I am floored by the amount of items that iTunes installs on my PC. I just want to be able to listen to my music on my PC, but iTunes wants to creep and crawl into every crevice of my operating system.

qttask - A part of QuickTime that wants to run in my taskbar every time I start the computer. The Q sits down there and annoys me until I remove it from my startup items. It returns with every iTunes update though.

ituneshelper - Well gee, I guess based on the name of this service, it helps iTunes. It supposedly makes iTunes perform better.

Bonjour Service - Finds things on your network. Kind of creeps me out because my firewall reports that it constantly wants to use my Internet connection.

iPod Service - Yet another service that could probably be built into iTunes without constantly taking up resources. I don’t even have an iPod attached to several of my PC’s, so why not give me the option to run this one or not run it?

Apple Mobile Device - Like the iPod Service, unless you have an iPhone, you don’t need it. Yet it runs anyway.

5 services from 1 application. That’s insane! I know Apple specializes in Mac stuff so naturally they aren’t that great when it comes to PC software, but my I don’t think we need so many services loading and taking up memory.

Lately I’ve had some strange feelings. Recently I found myself wanting an iPhone. Yah! Me wanting an iPhone? Previously I had thought that the iPhone was a great waste of money since there are so many more superior products on the market. I also have no need for a device that does so much. So I forced myself to figure out why I wanted an iPhone. Weeks ago I had also explored the idea of buying a new MacBook also. Since I am broke, that is no longer an option for me though. I guess I just wanted something Apple.

I don’t really need the products that Apple offers.  Yet I still felt the need to buy. Why? I am now forced to admit, that I want to buy an iPhone for the simple feeling of buying something cool from the Apple Store. There is just something about the feeling when you go into an Apple Store and pick up something. You just feel cooler. I’d love to get my hands on one of those cool iPhone boxes and have the clerk bag it in those sexy looking iPhone bags. I would then carry it around the mall and be seen with my iPhone bag so that everybody would know I just bought one.

Apple does this really well. They just sell cool. They have an entire flippin’ store of cool! I wonder how many other people have just bought Apple products just because they are cool. As for me,  I have to resist the temptation. My tax return money can be spent on better things.

It’s been 3 years since I bought my iPod. Now it sits and acts as a paper weight on my desk. It turns on for a brief second or two before dying. Slowly it had been getting this way over the past year or so. About a 10 months ago, it would only last me about an hour. Then 6 months ago it was down to about 30 minutes of play time. Now it barely holds a charge. It’s the battery I’m told. The battery that’s encased into the iPod. The battery that I can’t easily to change.

Now I sit here looking at this useless piece of equipment and wonder why I ever purchased a device that doesn’t allow me the ability to easily take out a part as simple as a battery and replace it. Haven’t we gone backwards here as far as technology here?!? Would you buy a laptop that you had to take completely apart in order to replace the battery in it? We all know lithium-ion batteries have a limited shelf life. Once they are made, they lose capacity. So why is Apple building all of these devices with a part built into them that will eventually go bad?

As I was looking for some tools recently, I came across my trusty Sony Discman. Oh the memories it brought back. Many years I spent with it listening to Guns N’ Roses and Peral Jam on the trains and buses. I bought the thing in 1993, and it cost me $150. Could this item that has been sitting in my storage drawer still play CD’s? I tried it out. Of course! it works Because it runs on 2 AA batteries that I can buy at any corner drug store.

It’s things like these that make me believe that as consumers, we need to make better choices. Sure the iPod is cool, but there are other players that are even cooler that work and do things as good as the iPod and last longer. When I buy a music player, I expect it to have a longer shelf life than 2 or 3 years. The people plunked down $600 for an iPhone will have to deal with the same situation 2 years from now. Granted that technology will change and people will probably want something new by then. But if it’s my money, I’d rather spend it on something that gives me the choice of using it 15 years from now without having to disassemble it, just like my trusty Sony Discman.

Apple took aim at the owner of Think Secret, a site that exposes secrets about Apple’s upcoming projects. Through the courts, Apple was able to shut the site down, but it didn’t work out the way they intended. They were countered in the suit and ended up having to settle out of court with the site owner. As part of the agreement, the site owner agreed to shut the site down. Read all about it here.

This may seem like a victory for Apple. After all, they shut down the site. I would disagree though. With the Internet, there is always somebody else in line to step up and build a web site on any subject. It just doesn’t make sense for these large corporations to constantly fight to have sites taken down. Another will always just spring up in its place.

The same goes for the RIAA. They spent years fighting file sharing networks only to find that Napster was replaced with Kazaa. Kazaa was replaced with Limewire and BearShare. Limewire and BearShare was replaced with Torrent sites.

The power is shifting away from large corporations to individual people. Now instead of corporations suing other corporations, they are suing average Joe. It’s a battle the large corporations just can’t win in the long run.

I’m glad that Apple decided to add a feature Internet Explorer for Windows users have had for a long time to Safari 3 for Leopard. You can now right-click/control-click any image and select Use Image as Desktop Picture.

Safari stores the image in a folder at username/Library/Safari.