Sorry, Greenpeace

But you made me do this. Larry Ellison and I went out on his yacht today and did some fishing. We were looking for dolphins but guess what, we got lucky. That's me in the yellow slickers, admiring my catch. Beside me is Larry's latest Asian squeeze, Ping-Mi Nao, a twelfth-grader at Sacred Heart Academy in Atherton. She's been working as an intern at Oracle but next month will be named CEO of Larry's new software-as-a-service startup.

Greenpeace, since you wanna play hardball, let's play hardball. We're gonna stuff this big fella with broken iMacs and iPods and Cinema Displays and drag him up the coast and drop him someplace where Eskimos go fishing. Just remember who you're messing with. I'm friggin Steve Jobs, bitch. I invented the friggin iPod. Have you heard of it? Now I've asked you politely to take down the fake Apple site. You refused. So we are cranking up the freak switch and moving to Code Orange. My offer is this: One whale a day gets it until the site comes down. I'm warning you. My best friend owns the biggest yacht in the world. I've got lots of money, and lots of whaling spears. Don't make me do this.

Just one example of a Greenpeace lie

This is pure bullshit and they know it. Yet they go ahead and print it. It just amazes me the utter rubbish people can print on the Web. Especially these anonymous bloggers but don't get me started.

Product life span

We get angry when our iPod breaks just after the one-year warranty expires. We get annoyed when Apple says it's cheaper to buy a new one than fix the old one. We hate it when we are reduced to selling our old PowerBook keyboard on eBay for five bucks. These are common consumer woes resulting from Apple designing products with short life spans. If Apple had to take back its old products, you can bet it would start designing longer lasting products that are easier to reuse and recycle.

Apple has good taste, and we want that flavor to last.

Fact is our products last longer and break down less than everyone else in the industry. They're the best-made consumer electronics products in the world, bar none. It's not just me saying this. Researchers have done studies. Okay, we commissioned those studies. But whatever. I'm just saying. This is bull. And it's just one example of how Greenpeace lies.

Folks, here's the deal. We're way greener than every other company. But Greenpeace knows we've got this lefty progressive customer base and they're trying to tap into that. Okay? They're like direct marketers, trying to buy our customer list and mail-bomb them.

More contact numbers for the Corleone family, er, Greenpeace

From their sickening attack website. Here are numbers to call to let Greenpeace know how angry they've made you. Tell them you love Apple! Tell them to leave Steve Jobs alone! Tell them to stop hating us for our freedom.

In the US:
Greenpeace USA
702 H Street, NW
Washington, D.C. 20001
(202) 462-1177

E-mail: info@wdc.greenpeace.org

International
Greenpeace International
Ottho Heldringstraat 5
1066 AZ Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Tel: +31 20 7182000

Email: supporter.services@int.greenpeace.org

Fight back against greeniac leftist tyranny

Dudes I am so depressed to see the comments supporting these blackmailers at Greenpeace. Do you not realize they are essentially a criminal enterprise? And, um, have you not figured out that if you wanna keep getting cool products from Apple, you should get the frig out of our hair? Left wing tyranny is just as bad as right wing tyranny. It's all tyranny.

Fight back. Call these a-holes and harass them. Ironweed's phone number is 866-456-9333. Act Now can be reached at 415-241-2510. Make sure you ask for Adam, and tell them Steve Jobs told you to call.

Meet Adam Werbach

Check out this douchebag. He's Adam Werbach. Says here he's on the board of Greenpeace International. You know, the guys who are giving me all this shit about not being green. The guys who've got all their little freako fanatics bombarding our switchboard with pestering phone calls. Turns out Adam owns a couple of little piss-ant companies in San Francisco. Ironweed Films and Act Now Productions. How much you wanna bet these groovy hippie-dippie artsy progressive filmmakers are using Macs in their shop? Put it this way, if they're using Dells, I'll eat my shorts. So here's the thing. I dare anyone to just call up and say hey, What kind of computers do you guys use? Got any Macs in your shop? Do you know they're full of pollution?

Ironweed's phone number is 866-456-9333. Act Now can be reached at 415-241-2510. Make sure you ask for Adam. And tell them Steve Jobs sent you. Heck, sing the Greenpeace song. Ask them if they've got Prince Albert in a can. Pretend you're buggering a baby seal. Whatever. Make these bastards as miserable as they're trying to make us. Do what you gotta do. Peace out.

Greenpeace song

This just came in from a reader in New Zealand. It's set to the tune from Pink Floyd's "The Wall." I was gonna set it to music with GarageBand but I'm super buried with this one-button iPhone. (Turns out it's harder than you'd think. Try it sometime and let me know how it goes.) Anyhoo, if anyone wants to set this to music, I'll put it up on the blog. And we can bombard Greenpeace's mail system with it. Much love, Kiwi.

We don't need no leftie lectures
From angry lezbos weighing nineteen stone.
No dark sarcasm on your website.
Greenpeace leave Steve Jobs alone
Hey, Greenpeace! Leave Steve Jobs alone!
All in all you're just a bunch of pricks with a cause.
All in all you're just a bunch of pricks with no balls.

You know we love our snow-white iMacs.
And iPods fit our hands just so.
We get childlike wonder from our Nanos.
Greenpeace leave Steve Jobs alone.
Hey, Greenpeace! Leave Steve Jobs alone.
All in all you're just a bunch of pricks with a cause.
All in all you're just a bunch of pricks with no balls.

"If you don't have an iPod, you can't have any music. How can you have any music if you don't have an iPod?"

Oh. My. God.

So now I realize why Woz called trying to pretend he wasn't on Colbert. I just saw it. Larry Ellison had it on his TiVo. (My iTv box had somehow frigged up and recorded "Magnum P.I." instead. I've got our engineers looking into it.) Anyhoo. Man. Woz was awful. Just terrible. Colbert didn't know what to do. You could see the sweat breaking out on his forehead, like How soon can we get this frigtard off the stage? Best part was when Colbert, flabbergasted by how stupid Woz is, goes, You didn't really invent the personal computer, did you. I'm being pranked, right? Well, actually, Colbert, in fact you were being pranked, because Woz most definitely did not invent the personal computer. I did. Which is why I wouldn't write an intro for him and help him sell more copies of his big fabrication. Shoulda called the friggin book iLie.

Little aside. I'm sitting there with Larry watching it and Colbert mentions that the co-author is "Gina Smith." And I'm like, Hey, Larry, how do I know that name? Larry shrugs and kinda looks away. I go, Wait, I know I know that name. Who is she? Wait a minute. Didn't she use to work for you? He goes, Oh, yeah, that's right, I think she did. I go, Wait, didn't you make her like CEO of some company or something? That thin client Internet computer, right? Larry goes, Gee, I dunno, maybe that's right. But he won't even look at me. So I go, What were you thinking making a freelance writer the CEO of a company, dude? He goes, Well, she was a very talented young woman, Steve. I'm like, Larry, it's me you're talking to, remember? El Jobso? Dude, you were totally trying to bang her weren't you? He goes, Noooo! Jesus, no! She was really a good executive. Really sharp. I'm like, Duuuuude, come on! You were trying to bang her! So you made her a CEO and started the entire company just cause you thought you could get into her pants right? Just admit it! He keeps denying it and I'm like, Well, she's a good looking woman, you gotta admit that, right? She was on TV for a while, wasn't she? She's hot, dude. And he goes, Well, I don't know, I never noticed. But now he's like totally blushing and it hits me. So I go, Waaaaait a minute, dude, did you bang her? Is that it? You were banging her so you made her the CEO of a company just so you could keep her around right? Are you shitting me? Finally he clicks off the TV and goes, Look, she was gonna sue me. Okay? She came over to interview me when she was working for ABC and I came out with a Viagra boner and let the kimono fall open. You know, the usual routine. The one Schwarzenegger taught me. Calls it "The Kennedy." Says he learned it from Uncle Teddy. Never fails, right? Except this time. I'm standing there with a hammer swinging in the air, I mean you could pound nails with this thing, and she's friggin screaming in horror like Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween II. So it was either pay her a few million bucks or hire her and let her play CEO for a while so she could put it on her resume. Okay? Now can we let it drop?

Friggin Larry. Most guys in that situation would just have the dame killed. But not Larry. No way. He gives her a job. He hires her. This guy is a total class act, I'm serious. He's up there with Bono, in my book.

So Woz calls

And he's all laughing his fat ass off and going, Ha! Bang bang! You been punked, sucka! Ha! You really thought I was gonna be on the Colbert show, and you even put it on your stupid blog! Idiot! Ha! You think I don't see all the shit you say about me on your blog? You think I forgot that you wouldn't write an intro for my book? Or that you ripped me off no those checks back in the Seventies? Who's the idiot now, idiot? Just remember who you're messing with. I'm the smart one, remember? I'm the one who actually designed the circuits, while you went running around in your bowtie chasing movie star pussy. I'm the friggin Wizard of Woz, baby. What's that? You're pissed? You're angry? Well, go get yourself a Segway and meet me on the field of battle, little bitch. I'll knock those goofy round glasses right off your face! I'll knock your smug little fake-Zen grin away too. I'm warning you, pal. I'm gunning for you! And this is just the beginning. You may be El Jobso the Magnificent, but I'm rich and I've got nothing to do all day -- nothing but frig with your head. Watch your back! Sleep with one eye open! And remember, I have guns! And I know how to use them!

