't taken their own lives yet.

  I now ask you to maintain the focus of your Great Lens of Contempt
  upon this woman, and not swing it in my direction when I tell you
  that as an internationally beloved technology pundit, my greatest
  source of office clutter is the cavalcade of free software and
  hardware that arrive at my office on a regular basis. A colorful
  sleigh, adorned with traditional Norwegian words such as "FedEx"
  and "UPS," arrives in the wee hours of 8:00-10:30 AM, while
  visions of sugar-plums are still dancing in my head. And out leaps
  a person in a festive costume, carrying an assortment of wrapped
  packages! They await me three hours later when I jump out of bed
  and come running down the stairs at the crack of 11 AM or noon
  or perhaps 1 PM at the very latest.

  Yes, it's the same principle as Santa Claus, except that the
  sleigh often arrives several times in a single day. Oh, and
  sometimes the North Pole expects me to ship the toys back after
  thirty or sixty days. Nonetheless, many of the hardware companies
  and all of the software publishers feel that it's in their best
  interests to let me hang on to the stuff, bless their hearts.

  Hence my predicament. Either I research and write a column about
  the thing, or it never makes its way into one of my newspaper
  columns at all. Some stuff shouldn't have been sent to me in the
  first place. I've no professional interest in a radio-controlled
  submarine, unless it can be made to run Linux.

  (Crud. Hang on...)

  (Okay: I've just checked SourceForge and I can't find any source
  or binaries for an E-Chargers Submarine Linux Project. Though I'm
  sure it's coming.)

  At that point, the thing is just something I trip over on my way
  to the other side of the office to swap a DVD. Here's a full copy
  of Adobe Creative Suite 1.0. It sold for a thousand bucks a year
  ago. But a brand-new edition came out this year, so this one
  (though still quite useful) is just cluttering up the joint.
  Into the box it goes. Why can't I close this drawer in my utility
  locker? Holy cats! I've got... four, five, six... _seven_ iPods!
  Nice ones, too, but now that Apple's stopped manufacturing that
  model, I don't suppose I need it in my reference library any
  more. Out. And guess what arrived this morning? A _third_ copy
  of FileMaker Pro 8 Advanced, just released this month! The first
  copy was fantastic, the second copy is being enjoyed by the editor
  of my newspaper column, I'm sure, but the third one has to go
  away, $500 list price or no.

  And what should I do about that G4 tower?

  A couple of months ago I bought a new top-of-the-line G5, a
  machine so powerful that when a flock of migrating geese fly over
  the building into the machine's huge bubble of electromagnetic
  interference, it changes formation from a tight "V" to a vague
  Apple logo. As soon as the G5 went on my desktop, the twin G4
  became the Standby/Server Mac and the former Standby/Server Mac
  became a slick and powerful drink holder. And frankly, I can come
  up with other ways of keeping a can of Coke handy... ways that
  don't displace an entire cubic foot of the office's breathable
  oxygen.

  But at least I _could_ sell that G4 if I wanted to. No such luck
  with the rest of this clutter; my moral compass is true and
  unfailing, and items given to me for purposes of research shall
  not go to fund a new 60-inch hi-def flatscreen. Even though doing
  so would _technically_ count as research, because I could then
  write a column about the new TV, thus benefitting my constituency.
  Gosh, why am I being so selfish and _not_ buying myself a digital
  projector with 1080i resolution?

  No! Away, devil-thoughts! My strength is as the strength of ten
  men, for my soul is pure!

  (No, indeed not. Not by a long shot. The fact that I even implied
  such a thing only underscores how much my soul could use a dry-
  cleaning and one of those tree-shaped air fresheners. But still:
  selling this stuff would be creepy.)

  But what _else_ can I do with this hardware and software? It's
  far too cool and useful to toss away. Okay, except for that
  basket of Newton MessagePad software, maybe. And a shrewd observer
  of the computing scene would probably acknowledge that a copy of
  Photoshop that installs from a brick of 16 diskettes is probably
  well past its sell-by date. Even donating stuff to a local school
  or library has started to become problematic. I'm sorry to report
  that finding a school system that (a) still uses Macs and (b) has
  hardware that can take advantage of modern software is fairly
  rare, at least within convenient driving distance of my house.

  My solution, then? Well, the good stuff goes into The Box, AKA,
  the Prize Wonderland, where it awaits a future user group talk.
  And then, the contents are quickly converted into money that
  I donate to the Red Cross.

  The Red Cross has always been my favorite charity. It's the one
  organization that, frankly, no sensible person can possibly have
  any sort of beef with. They do two things: they save lives
  through their blood work, and they help disaster survivors,
  doing everything from being the first at the scene with a blanket
  and a hot cup of coffee all the way to finding people safe places
  to sleep and a way to provide for their children.

  Plus, someone very dear to me is alive today because the Red Cross
  was able to locate nine pints of safe, typed blood when a surgery
  went unexpectedly and dramatically bad. So the Red Cross has
  always been my favorite charity. No sensible person, I repeat,
  can possibly have any sort of complaint about giving money to
  the Red Cross.

  I've done the Prize Wonderland Auction a couple times before and
  it's a pretty simple affair. I don't simply hold up items and
  ask for money. That'd be boring. Instead, the Prize Wonderland
  remains under cover, its contents unknown to all but myself and
  God (if any), throughout the entire proceedings. People don't
  bid on specific items... they bid on the right of First Dibs.

