Hijinks Inc.

Tag: .Mac

  • Portal 2: Release date announced

    We won’t have to wait too much longer, as Valve announced Wed morning Portal 2’s release date to be February 9th of next year.  Being a huge fan of the original, I’ll definitely be putting this one on my list.  Inherently, I’ll be opting for the PC or Mac version, as a game like Portal, in my humble opinion, is best played with a mouse.  They’re also releasing for PS3 and Xbox 360.

    There’s some awesome new elements they’re rolling out with this one, including Wheatley, a friendly British robot that will accompany you, voiced by Stephen Merchant (writer for both versions of The Office, and also starred in a few episodes of the US version).

    They’ve also added features, among others, like Repulsion and Propulsion Gel, an Excursion Funnel, the Pneumatic Diversity Vent, the Aerial Faith Plate, and a Thermal Discouragement Beam.  For trailers showcasing these features and more, check out Portal’s official teaser site here.

    For the latest news, keep an eye on gameinformer.

  • Clearing up hard drive space on your Mac

    I have a problem: I’m addicted to podcasts. From Diggnation and 1UP Yours, to Car Talk and A Prairie Home Companion, my subscription list covers a wide range of interests, and an even wider space on my hard drive. I have an 80 gig hard drive on my Macbook, and as of an hour ago I had 987MB free. That’s not good folks, that’s not good at all.

    I talked to fellow blogger Aaron about it, and he suggested a few applications that would clear up some space without forcing me to delete any programs or media.

    (more…)

  • .Mac mail service is down

    And the Mac community has already started speculating that this is part of Apple’s efforts to rebrand .Mac…

  • .Me – Apple’s missing link

    Except it’s not.

    It’s a nice thought that the revamp of .Mac will yield a brilliant and usable service to connect everything in your digital life, but the likelihood of that happening just isn’t very high.

    Colin Pape of Seeking Alpha thinks that Mobile Me (or .Me as some are calling it) is going to be the magic bullet for Apple, and it will suddenly tie all their products together. I’m sure that’s what Apple is aiming for, but they’ve neglected .Mac for so long that I’m not sure an overhaul and a new name is going to be enough to breathe life into it.

    On the other hand, some rumors suggest that Apple will be turning .Me over to Google for a portion of it’s revenue. Though with Steve’s ego, I find this hard to believe. It’s a nice idea though, imagine a Google run service that would allow for unlimited email/file storage and instant syncing of your contacts/calendar/photos/email/music from your phone (iPhone or Android) to the web, and your home or office computer.

    While the promise of an easy solution all in one place is nice, why pay for it? Nothing .Mac currently offers is worth the yearly fee, you can easily find free or cheap alternatives to most everything it offers.

    Only time will tell I suppose. I’d be more than happy to be wrong on this, the more innovative products and services Apple launches the better.

    [ In the interest of full disclosure, I currently hold stock in Apple ]

  • .Mac to be renamed Mobile Me?

    Clues in the recent iPhone SDK point to a impedding name change for .Mac, and after further digging the consensus is that its new name will be “Mobile Me”. Okay, kinda lame…

    Hopefully they can make up for their poor naming skills with a revamp of .Mac, maybe some nice upgrades so it doesn’t suck!