Sad thing is, I got a call from someone last night who told me that in fact Woz really did tape a Colbert episode. But he was so mental that they couldn't air it. They were afraid it would scare little kids or something. I'm just hoping it shows up on YouTube.

Woz, I'm begging you. You need to see somebody. And get on some meds. I'm saying this as a friend. Sort of.

Here's the photo to send to Greenpeace

Just so you don't have to go looking for it. Just rip it down from here and put it in a mail message. Show your support for Apple! Let these pinkos know we aren't going to tolerate any more attacks on the Apple community!

Remember, their email is:

supporter.services@int.greenpeace.org

Tell em Steve sent you.

Time to get radical

One of the reader comments has a great idea. Time to fight back on friggin Greenpeace! These puckered brown a-holes are only picking on Apple cause we're more popular than everyone else. So let's show them how popular we are. Bombard these frigtards with email and spam. Hell, rip down the photo of the whale lady blowing water out of her butthole and send them that. Or a link to that page. Whatever. Email address is:

supporter.services@int.greenpeace.org

So fire away. Hell, take down their website with a DDOS attack if you want. Just don't say I told you to do that. Or better yet, if anyone has the energy for this, let's throw together a spoof Greenpeace site. Free Mac Pro to anyone who can pull that off and make it funny. I promise to blog the hell out of it on a daily basis. Go baby go!

How long till Mr. Bill cuts a check?

Only a moron would buy YouTube, Mark Cuban says. Sounds perfect for Gates. All it will take is for Google to pretend like they're interested, and Gates will be on them like a hobo on a ham sandwich. Chad Hurley, are you paying attention to me? Listen up, punk. You too could be a Microserf.

Schmidt and his family go on a rampage

Again. They're driving people nuts in Mountain View. Check it out here.

Greenpeace is really starting to piss me off

Now they've set up a fake Apple website to give us crap for using toxic chemicals in our machines or something. Well, I've already expressed my opinion about these frigtards here. Picture's worth a thousand words, as a certain Mr. Will Shakespeare once said.

At last a reason to watch TV

True story. Once upon a time, a long time ago, we had this Russian dude named Yuri working at Apple who had an extra finger on his right hand. Like this little tiny extra thumb sticking out of the main thumb. It used to freak me the frig out. But I couldn't not look at it, you know? I'd go into meetings and think, Don't look at the thumb, don't look at the thumb. Like you know it's going to make you kinda nauseated, and you won't be able to eat lunch afterward, but you still have to look. Well, this is how I feel about Woz going on the Colbert show tonight. He just called and told me how great he was. But come on. You know Woz. He'll try to be funny, because he really thinks he's hilarious, but he won't be, because he's really not. God I get clammy palms just imagining it. It's going to be like watching a train wreck in slow motion. Or like watching Ricky Gervais in the original version of The Office, with those long, awful, drawn-out jokes that go way past being funny and just get really, really uncomfortable. All I can say is I hope Woz remembered to take off his helmet.

So am I gonna watch? Hell yes. I can't not. Then we can all share a good kibbitz on it mañana -- that's Brazilian for "tomorrow," for those of you who don't know. And thanks to some anonymous dude, I'm now able to put that funky Brazilian "n" thing in which I wasn't able to do before. Much love to our readers in South America, if that's where Brazilia is located, and I'm pretty sure it is. Free iPod to first person who tells me what this funky "n" thing is called. Peace out.

Muchas gracias, Diego mio bueno amigo

This is Diego, our spirit guide in Peru. He had no idea who I was. Or Sting, either. Which was so cool. (Of course the others all did, and we had to tell them to just chill out, we're just regular dudes like you. First time Sting let one go in his Depends we became just one of the guys, which was great.) Diego kept calling me "Atahualpa" and telling me I had like this very powerful connection to the energy centers in the Amazon, maybe from a past life or something, and could I feel it? Fact is the only thing I could feel was my colon spasming like I had a space alien trying to eat its way out of my butt, but I lied and told him I could. When in Peru, right? Awesome time. Highly recommended to all of you. If you go, tell Diego I sent you. Es un hombre muy awesomeoso.

Tabula rasa

That's Greek for "blank slate" for those of you who don't know. Well it's been a pretty exciting few days off. After all the chanting and meditation in Oregon I happened to hook up with Sting who had this great idea to fly down to this lodge in the rainforest on the Madre de Dios river in Peru and spend two days tripping on ayahuasca. I'm like, Dude, say no more, fire up the Apple jet and let's go, and if I come up with any product ideas I can write if off my taxes as work-related. (That's me in the white T-shirt in the photo. Sting is just to my right, barely visible in back.) Well, ayahuasca is pretty intense stuff. The experience lasts ten to twelve hours and is kind of a mixture of dreaming and dying. Side effects include vomiting and diarrhea, so you have to wear Depends and keep a bucket beside your mat. Luckily we had a great spirit guide, Diego, who played a flute and kept us centered. And sure enough this really opened me up to some new ideas, including this notion that the entire world is going to end in the year 2012 when the Mayan calendar runs out of days or something. But also I did some thinking about the iPhone. I spent all this time thinking about what people do with a phone and sometime during my second trip, as I was spooning with Sting and listening to his sobs, I realized, Man, what phones are all about is communication. Connecting with another person. That is the pure essence of the phone, once you strip away all the other stuff, which really is just clutter. At Apple we've spent years hacking away putting all these features into a phone when all people want to do is make phone calls. Not listen to music. Not browse Web pages. Just talk. They want to talk to one another. That's it. Sounds obvious. And it is obvious, if you're open to it. If you're listening. So as soon as I got back to the Jobs Pod I sent out an email to the iPhone team: We're back to square one. Starting over. Tabula rasa. Throwing out everything we've done so far and making a new phone that just makes phone calls. Small, white, gorgeous, as few buttons as possible. Our designers tell me we need at least 12 buttons so we can have all the numbers plus * and # symbols. I'm telling them to go back and do it over. I want one button. No more, no less. One. Like the Bono song, which we will totally use to promote the phone. The designers keep looking at me like I'm crazy. But I've never been saner in my entire life. We will do this. And it will be huge. Best of all, turns out that if all you want to do is make phone calls you can buy this super-cheap telephony chip set from China for like 50 cents a phone. Then we sell them for 800 bucks cause they have an Apple logo. Sweet, right? "The 1-Phone." Or: "The One." Or something. We'll do commercials showing people in colorful silhouettes, dancing around talking on their super-expensive white phones. Or maybe we'll hire that fat PC dork and have him use a regular phone and then a cool guy use an Apple phone.

Re: the hiatus, thanks to all of you for being so patient (even you, Luis Ordena Pizarro Clemento Morena Pimentar del Perro y Gato y Pato y Mamon, you dickbag.) Every once in a while El Jobso just needs to go off into the rainforest and think big thoughts. Man I totally loved Peru but it is sooo good to be back and able to get a decent shower again. And to not be puking into a bucket and crapping my pants. Namaste. Peace out.

Going dark for a few days

Dear friends,
The past few weeks have been exhilarating but also exhausting. The backdating scandal, the spying scandal, the new products from Apple -- it's just been wild. I need some time to just sit quietly and meditate and get back in touch with my inner genius. Luckily I've recently reconnected with Baba SunMoonStar, my old guru from Oregon (shown here) who has invited me up to his ashram for a few days of quiet contemplation. No phones, no computers, no Internet. Ergo (that's Spanish for "therefore") no blogging. Sorry. But I'll be back next week refreshed and restored. As always, namaste. I bow to you. Peace out.

Hot air

"I feel cooler already!"

"Don't worry, Jethro, it won't last."

Friggin Branson, what a con man

So Gore calls me all excited and says, Steve, did you hear about this? Richard Branson just gave me three billion dollars to save the planet!

Then he goes on and on in his doofy Southern accent about how great and important this all is, what a valuable big symbolic statement Sir Richard is making and how maybe Apple should step up and do something big like this too. I told him, Al, ya know, I hate to break it to you, but this idea you're gonna stop global warming is a crock of shit and we all know it. I mean what are you gonna do? Send guys into space to push the sun back a little bit from the earth so we don't get so hot? Like that movie with Bruce Willis where they blow up an asteroid? Jesus. Even if you could do it, you'd need a little bit more than $3 billion to get that project off the ground, right? Besides that, everyone also knows that whatever money you skin outta these rich bastards isn't going to offset global warming, it's just gonna be used to help you run for office. Branson's just trying to buy you off so you can help keep the FAA out of his hair with this Virgin Galactic thing and maybe push the DOT to bend some rules and push through his Virgin America plans.

But let me hit you with a cluestick, dude. First of all, Clinton's got his paws on this and as usual he's totally AMOG'ing you bigtime. He's not gonna give the money to you, he's gonna take a skim for himself so he can buy presents for whichever member of Danity Kane he happens to be banging this week, and the rest he's gonna give to his wife, you dumb-ass. Second, um, did you actually listen to what Branson said yesterday? He said he's pledging his profits. But have you ever looked at Branson's books? Do you know if those companies are actually making any profit? Poor retard Al goes, Oh, yeah, Steve, they're making a lot of profits, uh-huh, they really are. I'm like, Dude, Lesson #1 from Hollywood, which you should know by now, is nobody ever makes a profit, which is why you never take a cut of the profit, you take a cut of the gross. Idiot! You think Branson hasn't already figured out a zillion ways to move money around his companies to show as little or as much profit as he wants to? Biggest hit movies of all time are still losing money, if you believe the movie studios, Al. Jesus. Think!