  "Who will give twenty dollars for the right to be first to take
  an item of their choice from the pile of Fabulous Merchandise?"
  I ask. "Raise your hands." Nearly every hand goes up. "Thirty?
  Forty? Fifty?" I continue. With each increase, a few more hands
  lower until just two determined bidders are left. At this point,
  the results tend to be very competitive and very kind.

  Winner gets thirty seconds alone with the pile. In the meantime,
  bidding opens on the second pick from what remains. Then the
  third, and then the fourth... well, it continues at my discretion,
  and I suppose if the bidding were spectacularly lame, I'd retain
  the right to remove an item to await a more generous crowd.
  But that's just hypothetical. I've never been anything short of
  delighted by people's generosity. The bidders go home with some
  pricey gear plus a tax deduction. I go home with an envelope full
  of cash and checks for the Red Cross. And often, the user group
  invites me to join them for dinner afterward! What a wonderful
  evening, from every conceivable angle!

  It's a mechanism that I heartily recommend to any group trying
  to raise money for any purpose:

  1) Every group has a local charity that needs money. Sometimes
  it's the group itself. If you can't come up with an idea, please
  re-read the earlier paragraph about the Red Cross and why there
  is no better target for your charitable dollars.

  2) Every group has lots of members with plenty of equipment that's
  just cluttering up the house, but which is nonetheless far too
  good to throw away.

  3) The "first pick" concept is fairly compelling, and when you
  hitch it up to people's tendency to want to support Good Causes,
  the results can be awesome.

  4) The "Hands Up" auction technique is quick, efficient, clear,
  and requires no messy paperwork.

  And incidentally... if any of the above-mentioned pieces of
  clutter caught your fancy, all those items - maybe even the
  G4 - and a pile of other things will be in the Prize Wonderland
  on Wednesday, 28-Sep-05, when I give my talk at the Connecticut
  Macintosh Connection. Visit the link below for directions to
  the meeting, which will be open to everybody.

<http://www.ctmac.org/>

  Just be sure to bring your checkbook. There are people down
  south who desperately need help, which means that the Red Cross
  desperately needs your money. For my part, I solemnly promise
  that relatively few items in the Wonderland will turn out to
  be free copies of my books.


  [Andy Ihnatko is the Chicago Sun-Times' technology columnist,
  the author of a best-selling book on Tiger, a longtime and
  current columnist and contributing editor for Macworld, and
  "the Industry's 42nd most-beloved figure," a claim that he
  urges you not to examine too closely. He can be contacted
  at <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, or through the address posted on his
  Web site.]

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


Take Control News/26-Sep-05
---------------------------
  by Adam C. Engst <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

**Joe Kissell Speaking at NCMUG's MCE 2005** -- Best-selling Take
  Control author Joe Kissell will be speaking at NCMUG's Macintosh
  Computer Expo 2005 on 01-Oct-05, so if you have some free time and
  are in the vicinity of Santa Rosa, California, I encourage you to
  drop in to see him at 10:00 AM. I'm sure he'd be happy to chat
  about upgrading to Tiger, or what's new in Apple Mail, or backing
  up under Mac OS X, but only after his talk, which will be a bit
  of a preview for a new title he's working on: Take Control of
  .Mac. Needless to say, he's integrating information about all
  the latest changes to .Mac into his manuscript, and he'll be
  focusing on these new features in his talk at the MCE 2005.
  Admission is free; see the NCMUG site for directions and full
  details.

<http://www.ncmug.org/mce.html>


Hot Topics in TidBITS Talk/26-Sep-05
------------------------------------
  by TidBITS Staff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

  The first link for each thread description points to the
  traditional TidBITS Talk interface; the second link points to
  the same discussion on our Web Crossing server, which provides
  a different look and which may be faster.


**Backup 3.0 Observations** -- Readers look at what's new in
  Backup 3.0, and evaluate whether it's mature enough to replace
  more expensive applications such as Retrospect. (3 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2713>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/564/>


**StuffIt 10** -- Following Allume's release of StuffIt 10, a
  reader explains why he's not eager to upgrade. (1 message)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2714>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/565/>


**Small/old cross-platform backup solution** -- Repurposing older
  Apple hardware, a reader looks for advice on how to integrate
  a Windows XP machine into his backup system. (5 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2715>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/566/>


**Car options for iPod** -- Several methods are available to play
  music from an iPod through a car's audio system, but which ones
  are recommended from tried-and-true experience? (14 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2718>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/567/>


**Classic in Panther vs Tiger (and HyperCard)** -- After
  experiencing lots of bugs while running in Classic under Mac OS X
  10.4, a reader wonders if it's possible to downgrade Classic
  by itself, or if a full operating system downgrade is required.
  (6 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2719>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/568/>


**How "free" is Opera?** News that the Opera Web browser is now
  available without having to pay a license brings up the topic
  of how the company is able to turn a profit. (4 messages)

<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2720>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/569/>



$$

 Non-profit, non-commercial publications may reprint articles if
 full credit is given. Others please contact us. We don't guarantee
 accuracy of articles. Caveat lector. Publication, product, and
 company names may be registered trademarks of their companies.

 For information: how to subscribe, where to find back issues,
 and more, see <http://www.tidbits.com/>. TidBITS ISSN 1090-7017.
 Send comments and editorial submissions to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
 Back issues available at: <http://www.tidbits.com/tb-issues/>
 And: <ftp://ftp.tidbits.com/issues/>
 Full text searching available at: <http://www.tidbits.com/search/>
 -------------------------------------------------------------------




--
If you want to unsubscribe or change your address, use this link
http://emperor.tidbits.com/webx?unsub@@.3c557dc4!u=306a67f9

Reply via email to