The search engine maker/advertising kingpin/cloud computing proponent/buzzword factory announced today that it will be porting its Gadgets program to the Mac. Gadgets are little tiny apps that display one snippet of information, such as the current temperature or a list of sports scores.

Mac users already know these sort of apps as "Widgets." They can be downloaded from Apple's website and run with Dashboard.

Fortunately, the Google Gadgets are also going to run on Dashboard, so those of you that can't find what you're looking for in the thousands of useless Dashboard widgets can now sift through the thousands of useless Google Gadgets.

The BBC claims that its reporters were told by salespeople that if the phone we stolen, users would be forced to get an entirely new contract.

In reality, you would only be on the hook for a new iPhone, as your account data can easilly be transfered to a new phone.

Carphone Warehouse claims that this was an isolated incident and is not indicative of iPhones are actually being sold in its stores. The BBC begs to differ, noting that salespeople in three of the five stores it visited all tried to pull the same trick.

This could have been avoided if the policies covered replacement of hacked phones that get bricked by firmware updates. Those bad boys would sell like hotcakes.

Apple is not saying if or when this will be added to the iPhone (the company has a policy of not commenting on upcoming products or features) but it would seem to be a safe bet, unless Apple is already working on a similar tool of its own.

My Location is already running on Blackberry, Symbian, and Windows Mobile devices. Given that Google is really the only outside party Apple has fully embraced as an iPhone software developer, access and trust would appear to be a non-issue. It may not be long before one of the main gripes about the iPhone gets settled.

Macworld is reporting that not only did O2 activate a measly 26,500 so far, but those that did activate are having signal issues.

Given how widely iPhone speculation has varied thus far, and how inaccurate much of it has proven to be, you can take these reports with a grain of salt. Still, these sort of rumblings have to worry Apple a bit, considering how tough the European market can be.

The company is planning a special online Apple Store event under the banner "Ready. Set. Shop." Over the course of the day, users will be offered free shipping on select items. Apple wouldn't say which, but has promised the offers will include iPods, iPhones, and Macs.

I'm sure site traffic will be heavy, but its still better than getting kicked in the groin by a housewife while fighting over the last Scooby Doo cutlery set...

This will also supposedly disable the visual voicemail functionality from the iPhone as well, so if you're one of those Apple ad types who thinks that visual voicemail ranks just above penicillin on the list of mankind's greatest scientific breakthroughs, you'll want to avoid this.

In fact, unless you're one of the many who are already bound to an iPhone contract, this doesn't seem to be that great of a deal, unless your current phone plan costs $40 a month for 450 daytime minutes (and 5,000 night and weekend minutes).

The rest of us can just keep our current phone service and get an iPod touch that does everything but make calls for $100 less and no monthly fees.

Apple already has most of the pieces in place for a system far superior to Amazon with the iPhone/iPod Touch and the wireless iTunes store: Both devices have wireless internet capabilities, both run OS X software that could be easily updated with Apple's existing PDF reader. The touch-scroll and landscape features lend themselves very well to eBook formats. Furthermore, Apple already has a payment system in place with the iTunes store.  Subscription fees for blogs could also be done away with by integrating RSS support from Safari, and there wouldn't be any need for additional data transfer fees.

If Apple were to cut a deal with the publishers to put books on the iTunes store for a similar or cheaper price than Amazon and then bundle a mobile store feature into the iPhone/Touch, it could be game over for the Kindle almost overnight.

Would you pay $399 for Kindle when, for the same price, you can get a smartphone and video iPod that also delivers eBook subscriptions and lets you view blogs free of charge? It's no contest.

If this isn't already in the works, perhaps it should be. If for no other reason, it would be nice revenge for the NBC fiasco.

Apple's PR is notorious amongst journalists for being difficult to reach and even more difficult to work with. Whereas the mission for most PR staffs is to get information out to the press about the company, Apple's press team is more concerned about making sure the media gets as little exposure to the company as possible.  When Apple does come out into public, it's under circumstances so tightly controlled, you almost wonder if Barry Bonds is about to hold a press conference.