Also, I told him, Branson ain't gonna donate any money. He said he's gonna invest. So what does that mean, Al? Think quick, this is a pop quiz. It means he'll put a few bucks into John Doerr's greentech fund and make a 50x return on his money. And for this bit of "philanthropy" you idiots let him stand up there with his flowing fake blonde locks and look like a friggin hero. Goddammit, Al! Seriously. No wonder Bush kicked your ass in those debates, you're as dumb as a bag of rocks.

Al goes, Steve, I actually did win that election, if you go back and count up all the votes. At which point I just lost it and started shouting at him, Al, you friggin lost! Okay? That's why you're not in the White House right now! Have you not noticed that? You friggin lost! So deal with it!

Then I felt bad cause he got all depressed and started mumbling about how I'm right and he's never gonna be president after all and how was he ever so crazy to think he could run for president, and maybe he should just go start eating again and let himself get fat. Steve, it's those voices in ma head, he says. Those voices. They're back agin in ma head, Steve. Honey? Tipper? Honey, have you seen ma pills? Where are ma pills, honey?

You know what? We gotta get this guy off our board. I tried calling Jerry York but he's not taking my calls.

HP's newsroom mole revealed

Once again we're breaking news here at FSJ Blog. Meet Anthony Ronsavalli, aka Pedro Sanchez, innocent member of CNET's cleaning crew. Anthony is ex-CIA and was employed by Action Research Group from 2004 to the present, according to my sources. Note the fake mustache. For pix of this guy in various other "assumed identities" see here.

Marky, we hardly knew ye

Truth is, Hurd is a nice guy. And smart. I met him a few times, and really liked him. And he's done a good job running HP. But let's face it. With stuff like this coming out, he's toast. He's finished. I'd be surprised if he survives long enough to hold that press conference tomorrow. It's a real shame, honestly. But he's gotta go.

Power couple

"I'm watching you."

"I know, I authorized it."

Great story in this morning's Journal

About the punk kid Zuckerberg who founded Facebook.com and now is about to sell it to someone for a billion bucks. Best part is the line about him blowing off an 8 a.m. meeting with Microsoft. The borg was "incredulous." Guys, obtain a clue. The kid has taste. He'd rather be broke eating ramen noodles than sell his company to you a-holes. The stuff about not getting up early was just an excuse. You know, like when a girl tells you she can't go on a date cause she has to stay home and do laundry. You've heard that one before, Bill. I know you have.

This just in from reader "yebot"

Much love, yebot. Preloaded Bono-signed U2 iPod is in the mail.

Death to Fake Steve!

San Francisco Gay Longhairs marched outside the Apple campus yesterday to protest my recent posts about their creepy personal ads. We had to send out a squad of short-hair security goons to beat them off. Dude in the scarf got nasty with that pink gel dong, whipping it around like a nunchuck. No match for pepper spray, however. Front left in ski cap is Zak Sherwood, president of the Bay Area Gay Longhair Alliance (BAGL). He's demanding an apology for the tear gas plus a face-to-face with me. Ain't gonna happen.

eWeek editor 'disappointed' by HP's failure to spy on his staff

Scot Petersen, editor-in-chief of eWeek, says he is "saddened and disappointed" when he reads about the extreme measures HP took to gather information about reporters at his rival, CNET, while doing nothing at all about eWeek.

What are we, chopped liver? We don't rate a single phone tap, not even a pretexting attempt? Well I hope Pattie Dunn doesn't think she's scared us off. Because we ain't gonna let up. You don't get to be "the source for all high-tech news" by rolling over and playing dead every time some company plays hardball on you. We're gonna stay right in their face. For example, just this week we ran this hard-hitting piece called "HP to Open More SOA Centers" and this one called "HP Rolls Out Integrated Storage System for SMBs." That's got some knees trembling out there in Palo Alto, let me tell ya. And we got more coming. I'm sure they don't like it, but what can I do? I follow the truth wherever it leads me. So do what you need to do, Pattie Dunn, but we ain't backing down. Like the song goes, Shorty wanna step up, I twist his neck up. That's just how we roll at eWeek.

That giant sucking sound...

Comes from Fortune, which has published yet another hagiography, er, article (88th in a 4,000-part series, it appears) on the Google guys here.

Best line is this howling opener:

Google relishes being secretive and opaque ...

Um, right. That's why they're in every other edition of Fortune, cause they crave their privacy. I also really enjoyed Adam Asslickinsky's Tiger Beat style gushing prose. "Sergey is the brash one, who gets all the girls. Larry's the shy guy, but he's super smart and super funny once he gets to know you. Eric's the weirdo who gets pantsed and wedgied in the playground." Oh, hold on. I just threw up in my mouth and swallowed it. Okay, I'm back now and really digging the photo of Page and Brin in their lab coats. See, cause they're kind of like scientists. They're super duper smart. They went to Stanford and almost finished grad school. Geddit? Groan.

A second look at this photo

My question is: Are those real beards? Cause one year Woz and I went out on Halloween as the guys from ZZ Top (hilarious) and I swear we had beards that looked exactly like this. Rented them from some costume shop in Los Gatos. Anyway. Just wondering. Especially with the guy in front. That totally looks like a clip-on.

A rousing performance

"I'm not making nuclear weapons, except maybe sometimes I am, or I might be, but not really, well maybe sort of, though strictly speaking actually not."

"Makes perfect sense to me."

HP scandal deepens

This HP spying situation just gets worse and worse. Now photos are leaking out of Pattie Dunn's Abu Ghraib-style interrogation techniques. This roundup took place at HP headquarters in March 2006, according to our sources. Bottom photo in white pants on right is Michael Moeller, HP's chief spokesman. At his feet, with gray hair, is board member Tom Perkins. No wonder these guys are furious. Much love to our confidential source on this. Free nano is in the mail.

Vicious Brits

Okay, so our OS X market share slipped a teeny-tiny bit last quarter. But these guys at The Inquirer just seem a little too gleeful about it. And ya know what? It hurts. It really does.

If only we could keep her from coming back down

And use real nails. Someday when I no longer live in fear of being beaten to death and kosher butchered by Kablahblah thugs I'll share some of my Madge stories. Trust me, they're appalling. And they may offend some of our highly sensitive politically correct gay readers, not to mention all you NPR listeners who can't take a friggin Muslim joke. God knows I'd hate to lose you. (And by the way, all you defenders of the crescent and star, that's a woman desecrating a cross. I'll hold my breath waiting for you to write in and complain.)

But back to Madge. Truth is, she's beyond awful. Like remember the time we hired her to do the vid-cam linkup? First of all you wouldn't believe what we had to pay her. Plus the list of riders on her contract, like making us hire some special friggin rabbi and pay him forty thousand bucks to sprinkle goat's blood around her studio or something. And what's the deal with that gap in her teeth? And that fake English accent, like she's Mary friggin Poppins or something? Honey, I know it sucks to grow up in Pontiac, Michigan, but deal with it. Now she's writing kids books. "Tommy is Transgendered," is the next one, I'm told. Man, don't get me started. Oh, and one last thing. She's got bad breath. Really, really bad breath. Like she's been eating dog shit. And she knows it. I swear she does it on purpose just to bum people out. She always leans in really close when she talks to you, to make sure you get a nice big whiff of it. Almost makes you puke. No lie.

Stallman ejects from space shuttle?

How else to explain this?

It's official: Unbox sucks

Thanks to Fortune's Peter Lewis for pointing out the obvious. Amazon's movie service blows. Check's in the mail, Pete.

Oh, yeah. And we just put Napster out of business. Company is up for sale. Not sure who'd be crazy enough to buy it. Note to self: Call Bono before they do.

Gates breeding again

Now they're hatching them in labs. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

HP rolls out new PCs for all employees

Official name for this camera is "iControl" (hello? haven't we patented the use of "i" in front of other words?) but the kids at HP are calling it "Snoop." Main feature: You can't turn it off. (And yes, they're totally ripping off yet another of our ideas. Talk about a clumsy version of our built-in iSight, which is soooo much more elegant.)

Great new Zune ad

But a bit, um, derivative, dontcha think? See here. Much love to Macboy for this. Free 80GB iPod coming your way, pal.

What do you call the first Muslim shot into space?

A good start. Maybe we can send these guys next. Then these.

Raise shields: Vista on the horizon

Cisco's security chief says Vista scares him. Dude, I know the feeling.

Has Stallman stowed away on the space station?

He hasn't been heard from lately. And now this.

Overheard at Davos

"You're a sanctimonious blowhard with a huge ego and no talent."

"Seems to be working for you."

Okay, so this donut is Rhapsody, and this donut is SanDisk, and we mash them together like this and make one huge delicious donut ...

I'm sorry, boyo, but yer man Steve is right, yer fookin software is a pile o' steamin shite!

BONO: No lie, yer program blew up me fookin machine!
GLASER: It did what?
BONO: It blew up my fookin PC.
GLASER: Tell me exactly what happened.
BONO: How the fook do I know? Jaysus! Do I look like I work on a fookin help desk? Am I talking to you with an Indian accent?
GLASER: Did you try restarting the PC?
BONO: Restarting? I had to throw the fookin thing out and buy another machine!
GLASER: Yeah, that's not our software. That's a bug in Windows.

