From Apple Gazette comes iRing which sounds handy for those who are into ringtones. I’m not, heck I don’t even have a cell phone as of this writing, but I was thinking that when I do get back into the mobile phone game I might want to revisit something like this.
TechMixer describes the iRing:
An iphone ringtone creator application that automated converting AAC files into ringtones for the iPhone.
The Mac blog Macenstein has a subscriber magnet with its Mac Chick of the month pictorial with this month featuring Mandy Lynn.
Subscribed.
iPodfolder (Freeware, Mac or Windows):
Backup your iPod Music to a folder on your Mac or a folder on another iPod.
LiquidCD is a freeware for burning CDs and DVDs built for Mac OS X. But LiquidCD is more than a burning software and has useful built-in features.
I’ve yet to try burning a CD on the Mac, so holding onto this one to check out when that day comes. You mean the Mac doesn’t already come with some sort of built-in CD burning software?
In an interview with the Guardian Sling Media CEO, Blake Krikorian gives this Mac nugget:
Yes, we will support every device we possibly can [laughs]. Right now we support Windows and we’re releasing the beta of the Mac client this week for the Slingplayer worldwide. Both of those clients are free; you can download them and install them on as many PCs or Macs as you want.
Xbox 360 gamers might want to check out the Desktop Stats Viewer v1.1 widget:
This widget by default, shows the most recent game in the upper right, however, if you hover over the images on the bottom, It will display the specifics of the game you are hovering over, in that container.
This Torus Trooper game looks a lot like Tempest, one of my favorite old school games.
Just saw this ad (thanks Digg) for Internet Explorer 5.0 for the Mac from back in 2000. Click the picture below to view. 
I got a chuckle out of it. ZipIE?!
I just went back through all of 2005 at Version Tracker and picked out games that looked interesting. I only downloaded and played two of these.
1. l1neum 1.2 - a Qix clone, nice graphics. Downloaded and played.
2. Rubik - an unofficial Rubik’s Cube game
3. 4-World Planet - Text based adventure
4. Wire Hang Redux
5. Dungeons of Omaz - a curious game based on sound only, no pictures, text or video.
6. A legal good time 1.01 - odd name for a picture scrambling game
7. MacMame
8. Marbol 1.0 - puzzler
9. ishizume 1.1 - Klax clone. Downloaded and played.
10. SuperTux 0.1.3 - platform adventure inspired by Super Mario
11. Argonaut 2149 1.1.1 - Asteroids-like shooter
12. DCSquares 2.0.1
13. Zombies 1.0.1
14. Quinn 3.0 - Tetris clone
15. First Star Online 2 v1.2 - MMORPG
16. Spinvaders 1.0.0 - Space Invaders clone
17. Virus Out 1.0 - satirical game where you search for fake viruses on your system. Not real files are harmed, this is just a game.
18. Chemical Bonds 1.02 - puzzle
19. rRootage 0.23.1 - shooter
20. Christmas Crisis 1.0.1 - it’s seasonal mixing in a holiday game
Have any other cool Mac freeware games to share?
Create and share your own comics with Comic Life which is published by freeverse. It’s as easy as dragging, dropping, selecting and typing. It took me 30 minutes to create the comic shown below with zero prior experience:
I saw Comic Life at the local Megastore and was surprised to see the following testimonial as the top of box blurb: “Runs well, looks amazing, and does something so incredibly unique.” - Chris Pirillo, lockergnome.com. How about that Chris, you are a box star?!
I laid down the $29.99 (it’s only $24.99 if you buy from their website, I discovered later — doh) and took it home planning to install and check out when I had a few minutes.
After carefully knifing open the contents — the comic makes it look like this is some kind of struggle, but thats all in good fun — I removed the CD and stuck it into the eMac drive. Just had to drag the folder over to the desktop and then click on the CL icon to enter in the Comic Life code (found on the front of the instruction manual.
From there it’s a matter of choosing a comic template, dragging and dropping pictures from iPhoto or elsewhere on your Mac, adding captions and text, modifying the design and voila, you’ll have a comic created. The last step is exporting to a format that can be shared with others. It can be exported as an HTML document, images, directly to a .Mac account or even as a quicktime movie.
Any application as involved as this that lets a complete newcomer create something cool in 30 minutes or less is better than waiting for pizza to arrive.
Macworld gave this 4 1/2 mice. This is a well designed and implemented application, especially for creative types (my mind is whirring with ideas!). Plasq created Comic Life [official plasq RSS feed].
Haven’t put up any affiliate links or advertisements on this blog yet, but my long term plan has been to link to the Apple store or iTunes if they would accept this blog into their affiliate program. Recently I applied and am happy to report that Friday I received the email from Apple approving Mac Mode!
Apple Store
iTunes Music Store
Now for the handful of readers this blog has reaching to unsubscribe, don’t worry, this isn’t going to fill up with ads. Content comes first in my book and I prefer to review things that I’ve actually bought with my own hard earned money and if others like my personal review, why not put up an affiliate link to the product? I will mark the text links with the word “affiliate” so it’s clear what’s going on.
It has been a year of my Mac ownership and this blog and there hasn’t been a single ad here, so I wouldn’t worry about content changing too much, although I’m hoping in my second year of Mac ownership to post more (shouldn’t be difficult goal to attain). Also, I’m only planning at this time to show Mac-related advertising, so it should all be of interest to fellow Mac-heads.
This reminds me that I really need to write a post outlining the history of my first year as a Mac owner.
The rumours about a new iPod and iTunes combo with video have been circulating for awhile but today Steve Jobs finally made it official. The new iPod, named just that: The iPod will start shipping next week. I’ll try to get back with some screenshots and more information after I’ve checked it out further.
Over at Things That … Make You Go Hmm I just reviewed the Griffin radioSHARK for the Mac/PC. I have several Mac screenshots. One thing I learned that isn’t in my review (yet, I may update later) is that once you get it, go download the newest software from the Griffin website because even though it supposedly makes a check for the newest version, that built-in feature didn’t work right for me.
Also, they said it would be a two to three week wait for shipping, but it came within a few days of ordering.
The stories here and there about the doom and gloom in the online music downloading arena seems to be bogus at Apple anyway. Apple sees 64 percent growth in music downloads | MacMinute News:
Jobs then displayed the following numbers, noting that the iTunes Music Store has had 64 percent growth in the last five months.Songs sold:
May - 10,830,537
June - 12,331,133
July - 15,103,099
Aug. - 15,665,890
Sept. - 16,229,955
Oct. - 17,726,830 (projected)