Depending on your point of view, Apple PR is either brilliantly effective or needlessly hostile. They've built up a fair amount of resentment, which could be problematic if the iPhone/iPod synergy comes to an end and they have to actually pitch their products again.

I don't remember Microsoft PR ever doing this...
 

This wasn't lost on Carmack, who also noted "Their strategy seems to be working just fine from a business standpoint, so I'm not going to second guess them and tell them they're being fools or idiots for not focusing on this."

Perhaps Carmack remembers what happened the last time someone tried to create a mobile phone for gamers.

The suit had been brought forth by the New York City Employees Retirement System, who own shares in Apple stock. They claim that Apple's back-dating row and the $84m revenue cut that came with it caused them to lose money.

Unfortunately, in order to sue someone for damages, you have to actually have incurred some sort
of loss. The judged took this into account when looking at Apple's stock performance, and promptly dismissed the suit, noting that there was no reason to believe that the back-dating scandal had any sort of negative impact on Apple's stock price.

Tiger users will be receiving an update as well, and it's a big'un. 39 security fixes and roughly 18 compatibility and stability patches.

Windows users aren't getting out of the patching party either. Apple has updated the Windows Safari beta with a few security and stability fixes.

As usual, you can score any of these updates via Software Update or though the Apple download site.

If the Cupertino marketing machine is to be believed, the great thing about the iPhone is that it performs most of the functions you'd expect from a UMPC, short of word processing. And for that, Apple is more than happy to sell you a low-end Macbook.

Apple has to see that as mobile handsets get smarter and laptops get lighter and cheaper, the already-small market for UMPCs is shrinking.

The jailbreak site worked by exploiting a vulnerability in the iPhone's ability to handle TIFF files. The site used the vulnerability to deliver and execute the jailbreaking software onto the iPhone without the user having to do a thing.

Because this is the same way in which some malware attacks are carried out, this was a fairly big concern. The team behind the hack realized this, and thus included a patch that was installed after the jailbreak was completed.

Now, Apple has followed suit and fixed the vulnerability in the 1.1.2 iPhone and iPod Touch firmware update, meaning that the site-based jailbreak no longer works.

Keep in mind, this doesn't prevent the actual jailbreak, it just means that you will have to get off your lazy butt and run the jailbreak software yourself.

That is, until the developers find another hole...

When iPhone users would roam outside of the US, data usage became a major headache. The constant flow of data transfers would be classified as transfers made while roaming, and thus would be charged a premium. This lead to several cases of users ending up with heart-stopping phone bills for doing little more than leaving their iPhone on during a vacation.

In hopes of stopping these nightmare bills, AT&T has introduced a new data plan for travel. Users can pay an extra $60 a month to receive 50MB worth of data transfers in any of 29 countries. You have to call in advance, and in some cases this can double your normal monthly bill, but it's still better than getting hit up for a couple grand in mobile charges at the end of your dream trip.

If the UK launch is anything like the US launch, you'll actually be better off going to Carphone Warehouse than the Apple store. In San Francisco, lines outside the Apple store wrapped around the block, while there were maybe 50 people outside the AT&T outlet. If you want to get an iPhone and can live without the Apple ra-ra display, Carphone Warehouse could be the way to go.

Just how much of a threat this is remains debatable. Mac defenders will also note that it is a social engineering trojan and not a remote exploit, meaning that the user has to deliberately download and accept the trojan.

It also has not been lighting up the security honeypots. When the news first broke this morning, research teams from McAfee, Symantec, and Trend Micro had yet to find a copy of the trojan in the wild. Since then, both McAfee and Sunbelt Software have found sites serving the trojan, but there are still few actual infections being reported.

The real story, however, goes well beyond this particular trojan. It may signal a new change in the attitudes malware authors have towards OS X. It has long been believed that malware authors simply do not see OS X as being worthwhile to attack. If this trojan succeeds, things may change.

So, let's make sure it doesn't. Educate your friends and family on safe practices. Don't download strange files from unknown sites, and if you do get infected, follow these steps.