Rob Glaser describes the size of his unit

And exaggerates by 50%. Okay, that's mean. Sorry. Anyhoo, says today in the Journal that RealNetworks is gonna team up with SanDisk to make a closed-loop music system. Question is, when RealNetworks fails at this, as they have failed at everything else, how will Glaser manage to blame it on Microsoft? (The irony is that Glaser perfected this tactic of blaming others while working at Microsoft, where he rose like a helium balloon and always moved on before anyone discovered the disasters he'd left behind.) Despite his record of incredible underachievement this guy has an ego even bigger than his ass. He seriously believes he's way smarter than Gates, and it drives him nuts that he can't succeed at anything. Consequently he's become the biggest whinger in tech. Yeah, yeah, Gates plays dirty, boohoo.

Rob, here's some tough love. Your problem isn't Microsoft. Your problem is your software. It's crap. In fact it's even crappier than Microsoft's software, and that's saying something. Your software doesn't get viruses; it actually is a virus. So look, if you're really going to try to stay in this business, why not pull your panties out of your crack and get to work fixing your code? Oh, right. It's easier to go whining to the feds.

News flash: Microsoft releases Service Patch 1 for Zune

Before it's even shipped, there's a patch you gotta install. To fix a glitch in the WiFi system whereby if you receive a song from a pal it can inadvertently reformat your disk. Hackers are exploiting this and turning Zunes into weapons that can wipe out all the other Zunes that are within WiFi range. ZuneZapping, they call it. Hop on the subway with your Zune, step off with a fragged disk. Can't wait to see frigtards stumbling around gazing down at their butt-ugly Zunes, frantically pressing buttons, wondering what happened. Thanks, Microsoft.

Whoops

I've just been informed that Dementia Man is an actor who is working for us. He's part of our anti-Zune viral campaign. So is this. Sweet, right?

That Zune demographic

Check out Tom Bosley's demented twin raving about Zune in this video tribute to Microsoft. Is this Redmond's idea of a cool viral marketing campaign? God I hope so.

Dear Lord Gates, we give you thanks and praise, but please don't let Vista slip again

Workers at a Taiwanese DRAM factory hold a prayer vigil for Microsoft's new memory-hungry operating system.

I shouldn't admit this

But Zune scares me. Not because it's so great. (Though in fact it's pretty good, mostly because Toshiba's making it. See the recent Prizefight review of a Gigabeat by the beautiful Veronica Belmont of CNET, she of the sexy Connecticut accent.) What's scary is that it's Microsoft. We mock them for not innovating, for letting other companies create markets and then scooping in late with me-too products that don't really work right. But ya know what? It friggin works. For the life of me I don't know why. The Mac OS has been better than Windows, way better, for almost a decade now. Yet we've still got 3% market share. So yes, Zune scares me. I'll never admit that in public, of course. We'll say Zune is addressing a different market. (Read: frigtards.) We'll spread some FUD about how the WiFi feature doesn't work. We'll create a few virus scares and bug reports. We'll make sure Walt Mossberg says it's a piece of crap. We'll let everyone know how their online music store keeps crashing. We'll do our best to fight it, in other words. But you know they're gonna move a lot of units. Yes, it's ugly. Yes, Microsoft has no taste. Only now, in middle age, does it occur to me that most of the world has no taste either. Go to a mall and look around.

Here's the thing. I've spent my whole life fighting these guys, and we all know how that's worked out. That's why I'm scared.

HP's flack, spied upon, says: Thank you, ma'am, may I have another?

Mike Moeller, ex-BusinessWeek tech reporter, earned the undying respect of his colleagues by quitting at the height of the dotcom boom and trying to cash in by becoming Marc Andreessen's flack at Loudcloud. (Remember Mike's smacktalk about how huge they were gonna be?) Well somehow Mike ended up doing PR at HP, and it turns out he too was a target of Pattie Dunn's doofball spy program. So is he quitting? Suing? Nope, he will continue to serve as HP's paid apologist, CNET reports. Moeller's money quote: "I think it should speak volumes that I am still doing my job." Um, yeah, Mike, it does indeed speak volumes. Volumes upon volumes. By the way, Mark Hurd says don't forget to pick up his suits at the dry cleaner on your way in on Monday, and Pattie says she's told you this a million times, she wants Splenda in her latte, not Equal, which is what you gave her last time, and she friggin hates that, so shape up, bitch.

Three plays and then the song self-destructs? Damn you, Zune! Damn you to hell!

Some advice for Microsoft

I've been thinking about that Vista beta program, where Microsoft can't find anyone who's willing to spend $2,000 on a high-end PC and then sit around watching it blow up in order to help Microsoft debug their frigged-up new operating system. So here's my idea. Instead of just giving Vista away free, maybe Microsoft could pay people to use it. Sounds radical, I know. But it seems to be working out pretty well for Novell.

Linux development grinds to a halt

Has anyone told Linus Torvalds about this? Guess he'll figure it out when all of his maintainers suddenly go dark on him. Word on the street is that Sam Palmisano made a personal visit to Les Moonves trying to put the kibosh on the show. No luck. Sorry, Sam. Guess you'll have to go back to writing your own operating systems. Just like in the old days, remember? You know, like actually hire programmers and pay them money, instead of relying on the kindness of the Bad Smell Brigade? Tough noogies, I know.

Stallman surfaces again

Now he's in Germany, using another false name, "Alois Pletti" (not sure what that means in Klingon) and winning prizes in beard competitions. See here. The guy's got more aliases than Jack Bauer. Thanks to Hog for the tip. Slashdot is gonna have a field day with this.

Think different. Think expensive.

Have a peek at this. This guy is using his $900 Mac Mini as a DVD player. Has almost all the same features and functionality as those $50 no-name DVD players, but without the stigma of low price. This is exactly the kind of consumer we're targeting with our Apple-in-the-living-room strategy. The kind of guy who says, Hey, I'm a little bit different. I'm a little bit better than you. I care enough about movies to spend a little bit more (or a lot bit more) to get that glossy white box in my living room. Sweet.

New, smaller retail stores

Here's a first glimpse at an Apple worker putting the finishing touches on what we're calling the new NanoStore, which we believe will be the smallest retail outlet ever built. We're going to be on a very aggressive rollout for the next year, opening one new store a week, on average. The idea is that just as everyone else starts copying our spare, modernist look, we're going to move to something more traditional. They zig, we zag. It's how we stay two steps ahead.

This is so rich

Some guy who blogs under the fake name "Thomas Hawk" says here that iTV is a dumb idea. Who in their right mind believes anything written by some anonymous douchebag who writes under a fake name? I mean really.

Use Vista, or else

Says here that Microsoft is desperately seeking beta testers for Vista. Hey, Smith & Wesson is looking for bullet catchers, too, but I wouldn't be in a big hurry to sign up. I'm trying to remember what Microsoft used to call people who tested out their unfinished software. Oh that's right. "Customers."

Om Malik (who he? ed.) says I'm the new Bill Gates

This because we do DRM or something. Yeah right, Om, and you're the new Vinod Khosla. In your dreams. No guff, here's Malik's little essay. And here is his very modest 4,000-word biography which lists every little award and TV appearance. Dude, who knew you won the gold award from American Society of Business Publication Editors back in 2001? And you got written up by Silicon India? Wow! Rockin!

Thanks for the advice, Business 2.0

Business 2.0 writer Jon Fortt wants you to know that Apple will have a hard time making this movie download thing work. His article bears the incredibly savvy headline, Warning to Jobs: Taming Hollywood not easy. Gee, really? Wow, thanks for the warning. Not easy, huh? Maybe we better just drop the whole thing.

Hey, Jon Fortt, here's a warning for you: Your Head Is In Your Butt. Extracting It Not Easy.

Dude, if I wanted to be told the obvious, I'd subscribe to BusinessWeek. (You've heard their new slogan? BusinessWeek: In case you missed the Journal last week.) Honestly, does anyone actually read Business 2.0? Does it appear in print? I don't think I've ever actually seen a copy of it.

Flash news: Nancy Grace begs forgiveness, says `I went too far,' then jumps off bridge

Just kidding. Unfortunately.

Another McNealy sighting

This just rolled in from an engineer at Xilinx who asks that I withhold his name.

Dear Steve, Our paintball team was at Bear Creek paintball on Route 17 in Los Gatos last weekend and we were short one guy. The owner says there's some dude out in the parking lot by himself who's looking to join a team for the day. We said okay and in walks this nutjob dressed like a commando and talking gung-ho military, saying "ten-four" and "roger that" and "Charlie's got us pinned down! Where's my friggin air support?" So we figure he's some kind of crazy ass Nam vet but whatever, he bagged more dudes by himself than all of us together, and we totally fragged the dudes from Altera, who usually kill us. So then we're all wondering, who the hell is this masked man? He's just sitting there cleaning his gun (yeah, he brings his own weapon, which one of our guys says is some kind of super-expensive gun made in the Czech Republic) and muttering about Bill Gates. Then as we're out in the parking lot getting ready to go for beers, he pulls up in his Hummer, whips off his mask, and yeah, it's McNealy. He gives us the finger and takes off, spraying dirt all over us. Guy is flat-out nuts, I swear. But as I said, he did put a lot of kills on the board.

Gay Freddy Krueger says thanks

Also in the mailbag in response to the item on scary gay longhairs is this email from Whipkey Uncle aka Gay Freddy Krueger.

Dear Steve, Jes wanna thank y'all for linkin to ma personal ad and sendin some traffick ma way. So far I got three runaways who wannna come live with there wild n crazy uncle whipkey. No hard feelins on the Freddy Kruger name either. Keep up the good werk. By the way I know u used ta be one of us (a longhair) and I wish y'all wud consider gone back to that look, the short hair dont suit ya. xoxoxo hugz n kissez, Whipkey Uncle. PS pleez post mor items on the Yelptards I love em and the makin out girlz are favorite.

