Wireless buffalo, a new way to block spam, and floating mice: TidBITS is full of surprises this week. Newly crowned Contributing Editor Glenn Fleishman expands his AirPort network with Buffalo routers. Adam looks at Eudora 6.0, including its new SpamWatch feature. Keith Kaiser thinks beyond the mouse pad with Gyration’s Ultra gyroscopic mouse. In the news, we welcome Fetch Softworks as a new sponsor, announce the winner of last week’s DealBITS drawing, look at iTunes Music Store sales, and note releases of new iMacs, larger iPods, Salling Clicker 2.0, and FileMaker Pro Applications.
DealBITS Drawing: Tom Bihn Winner -- Congratulations to long-time TidBITS reader Harold Kite of usit.net, whose entry was chosen randomly in our first ever DealBITS drawing
Fetch Softworks Sponsoring TidBITS -- We're pleased to announce our latest long-term sponsor, Fetch Softworks, makers of the Mac's longest-standing FTP client, Fetch
iMacs Speed and Ports Bumped -- Apple refreshed its iMac line today, bumping the processor speed up to 1.25 GHz and improving components on both the 17-inch and 15-inch models
20 GB and 40 GB iPods Debut -- Apple today announced the release of 20 GB and 40 GB iPods, replacing the 15 GB and 30 GB models in the current lineup. The 10 GB model remains available for $300, the 20 GB model is $400, and the 40 GB model costs $500
iTunes Music Store Sells Ten Millionth Song -- Apple announced today that after about four months the iTunes Music Store has sold its ten millionth song (in an ironic comment on the state of online music, the song was Avril Lavigne's "Complicated")
Salling Clicker 2.0 Adds Palm Support -- Salling Software has released Salling Clicker 2.0, updating the popular utility for controlling a Mac from a Bluetooth-capable device (see "Salling Clicker in Action" in TidBITS-694)
FileMaker Releases Two FileMaker Applications -- FileMaker is going in a new direction with its long-standing FileMaker Pro database software. In addition to developing the database applications themselves, the company will also sell FileMaker Applications, a series of task-specific programs developed using FileMaker Pro which - unlike most custom FileMaker solutions - are unlocked to enable customization and extension by FileMaker Pro developers
Glenn Fleishman Joins TidBITS -- We've always tried to keep the TidBITS organization lean (though not mean), but our friend and colleague Glenn Fleishman has helped out for so long and in so many ways that we had to make it official
We've written in the past about the feature in Apple's AirPort Extreme Base Station that allows you to connect several base stations together wirelessly to form a larger network (see "AirPort Extreme: In the Key of G" in TidBITS-663)
Last week Qualcomm released Eudora 6.0, a major upgrade to the company's venerable email client. Eudora's marquee feature is SpamWatch, a new plug-in that employs Bayesian filtering to move spam-like messages to a new top-level Junk folder, but there are a few other welcome changes for users of both Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X.
SpamWatch -- There's no question that spam is by far the worst problem facing email users today
I'm easily the most relaxed Mac user anywhere.
Let me explain: My reclining chair is surrounded by my technology, made up of four or five remotes, cordless phones and cell phones, remote light switches, and of course a laptop table with my AirPort-enabled iBook
Hog Bay Notebook comments -- Readers weigh in on what they like and dislike about Hog Bay Notebook in comparison to other snippet keepers. (4 messages)
Internet vulnerabilities -- So is the Internet more or less vulnerable than Chuck Goolsbee described in his interview? And does the Internet make for a good target for terrorists anyway? (14 messages)
Concerns with Google -- After our announcement of the experiment with Google AdSense, a reader wrote in with some concerns based on the Google Watch Web site