From MacWorld San Francisco

Down the Escalator into the MacWorld Show Floor

Down the Escalator into the MacWorld Show Floor

 

It’s been a long day, and I’m typing on ye olde Tibook for what I fear will be one of the last times (the poor metal hulk is in its final days, with a permanent green line on the screen that extends from top to bottom about 3 centimeters from the right edge).I managed once more to make it into the Keynote, albeit barely (no seats left, so I stood with hundreds of others at the back). There must have been the equivalent of the population of a small city in the West Hall of the Moscone Convention Center. It was a little unnerving just getting up and down the series of escalators to the third level where the Keynote was. If we didn’t keep moving, there could have been an ugly pile-up.

The newly announced iPhone looks very impressive, and I’m pleased to see Apple once again pulling the rest of the industry forward. Many people (myself included) would have very different lives if not for the creative energies of this legendary company, now 30 years old. Jobs also announced that Apple Computer was changing the name of the company to simply ‘Apple, Inc.’ That said, I’ve been disappointed to hear that Apple has no new laptop computer for me to replace this one with (I was hoping for something small and light, but it looks like the 15-inch will have to do). They may be losing the Computer from the name, but they’ll keep making their former namesake.
Haven’t seen as many people that I know as usual. That may be because I’ve been spending most of the first 2 days in a class on administering an OS X Server.

So You Want to Vote to Change the Massachusetts Constitution?

Back in Boston, Governor-elect Deval Patrick this morning called on legislators to skip taking a vote on an amendment that could ban gay marriages in Massachusetts.

“I believe that adults should be free to choose whom they wish to love and to marry,” Mr. Patrick said. “… Never in the long history of our model Constitution have we used the initiative petition to restrict freedom. We ought not start now.”

Nevertheless, a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage survived a second vote in the afternoon afternoon after 62 lawmakers moved to advance the initiative to the next legislative session, ensuring that the battle over same-sex weddings will continue for at least another year.

A friend of mine back in Boston, Michael Femia, has a great blog called Bunko Squad. Today he masterfully skewered the political discourse in a Poll of his own that suggests:

If there is a public vote on same-sex marriage, what should we vote on next?

__ Banning Divorce

__ 3-Child-Per-Couple Minimum

__ Black People Eating At Lunch Counters

__ Women Need Husband’s Permission to Drive

__ Abolish Child Labor Laws Down to Age 4

__ End Tax Exemption for Politically-Active Religion

Good one, Michael.