Stallman spotted

Lots of feedback rolling in from the recent item on that scary gay longhair website.

Our open-source pal Hans-Olaf Gutmansdottir aka Hog writes in to say that the "FLOSS commmunity" (wtf?) has been "roiled" by that item as it turns out that their beloved leader, Richard Stallman, the patron saint of the Free Software movement, apparently has been advertising on that site under fake names. Says Hog:

I discovered this after reading the item on your blog and amusing myself by sifting thru ads placed by the longhair gays. That's when I found this under the name "Kwai Lam." It's obviously Stallman. The clue of course is that "Kwai Lam" is a Klingon phrase meaning "one who obstructs or delays," as in "one who stalls," or "stall man." Well many pages of Slashdot are being given over to this mystery and some members are very angry, not that they dislike homosexuals but just our Dear Leader has kept things from us. Plus, the text of his ad which is terribly frightening. And the URLs for his photography, including pictures of his lover, have upset many people.

Check it out if you have a few minutes to waste. But be warned: the photos of his lover get nasty. Definitely not suitable for work. And definitely not for right after you've eaten. Wait 20 minutes or something.

Re: the Apple-Sun merger

Lot of people writing in to ask what happened to the big merger. Those of you who are hardcore Apple watchers will recall that 10 years ago Sun was supposed to buy us. This was back when we were really hurting and almost going out of business. Scott made all sorts of promises and then the night before we were going to close the deal he canceled -- just left us standing at the altar. So we've been waiting for some payback, and now we've got it. Monday night we rented a suite at the Four Seasons in Palo Alto and had him wait there. Meeting was set for 9 and we were going to sign the papers. Then I just hung out in the Jobs Pod and kept having people call telling him I'm running late. Meanwhile we've got his suite bugged, which affords us the enormous treat of watching him get more and more pissed off as the hours roll by. Finally it gets to be one in the morning and I'm still supposedly running late, can't get there for another hour. So here's the treat. He slams down the phone, then orders up some in-room porn and does what people do with in-room porn. We wait till he's done and then I call and go, Hey, you know, Scott, I've been looking at the financials again, and we just think this isn't going to work. I'm sorry. Of course he starts screaming and calling me a loser. I'm like, Hello, I'm a loser? Who's sitting there spanking his monkey in a hotel room? And hey, a little word of advice? I'd throw out that Sears blazer. Yeah. Check it out. You got some man gravy on it. Peace out, schmuck.

Another slip for Vista

So Uncle Fester just called me. I'm not kidding. He tells me Vista is slipping again. They're going to have to announce a new date: June 2007. So they're looking for something else they can announce a few days before to serve as a diversion, like maybe some kind of partnership around TV-and-music technology. I suggested maybe Gates could use his philanthropy to give iMacs to kids in Third World countries. Or just license OS X, as I've been suggesting for months now. Ballmer groaned and hung up. Offer still stands, egghead.

Anyhoo, you read it here first: Vista, June 2007. (My bet is they miss that one too.)

I know Bob Iger looks like a stiff

But he's actually a hot you-know-what. So yesterday he pulls me aside and says there's this big meeting later this week in L.A. and he thinks I should fly down before Apple takes away my jet. (Ha ha.) Iger says it's a movie pitch for a live-action film and there's no Pixar connection but he still thinks I should attend. But he doesn't want to tell me what it is because he wants it to be a surprise. He goes, All I can tell you is that it's gonna be worth it. I've got people begging me to let them attend. Mark Cuban offered me a hundred grand to watch through a mirror for Pete's sake. So are you in?

So whatever. I'm in. I'll share more info once I get it.

iWant my iTV

So now you know why Sting was in town. We're doing an ad campaign riffing on the old MTV song by Dire Straits. Message is, Just like MTV changed everything, now iTV is changing everything again. We're gonna get some of the original veejays from the 1980s, if we can find some who aren't living on the street and smoking crack, or weighing four hundred pounds and living in their mom's basement. When I say we're changing everything, I mean, literally, everything. We're in your den, we're in your living room. We're everywhere. The world is changing, and we're leading the way. You can tell I'm just really excited. Incidentally, regarding Sting, apparently he's this big anti-television crusader, and gave us a bunch of hooey at first about not wanting to promote a TV-related product. All he's gotta do is sing four words in that falsetto voice of his. Hell, one word is all we really need and we can splice it in. For that matter we could hire an impersonator and pay Sting nothing. Which is kind of a point I made to him, gently, while we had our heads up each other's butts during a yoga stretch. Anyway, everybody's got their price. Sting's, in fact, is lower than you'd think. A lot lower. So much for commitment to causes. Like Bono told me once, "You know what Sting's number one cause is? `Cause I need the money.' Yer man would burn down the fookin rainforest himself if you paid him enough."

I'm sure that's not true. Anyway, Sting is on board. He was backstage yesterday, but he made me promise not to bring him out. That's just the way he is. Totally self-effacing. No ego, no pretense. Peace out.

Correction: Math mistake

No sooner did I post that item about Sting than I start getting email from people saying that ten cents times a billion downloads is not half a billion dollars. (And plenty of folks made liberal use of the word "frigtard.") Look, my Dashboard widget wasn't working, so I just wrote an approximate figure. As I've pointed out before, I'm no good with numbers. But everyone's a critic. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa, as the French would say.

Geniuses have feelings, too

It's easy to be a critic. It's easy to snipe. I know, I do my share of it. But when I see things like this I just get so sad. Some blog runs pix of Woz's house. That's bad enough. But read the comments. The first guy rags on Woz for having a cheap espresso machine. Then someone says this:

To think that such oppulence is created by those who know of the world's undernourished and impoverished.

So you can't win. Like with some of the comments here lately. Friends, remember. There's a human being on the receiving end. To be sure, a very wealthy, brilliant human being, a human being who has changed the course of history and who lives a life you could not even begin to imagine. But a human being nonetheless. With real human being feelings. So let me be open with you. Some of this stuff hurts. Let me share one of Sting's lyrics which we discussed at length this weekend, from his song "Russians":

We share the same biology/regardless of ideology.

Friends, we're all brothers and sisters. (Except you, Alvy Ray Smith.) So go easy. I've had a lot on my plate lately. By this time tomorrow you'll know what I'm talking about. These new products come directly from my heart. I hope they will add wonder to your life. Namaste.

Sting is so down to earth

Tomorrow is Showtime, and I'm remarkably calm. Maybe because the rehearsals went so well. Or maybe because what we're announcing is just so amazing. Or maybe because we had Sting and Trudie visiting over the weekend. They're both such open people. There's no pretense, no artifice, no sense of anything false. They just let themselves be. We didn't talk about technology at all, except they saw our new 24-inch iMac and were totally blown away. For thirty-six hours I just forgot about everything Apple related. We did yoga in the morning, meditated in the afternoon, went for walks on the beach (which drew some stares, as always), talked about the environment and art and human rights. Also Sting has an idea about how we could use iTunes to end world hunger. The gist is we add a dime to the cost of every download, so it's $1.09 instead of 99 cents, then we donate that dime to a feed-the-world type organization. A billion downloads times ten cents each is, like, I don't know, half a billion dollars or something. Will we actually do this? I doubt it. But just the fact that we could is so cool. Anyway. This was one of those perfect weekends in California where you stop and smell the eucalyptus and put your priorities back in order. BTW, check out the quality of the photo here. It was taken with a new device that you'll be hearing about very soon. That's all I can say for now. Peace.

If you think HP is messed up

You should see the stuff Sun has been pulling. Remember all those top execs who bailed a few years ago? And finally Zander too? McNealy was listening to their cell phone calls, and they quit in protest. Doerr knew all about it but kept quiet. But now that the HP poop has hit the fan, it's gonna come out that Sun should have disclosed this stuff too. So Doerr tries to weasel out by pulling a Tom Perkins, quitting in a so-called huff. No doubt he'll start leaking to the Journal, too, to keep his own ass covered down the road. (Because yeah, the Journal will make that kind of deal. Give us McNealy, we let you swim free. You don't think they're ethical, do you? They're as bad as we are, maybe worse.) However the SEC might not be so easy to buy off, and apparently Doerr knows it. Our private investigators (yeah, we have them, duh) last night photographed Doerr and an unidentified man visiting a self-storage facility in San Jose and loading duffel bags (cash presumably?) into a pickup truck.

Who did HP's dirty work?

Do any of these case studies sound familiar?

Who do you think keeps Terry Lenzner's mysterious company gainfully employed? Yes, these are the same guys Larry Ellison hired a few years ago to dig through Microsoft's trash. They got caught that time too.

Blood in the water

The witch hunt is on in the Valley, and people are freaking out. These pygmies and parasites in the press have been living off us for years. But all the while they've been lying in wait, brooding, sniping, waiting to attack. They're all jealous cause they work at some newspaper and get paid crap while we make millions, or billions, even though they're convinced we're a bunch of morons and they're way smarter. Truth is, most of them couldn't run a lemonade stand.

Word to your mom, reporters: We're better than you. Sorry, but it's true. Look at the two people in these photos. You're not fit to shine their shoes. Now you want war? Okay. Let's play, pygmies. Let's play.

