SteveJamieson.com

We’ve probably all heard the recent press about some audiologists alerting the world that listening to your iPod (or any other portable music player, for that matter) too loud for too long will cause hearing loss. Now, someone is suing Apple because they don’t put warnings on the iPod about this fact.

But wait a minute… “Patterson does not know if the device has damaged his hearing, said his attorney…”

So… if he hasn’t actually experienced hearing loss, how does he have legal standing in this matter?

Oh… because the iPod could be turned up by the user to a potentially dangerous volume it’s somehow “defective”, and therefore he is entitled to a iPod that maxes out at an undisputedly safe volume. Riiiiiight…

Four words: Boot to the Head.

Just when you thought the recording industry had sunk as low as they could in their “fight against piracy”, they do something even more asinine. This time they’ve taken down pearLyrics, a program that searches the internet for the lyrics of the song currently playing in iTunes and can then add the results to the lyrics ID3 tag in the music file. Somehow this violates copyright law? I’m with the Electronic Frontier Foundation—that argument has no legal leg to stand on.

I’ve been using pearLyrics for months now. I love it, and I will continue to use it. When will the recording industry learn that this sort of crap only makes people like me seriously pissed off at them and less likely to buy their wares.

For a variety of reasons, iTunes has not handled classical music well enough for many individuals. This document provides a step-by-step guide to applying new features that can be used to make iTunes handle classical music more satisfactorily.

Oooooo… Front Row

I think it’s official that Front Row—Apple’s new media center app that’s bundled exclusively with the new iMac (that I missed by a month)—is a hit. Mac users everywhere want it. Now the question is whether Apple will answer the demand by making it available to all Mac users. Will it show up in Mac OS X 10.4.3? iLife 2006? I hope so.

New iMac | New iPod

It was fun being on top while it lasted. Kudos to Jed for being the first to make fun of my now obsolete technology with the above image.