More in an irregularly occurring series...This morning, Apple quietly upgraded their new MacBook Pro laptops, claiming the machines are up to forty percent faster than the previous version. While in previous years, the mere mention of a potential product release would have had the Macosphere abuzz, this is taken in stride. My PowerBook G4 is doing great at home, and I haven't pushed for an upgrade at the office yet...
As expected, the greater amount of buzz around Apple is instead around their digital devices. Wired has a great, in depth look at the iPod's birth and how it was initially perceived, including a first-person look at how Bill Gates took in the device the day after its debut. Forbes also chimes in on "Why Apple Won". Meanwhile, MacNN is looking forward to how the much-anticipated iPhone and iTV are going to further accelerate Mac growth.
But Apple's resurgence isn't the only concern Microsoft has to face right now. As applications become more Web browser-centric, led by Web 2.0 pioneers and Google, the Redmond monolith is losing its grip on the consumer. On Malik, contributing to Business 2.0, despite going independent, says that while you've heard this story before, it's really happening.
Speaking of online apps, the one making the most buzz this morning, is of course, Google. Google released a new custom search engine through Google Coop, where webmasters can host Google search engine code on their own sites, and drive search results internally, without buying expensive custom hosted software. We're definitely going to give it a look here and at the office, to see if it can save us a few grand a year.