Everybody out here is paranoid. Because all this so-called "illegal" stuff, like backdating options and spying on reporters? We've all been doing it for years. It's par for the course out here. You think Intel isn't listening to phone calls? You think Larry Ellison doesn't have his ex-CIA pals tapping every board member's phone, and gathering video feeds from reporters' houses? You think the Googletards don't do anything with all that info they gather? You think Hollywood execs are the only ones who hire Anthony Pellicano? Obtain a clue, people. There are billions at stake out here. I'm telling you, it's gonna get ugly out here before this is over.

Genital wart ads are rolling in

Along with the offers to "date singles with STDs." Er, generous offer, but I'm gonna hold off for now. Google is seriously amazing. Or frightening, depending on your point of view. Only hours after posting this and then this the ads for genital wart cures, vaginal speculums, Pap smears and cervical dysplasia are rolling in, taking turns with the Satan ringtones and Satanic screensavers. Whew! Nick Carr, are you paying attention? Anyhoo, since nobody clicks on the damn things we might as well have fun screwing around with them. So dudes, let's go for broke. I almost don't dare to do this. But I'm gonna. It's how the Jobsmeister rolls. That's right, I'm going nuclear.

Have you heard about asbestos? Apparently, if you get exposed to asbestos, or if there's asbestos in your insulation or asbestos in your pipes, you can get something called mesothelioma, which is a kind of cancer from asbestos, which gives you mesothelioma. And, um, apparently there are quite a few gurney-chasing dirtbag lawyers who specialize in mesothelioma patients and fight like rats in a bag for the chance to buy online ads about cancer, mesothelioma, asbestos, and such things. Also, lead paint. And asbestos. And genital warts. Those can give you cancer too. But not mesothelioma, I don't think. Oh well. That should do it.

Raise shields, Mr. Sulu! Attack of the dirtbag lawyers to commence shortly!

Introducing Nicholas Negroponte's new $100 smart phone

Yes, here it is, up and running in the Third World, with a Linux OS, Openwave browser, built-in camera and MP3 player. This dude is calling his sister to see if she got the photos he just uploaded to his blog using a Java applet he wrote himself! Bet those shots look great on her shit-green hundred-dollar laptop with its hi-rez 7-inch screen.

Okay, I'm lying. I stole, er, borrowed this photo from Jonathan Schwartz's blog. I went there hoping to find some explanation of John Doerr's departure, you know, in that whole "naked conversations" tell-the-world-everything blogger style that Jonathan is always raving about. Just look at this post from two months ago, regarding "sunlight":

You can tell I'm a big fan of transparency - that's why I write a blog. ... A very wise man once said, "Sunlight is the best disinfectant" - and in my view, exposing our internals to the outside world also helps us respond to problems more rapidly.

So what up with the Doerr departure? Jonathan hasn't posted anything for three days. Maybe he's busy sending out resumes. Note to Da Vinci Code fans. (Yes, Dvorak, that means you.) Sun has been rumored to be in acquisition talks. Now John Doerr, a board member, departs and gives no good reason. Perhaps he has a conflict of interest. Question: Where else is John Doerr a board member? Nah, that makes no sense at all.

Jonathan, please, you beacon of sunlight, you purveyor of digital disinfectant, tell us what's going on here.

You see, we give it away free, but make up for it in volume

Boy genius Jonathan Schwartz outlines his bold new plan: give hardware away free. This guy has been hitting the open source crack pipe a little too hard, amigos. Oh well. Schmidt hasn't told him this yet, but first move after the merger is we get rid of Schwartz. He can go be a full-time blogger, like Scoble and Gillmor and the rest of those pea-brains.

More on the Apple-Sun merger

So the deal is done, and while the Sun board is flipping out, on our end there was less hassle. I want to go run Disney and GM anyway. I haven't discussed the GM thing publicly yet, but Jerry York is making some phone calls, in the wake of the Bill Ford fiasco. My first project: An all-white electric "iCar" with a battery that craps out in 18 months and can't be replaced. (Prototype shown here.) And a Sun merger gives me a graceful way to settle the options thing with the SEC by paying a fine and stepping down as CEO, which is what those dicks are demanding. Whatever. At least I get to keep the jet. And you know I'll still be running Apple, even if I'm no longer running Apple. Just the way it is. It's my company. Publicly traded? Yeah right. Kiss my ass.

Sumner Redstone just called to fire me

I'm not kidding. The dude is 83 years young and totally losing his marbles. First he canned Tom Cruise. Now he's tossed out Tom Freston, six weeks after saying he wouldn't ever fire Tom Freston. Hello, people close to this guy? Is the resemblance to Ronald Reagan in his later years still not registering with you? Just now -- I'm not kidding -- my new Apple smart phone rang and it was Sumner Redstone and he goes, Steve Jobs? Mr. Steve Jobs? This is Sumner Redstone! You're fired! That's it! You're out! Clean out your desk and leave by noon! I go, Sumner, I don't work for you. I'm at Disney. He starts shouting, Don't give me any lip, bub! You're fired! You hear me? Clean out your desk!

I go Sumner, Are you okay? He goes, Sure I am. I eat my own poop.

Then in the background I hear Shari going, Daddy, what are you doing? Oh Christ almighty. He's got the phone. Daddy, put down the phone. Jesus Christ, who left the fucking phone in his room? Juanita, would you get in here please? Right away? Christ almighty.

Gynecology. Go Fetch, AdSense! Good boy!

Just found this wonderful blog called "All About My Vagina" and borrowed their artwork. It's got really wonderful information about gynecology, Pap smears, and other vagina-related topics, like labial symmetry, avocado vulvas, and links to pix of cute ones. Plus you can buy vag-related T-shirts. Check it out, dudes. It's very cool. Let's all give a cheer: Gynecology, gynecology! Yay!

Okay, AdSense. Bring on the vag ads. I'm begging you.

Satan rules!

Holy crap! One day after posting some Satan stuff per Sergey's instructions, and only minutes after posting the Satan-and-Paris-Hilton wedding announcement, the Satan-related ads are rolling in. Like "Traditional Satanism" and "Satan: A Biography." Google, your algorithms are brilliant. By which I mean brilliant in the sense of a brilliant dog that chases its tail for hours on end. So on to our next ad topic. This time let's make it something FSJ's readers are interested in. Like, um, gynecology. Pap smears, vaginal exams, genital warts. Go, Google, go! Fetch! Good boy!

Dvorak's gonna have a field day with this

Conspiracy fans, start your engines. Why is Dr. Evil leaving the Sun board? We all know that Dr. Evil is pissed at me for the recent remark about his "My Asshole" greentech company. So here's how it goes. Squirrel Boy and Ponytail Man present the merger-with-Apple plan to the Sun board. Doerr says no way is he gonna be involved with El Jobso. Plus he thinks the whole idea is farkakte anyway, there's no synergy. McNealy votes "nay" too and says it's because I've been posting fake pix of him on my blog. He's got them all printed out and hands them around. Like this one and this one and this one and this one.

And my personal favorite, this one from the Pebble Beach locker room.

Big Tooth Man says, I'm sorry, but no way am I gonna work with this guy. Rocky the Squirrel and Peacenik Ponytail Man say look, Steve's been ripping us on his blog too, but we've got to put personal issues aside. Besides, the plan is to push Jobs out and make Schmidt the CEO of the combined company. McNealy says, Then who's gonna run Google? Schmidt says Google will continue to be run by the Church of Scientology as it has been from the start. McNealy grabs Schwartz and pulls his shirt over his head, hockey-fight style, and then tries to swing Schwartz around by his ponytail. Schmidt jumps in like a referee and tells McNealy to sit down, because none of this would even be necessary if McNealy hadn't spent 200 days a year on the golf course and the other 165 obsessing about Microsoft like some crazy Captain Queeg, he's already had his chance and screwed it up, and nobody has ever forgiven him for driving out Zander, just look at Motorola since Zander took over and then look at Sun, enough said. Doerr slams his briefcase shut and says, "I quit and I'm leaving."

The whole mess gets announced at the September 12 press conference. The "Showtime" thing is just a diversion. We'll do all the announcements about new products and movie downloads and then at the end of my seven-hour presentation, just as I'm leaving the stage, I'm gonna say, "Oh, I almost forgot. There's one more thing. We're buying Sun." McNealy bellows from the wings, "Merging. Merging with Sun." Then he comes out and makes some lame jokes about how Microsoft and IBM both suck. Crowd goes wild. Scott leaves early to squeeze in 18 holes and pass out in a golf course locker room again.

Okay, Dvorak, there's the ball, now run with it. Peace out.

It's official: Satan, Paris Hilton to wed

Only kidding, dudes. This one is just here to mess with the AdSense algorithm. Plus, that's a pretty hot picture of Paris. Only way to improve it would be some duct tape over her mouth. But you can't have everything. Still waiting for the Satan ads to start kicking in.

Kind of ironic

Wasn't it just a week or so ago that Businessweek was saying that HP had all the mojo, and Apple was losing momentum? Hmmm. Funny how things go, eh?

You know, in the midst of this HP spy scandal, I'm reminded of something Tom Perkins once told me. Steve, he said, whatever you do, don't ever put a woman on your board of directors. Don't let any women be on your top executive team either, if you can help it. They're treacherous, Steve. Way worse than men. Ten times worse. First they have kids and they're never around. Then they hit menopause. Makes them nuts. Like Linda Blair in the Exorcist.

Well, I took his advice, and that's why you won't see any women on our board. None among our top execs either. That's right. No women, no minorities. And only one crazy person. Well, two, if you count me. We're kind of proud of our record on this.

