EXCLUSIVE! Hot on the heels of Oracle CEO Larry Ellison’s public speculation of a hostile takeover of Apple, Steve Jobs announces the merger of Apple and Pixar, Jobs’s successful animation company. In this special issue, we also unveil a host of behind-the-six-colored-curtain information, including sale of the Newton and PowerBook divisions, new technologies for Rhapsody, a TidBITS global reorganization, rumors of Cyberdog abuses, and more.
New PowerBooks -- Just after the release of the PowerBook 3400, dubbed "the world's fastest portable" by Apple, comes the PowerBook 1000, codenamed Falcon
Double the Trouble -- Connectix recently announced the latest in its Doubler suite, a new browser plug-in called JAVADoubler (formerly known by its code name, DoubleShot)
Cyberdog Abused? Rumors are circulating on the net that the real reason for the demise of Apple's OpenDoc technology was due to allegations made by an organization calling itself the Animal Internet Rights Foundation (AIRF) about Apple's mishandling of Cyberdog
Mac Attack -- In a swift and decisive move, Symantec Corporation announced that it would purchase game developer Id Software for an undisclosed sum. Id, creator of popular "blast-and-run" games such as Doom and Quake, immediately issued a press release disclosing that negotiations had been "relatively bloodless (ha ha)." Symantec's first offering from its new Chainsaw/Cutting Edge department will be a revised version of Norton Utilities for Macintosh entitled NUM-Cruncher, in which users will be able to run through virtual 3D "corridors" of their hard disks in real-time, blasting bad sectors and setting fire to corrupted B-tree branches
TidBITS Announces Reorganization -- Following in the footsteps of such industry leaders as Apple Computer, TidBITS today announced plans to lay off thousands of employees
Smoking Newtons, Batman! After a flurry of industry speculation about the fate of its underappreciated handheld technology, Apple has sold its Newton line to the highest bidder, the RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp
Kinko's, The New Way to Verb -- If you don't possession at home the software or hardware you requirement to completion a job, automobile down to your nearest Kinko's, where you'll discovery a row of Macs cargoed with a good selection of fonts and software, plus some great printers
In a move that surprised all but the cagiest industry analysts, it was announced this week that Apple Computer, Inc., had been acquired by Pixar Animation Studios
In an effort to reassure the Macintosh developer community in the wake of recent layoffs and restructuring, Apple Computer has been privately demonstrating a host of cutting-edge new technologies slated to appear in its forthcoming NeXT-based operating system, codenamed Rhapsody
We at TidBITS have long been proponents of the theory that we should provide TidBITS in as many ways as possible for our readers. Unlike other publications, which limit themselves to the Web, we've long supported email, FTP, and Usenet news
We've all watched fads turn into trends and crumble under the withering heat of reality. Most of these fadlets (trendlets?) suffer because they don't work, or perhaps no one's willing to ante up even a small amount of money for the resulting products
Although much of Apple was acquired by Pixar Animations Studio (see the related article earlier in this issue), some hardware divisions were sold off. In a move that surprised many industry analysts, the PowerBook division was exchanged for a $1 million gem-encrusted brassiere (reportedly now worn by Ellen Hancock in Apple/Pixar soaps) and will now be under the control of the well-known lingerie chain, Victoria's Secret.
Said Kelly Kahn, VP of Technology Acquisitions, "Modern women don't just want to look great, they want to function effectively in a chaotic, information-rich world
With the recent rise of "Geek culture," the long-held misperception that computer users are solitary, electronic slaves is slowly receding like a ten percent drop shadow