Remember the Simon and Garfunkel tune, “The Sound of Silence”? Yes, it’s available at the iTunes Music Store (iTMS), but it turns out there are nine other songs available for purchase from the iTMS that consist of nothing but silence! Three of the tracks, from “Slum Village”, are labeled as having Explicit Lyrics. What’s the cost for silence? The same as all other songs on the iTMS – 99 cents! Another track, “15 Minutes Silence”, by Deuter, is an “album only purchase”. Why? It’s 16 minutes long.

Yesterday, Apple released the iChat AV 2.1 Public Beta. iChat is an internet messaging application that includes video chat. Previously, you could only video chat with other iChat users, although you could text chat with anyone with an AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) account. The new beta adds compatibility with the new AOL Instant Messenger 5.5 for Windows (XP only), so now you can video chat with millions of people in both the Mac and PC communities. Both iChat and AIM are still not able to communicate with messaging systems from Yahoo and Microsoft.

While you’re remembering, remember Mike Rowe, the Canadian student web designer who caused an international legal stir with his MikeRoweSoft website? He recently settled with the “real” Microsoft, receiving an X Box, Microsoft software training, and a trip to a technology conference. He also put the voluminous legal notice sent to him by Microsoft up for sale on eBay. What was the winning bid? $1037. By the way, he’s keeping a second copy for his personal memoirs.

Looks like some other tech companies are jumping on the G5 bandwagon. The powerful processors, manufactured by IBM and used in Apple’s high end PowerMacs, are reported to be the front-runners for use in Microsoft’s X Box 2 game console, due in the next year or so. Also, Sony just pumped a $325 million investment into IBM’s G5 factory, to produce new “Cell” processors. It is not known what Sony will use the chips for, although a new PlayStation game console is a possibility.

Finally, remember Virginia Tech University’s supercomputer cluster based on out-of-the-box PowerMac G5s that came in third in the recent competition, at a fraction of the cost of the other entrants? Does the number 10.28 teraflops ring a bell? Anyway, Virginia Tech is upgrading its cluster to the recently introduced XServe G5 servers, with dual G5s in each box. More power, less space and heat. Sounds like a good idea.

© 2004 Peter F. Zimowski