Just FYI: we do spy on all of these people. My orders.

So Schlender just called

Just for kicks I had my assistant block him a few times. Then I had her pretend to make a mistake and let it slip out that I was in a meeting with a team from Newsweek which I knew would torture him. But finally I patched him through. And he's like, Um, hey, I didn't get my Showtime invitation, was that a mistake or something? I told him, Girlfriend, I told you, you're dead to me. He starts saying he's sorry, it wasn't his decision to pull the cover, it's his asshole editor. I tell him I'm sorry too but we've only got a thousand seats for this event and we can't invite everyone, this one is only for people who are loyal, but maybe he'll get in next time, who knows?

For a long time he's silent. Then he goes, You're gonna show the smart phone, aren't you. I know you are. Damn it, Steve! God damn you! You promised me I could be there for the smart phone. On that weekend in Tahoe, remember? You promised! And I said, Well, you promised I was gonna be on the cover. And then you lost faith and put those MySpace guys on instead. I guess you think they're the cool company now, not old El Jobso. Guess you thought El Jobso was all washed up, over the hill. He goes, That's not true! That's not! I go, And now it's Showtime and El Jobso is the sexiest bitch in town again and you can't come to the party because you blew it. You blew it, Brent. You lost faith in me. I'm sorry. I can't have that with people. I need to trust people. I can't trust people who lose faith when there's some little blip over some stupid options. He goes, I didn't lose faith! I didn't! I've never lost faith in you! In twenty years I've never for a moment stopped loving, er, lost faith in you!

By this point he was crying. Not really sobbing but kind of sniffling. He goes, You know what? You're sick, man. You are. I know you're sitting there laughing at me, you son of a bitch. But you know what, I feel sorry for you. I really do. You know what you're like? You're like one of those twisted spoiled girls on that Super Sweeet Sixteen show.

I go, Wait a minute, I'm like a girl? Who's the one crying into her pink Princess phone? He was still crying when I hung up. Which felt very satisfying, let me tell you. Luckily I taped the whole thing on my iPod and mailed the file to Ive. He says it's hilarious and wants to put it on iTunes as a podcast. Katie, the PR girl, says no way. Party pooper. I told her go get your rifle and get back to your post.

Talk to the hand, Wall Street Journal

Didja see this Jesse What's-His-Name piece in the Journal this morning about how I should stand up and address the options scandal or whatever? First of all there's no scandal. Second of all what do you want me to do? Go rewrite the stupid laws that got us into this mess? Because that's the problem. You get it? The laws. Not us. So go bug Sarbanes and Oxley. They're the guys who caused the mess. Anyhoo here are my favorite quotes:

So what do we do with Steve Jobs? To have his companies caught up in the scandal raises the stakes for everybody. He is more than just a CEO, larger than his industry. Apple arguably has made the greatest cultural contribution of any of the great technology entrepreneurial endeavors that rose up in the late 20th century. Apple's iPods and Pixar's movies have risen to the level of art.

Okay, yes, so far so good. But then we get this:

"The difference between a cult and a religion is one outlasts its founder. At what point do you make decisions that no single individual is above the values of the institution?" Mr. Khurana says. "This blemish on [Apple's] reputation should cause people to pause."

Um, okay, Mr. Nobody Has Ever Heard of You But You're The Only Guy the Journal Could Find to Say Bad Things About Old Steve (On the Record). I will seriously take that under advisement, not. But then there's this:

So far, Mr. Jobs has been largely silent about the scandal, relegating his comments to press-release statements vetted by lawyers and public-relations professionals. That's understandable: Apple is being sued over its options practices, and he doesn't want to make himself more vulnerable. He also might be hesitant, understandably, to identify himself personally with the scandal. His silence is a mistake. This is an opportunity for a great third act in a great career: This is a job for Mr. Jobs.

Dude, please. Let me get out my miniature violin and play along with your whining. Really. First of all doesn't anyone else think the Journal is kinda working this whole options "scandal" a little too hard? Their own editorial page guy says it's all horse shit. But no, these little freaks are gonna keep howling. You can just see them drooling for a Pulitzer. I just love it when these broke-ass bozos who've never made a dime in their lives finally let their petty little resentment show through. Jesse, I'm a friggin bazillionaire. I'm sorry. I know this offends your leftie journalistic sensibilities. I also invented the friggin iPod. Have you heard of it? So tell me, what have you done with your life that entitles you to scold me and tell me how I should run my company? Have you ever run a company? (And no, that little business selling weed in college doesn't count.)

You know what? I'm really sick of the Journal ragging on me. So I had my assistant take this picture of me (above). And here's what I'd like you guys at the Journal to do. Squint real hard, and imagine the two fingers on the right disappearing. Then make the two on the left vanish. Then turn my hand around. Hey look, I'm waving to you!

The suspense is killing you, right?

Oh, I've seen all the stories. Like this one and this one. I've heard all the speculation: an iPod with a wide screen, a device for the living room, a smart phone, movie downloads for ten bucks apiece. I've read all these goofy rumor blogs and analyst reports. You know what? I love it. I am soooo still the boss of this Valley. I am soooo still the only person who can make this whole industry sit around waiting for the chance to hang on every last word I say. What's left? I guess I could run for King of the United Nations or something. But who wants to live in France?

As for what we are gonna unveil next week, all I can tell you is that lots of the stories have been correct, sort of, but nobody has got it completely right. You're all kinda warm, but you're all kinda wrong too. One bit of advice: Think bigger. Imagine the most outrageous, audacious thing we could do. Then double that. Think of something so big, so profound, that people are going to redesign their houses around it. Entire neighborhoods, revamped for this technology.

One thing I can guarantee you: Once again, as we have so many times before, we are going to blow your friggin minds. The way only we can. September 12, 2006. A date that will live in history. Showtime.

Peace out.

Satanic fun with AdSense?

So during our long weekend we were digging through Bonzo's stash bags and I asked Sergey Brin, Dude, I've been using AdSense for a few weeks and all I've made is like twenty bucks. Can that really be right? How much of the money am I getting? He goes, Oh, you're getting almost all of the money. I go, Really? He goes, Um, no. You get almost nothing, sorry, that's how it works, because if we gave all the money to bloggers they'd just be evil with it, whereas if we keep it we can put it to better use, like by promoting free speech in China.

Then I asked him about keywords. Like, the other day I mentioned Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin and suddenly I'm buried in ads for those twats. Then I did the posts about Hans-Olaf and got all these ads about hackers. Sergey informs me that it's just some frigtarded algorithm that tries to guess what you're writing about and target ads to that content. He says you can totally frig with it by putting in frigged up keywords but this pisses off the guys who do the algorithm cause they have to keep tweaking it when people intentionally throw it off. He says the marketing dudes in Google labs do this all the time just to drive the dweebs nuts. I go, You mean like if I mentioned Paris Hilton? Or Satan? Or Paris Hilton and Satan having Satanic sex in the room of Satan worshipper Paris Hilton and her Satanic cult friends? Would I then get all sorts of ads about Satan and Paris Hilton? If I wrote something like Satan-Satan-Satan and Hail Satan and Satan Lives or Satan Rules, would I get all sorts of creepy ads with pentagrams or whatever?

He goes, I dunno, dude, try it and see, just make sure you put it in the title of the item. Also, try publishing it twice, you'll get more effect. Hey, look, what do you think these red pills are? You wanna try some?

Satanic fun with AdSense?

So during our long weekend we were digging through Bonzo's stash bags and I asked Sergey Brin, Dude, I've been using AdSense for a few weeks and all I've made is like twenty bucks. Can that really be right? How much of the money am I getting? He goes, Oh, you're getting almost all of the money. I go, Really? He goes, Um, no. You get almost nothing, sorry, that's how it works, because if we gave all the money to bloggers they'd just be evil with it, whereas if we keep it we can put it to better use, like by promoting free speech in China.

Then I asked him about keywords. Like, the other day I mentioned Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin and suddenly I'm buried in ads for those twats. Then I did the posts about Hans-Olaf and got all these ads about hackers. Sergey informs me that it's just some frigtarded algorithm that tries to guess what you're writing about and target ads to that content. He says you can totally frig with it by putting in frigged up keywords but this pisses off the guys who do the algorithm cause they have to keep tweaking it when people intentionally throw it off. He says the marketing dudes in Google labs do this all the time just to drive the dweebs nuts. I go, You mean like if I mentioned Paris Hilton? Or Satan? Or Paris Hilton and Satan having Satanic sex in the room of Satan worshipper Paris Hilton and her Satanic cult friends? Would I then get all sorts of ads about Satan and Paris Hilton? If I wrote something like Satan-Satan-Satan and Hail Satan and Satan Lives or Satan Rules, would I get all sorts of creepy ads with pentagrams or whatever?

He goes, I dunno, dude, try it and see, just make sure you put it in the title of the item. Also, try publishing it twice, you'll get more effect. Hey, look, what do you think these red pills are? You wanna try some?

Slightly off topic

But this is one of the scariest sites I've ever encountered. Especially since some of our staff appears to be advertising on it. Like "Furr" aka Steve from the OS X QA team, and "Piercdabit" who is totally one of our outside sales reps wearing a wig and sunglasses. (I'm not gonna name him cause he's married.) I will, however, just come out and say that this "Robert" dude is obviously Guy Kawasaki in a wig and fake beard. There's Todd from our cafeteria, which gives me the heebie-jeebies. Finally here's gay Freddy Krueger who has no connection to Apple but I had to include him because he's giving me nightmares.

Another from Hans-Olaf

Steve, Here is another photo which I thought you would like. Though RMS travels without any luggage of any kind, he was on this trip accompanied by his pet iguanas, shown here are two of them, Sir Isaac GNUton and GNUzie Kurtz. (There are four altogether.) I was not aware but these are quite affectionate animals and good company during long hours of hacking and debugging and crafting device drivers, as I was to learn since RMS and his four friends stayed at the home of my friend, where I too was staying. Several of our members will adopt their own iguanas soon after spending time with these fun creatures.

Adventures in hacker-land

Our pal Hog from Free Software Foundation Scandinavia sends this photo with some exciting news:

Dear Steve, We recently are having an honor of a visit from Richard M. Stallman. RMS spent several days with us at our annual meeting in Sweden and was able to attend the induction ceremony of some new members. RMS taught us about an initiation ritual he calls "GNU Communion" which consists of Swedish wafer cookies and a sip of RMS's pee. Shown here are three "gnubies," programmers from IBM, who were taking their first communion. Note the expression of the IBMer on the left. A bit sour perhaps? Note too the solemn look on the face of RMS as if he is saying, Yes, well, if you want to belong to my movement, there is a price to be paid, so drink up. Well the ceremony seemed unorthodox and the IBM guys thought it was a practical joke and even called their boss to find out if they had to do this and they were told, yes, they have to do whatever is asked of them, since their mission is to become accepted by the community. I too thought it might be a prank of some sort, to be honest, because IBM is sending so many of their guys to infiltrate the movement and I believe RMS is skeptical of their intentions and resents so many of them suddenly claiming to have had some kind of religious conversion. But RMS insisted this is not a joke and is very widely practiced in other parts of the Free Software community and that no one can join FSF without passing what he calls "the piss test." So it was quite an honor and a rare treat for our gnubies. Several of them reported recovery from minor ailments in the days following. (One hacker's chronic wrist pain simply disappeared overnight. Another who suffers from headaches has been free of this affliction.) So, we have frozen the remainder of this miraculous healing liquid for future user group meetings. As always RMS was traveling with no luggage or personal effects of any kind. Such an inspiration. Steve, I hope someday you have the good luck to meet RMS as he is truly a great human being, like Gandhi or Miles Davis. Maybe you could use him in one of your ads? Though first you will have to set free all of your code or he won't touch your machine. Love and happy hacking, Hans-Olaf.

It's official: John Dvorak has lost his mind

Either that or he's smoking crack. How else to explain this?

Dvorak, we're not gonna buy Sun. Honest. All this stuff about Andy Bechtolsheim being an investor in Google and friends with Schmidt who once worked at Sun but now has joined the Apple board to arrange a merger so he could become CEO of Apple-Sun with McNealy out of the way -- it's like Michael Moore and Dan Brown had a retarded love child and he's writing a column for Marketwatch. Just stop, man. Really. It's embarrassing.

Dan'l Lewin stabs me in the back

In this story someone sent me just now. Money quote:

"We tend to take the long view. There's a flash of brilliance in the iPod, but what will they do after Steve is gone, when it will be about massive scale?"

Dude, it's bad enough that your name is Dan'l. (Poser!) Worse yet that you sold your soul to the devil and you're working at Microsoft. But if you wanna talk smack, let's talk smack. Zune is a friggin Toshiba Gigabeat with a Microsoft label on it. It's getting hammered before you even release it. And when I think about what we're about to unleash on you guys -- when I look down on my desk, right here, and gaze at the extraordinary beauty of this object -- well, ole Dan'l Boone, I almost feel bad for you.

Of course I feel bad

Like everyone does. It's terrible. But I have to tell you, I've never been able to forgive him for this. Watch the video and you tell me. I was horrified when I saw it. I wrote to this guy and told him, Look, I know English people have a weird sense of humor, and a different sense of what's right and wrong, and I'm not trying to impose my own cultural values on you or whatever. But this is just unacceptable. And I'm not the only one who feels this way. A lot of people are really upset. Never got any response.

Al Gore, Mr. Youth Market

So Bono just called in a panic. Turns out he's the one who got Al Gore set up to appear at those MTV awards, figuring it's a way to get Al out there in front of some kids, loosen him up, freshen up his image. Instead old Al ends up looking like even bigger turd than he actually is, and the show turns out to be the biggest flop in MTV history, according to this article. Money quote:

Last night's show was widely criticized for being dull and lacking the sort of buzz-worthy moments of VMAs past.

Dull? Lacking in buzz? With Al Gore in da house? Hard to believe, right? Like I told Bono, Dude, Al Gore is Mr. Charisma. But maybe they shoulda got Jerry Lewis to star alongside him. And Dean Martin. Or is he dead? I can't remember. Say, how're you doing with that plan for rebuilding Iraq?

Bono says, About as good as your Apple Computer World Peace Summit, boyo, but anyway, look, I know, Al's a dope, so give it a fookin rest, okay? I told him, go out there and tell jokes or something, or at least put on some cool fookin clothes and some earrings and some giant blue sunglasses, and mess up your hair a little bit and don't shave for a couple days, it totally makes people not notice that you're actually a bleedin middle-aged man. Al goes, Look, I'm not going out there dressed like a homeless man, Bono, no disrespect but it's just not me. So I go, Fine, Al, but whatever you do, don't fookin talk about fookin glaciers and all that shite, for Christ's sake! So what does he do? Jaysus he goes out there with his bollocking Powerpoint slides. Guy's got the instincts of fookin house plant. He's out there in his dark suit like a black hole sucking up all the energy in the room. Steve, it's bad, man, it's bad.

I go, Well, at least he didn't start talking about putting warning labels on CDs again and banning hip hop or whatever. Bono goes, Don't laugh, your man's crazy wife is still talkin about that shite, she was backstage saying how she just doesn't get this rap music today, what's wrong with all these black people and why are they so angry, and now there are white people imitating them, my-oh-my-oh-my-oh-dear, and whatever happened to Peter, Paul and Mary and the Kingston Trio. Christ! I'm like, you gotta be fookin kiddin me lady! Peter, Paul and fookin Mary, canyerbelieveit? Jaysus. She's thick as two short planks. If you gave her an enema she'd lose half her fookin IQ, I swear.

He says, Bottom line is, Tipper's gotta go, that's all there is to it, man. Your man knows it, too. She's gotta go. I talked to Soros about it. You know he was involved in the Princess Diana tunnel thing right? Guy knows everyone, believe me. Anyway, man, don't have too much fun in Shanghai, okay? Don't be evil, right? Ha! Put me on speaker so I can say that to Sergey. Hey, Sergey, don't forget to lock up a couple dissidents for me while you're over there. (Sergey rolls eyes, makes hand into loose fist, moves up and down in "jagoff" motion, gives finger to phone, mouths words "friggin Paddies.") Okay, Bono says, don't do nuffin I wouldn't do! Adios, amigos. Peace!

Sergey's actually a cool dude

Just need to mention this. I know I've ripped on Sergey a bit here on this blog. But he still reached out to me with this offer of a long weekend trip. And ya know what? He's actually a cool dude. Sort of reminds me of myself at his age. (If only I'd had his kind of money. Scary.) Just one example: Since his party plane still isn't ready, he's leased the old Led Zeppelin jet at some ridiculous price. To which all I can say is, Wow. I'm sorry, this kid has class. We're pumping nothing but Zep through the sound system, and we've been going all over the plane finding crap the Zep dudes left behind. Like a pair of Robert Plant's girl jeans, and Jimmy Page's bullwhip and handcuffs, and these big duffel bags in a compartment under one of the couches which we think belonged to Bonzo since it's got a box of drum sticks with it. Not gonna say what's in the bags but put it this way, there's enough to fill up a hot tub, and Kate Moss says she's getting on the next flight out of London to meet us in Shanghai. Sergey just got off the phone with her. Looks like no sleep this weekend. Oh well. I'll sleep when I get back to the monastery in Cupertino. Not much going on next week anyway.

Will blog again if possible. Peace out, people.

Hard to reach this weekend

Blogging from the road and might not have great access for the next few days. I'm in Japan with Sergey Brin checking out these new sex robots that some guys from Tokyo University are developing. (As you can see, the early models aren't great -- they go for this punk rock look, a total turnoff for me.) But they're getting better, and basically the deal is for $250,000 they'll make one to spec for you. Sergey wants them to make him a bot that looks like Scarlett Johansson but is a shemale. (I'm not asking any questions.) I've brought over a Mitchell Aidelbaum photo of Bike Helmet Girl and a shot of Veronica Belmont taken from her flickr page. When I showed them the photo of Bike Helmet Girl the Japanese dudes all started panicking and freaking out and talking a mile a minute to each other. Finally the one dude who can speak English says, Jobs-san, my colleagues want to know, please tell us, what is name of company that make this robot? I told them she's not a robot, she's a real girl, she was at a party in San Francisco. Guy goes, No, no, this is not human. This is robot. Very very good likeness, but robot, most certainly. German made, we think. Where you see her? I told them I've never actually met her, just traded email. But I think she lives in San Francisco. The Japanese dudes all have this conference, and then they say to Sergey, Brin-san, we must go to San Francisco and find her, can you take us in your party plane? Brin says sure, no problem, but we're heading to Shanghai for the weekend, but we'll stop and pick you guys up on the way back.

Well, more later. Peace out.