At first Glance, the app appears to be more than it is. While the store has a great sidebar, I found the interface a bit sluggish (it’s obviously loading all of the app data from the net), and sometimes unresponsive when I tried browse into an app’s info page. The navigation arrows normally found at the top of apps, were kicked to the bottom (likely because of the giant branded awning), and took a few minutes to get used to clicking at the bottom.

The Bodega interface is slick, except for the exceptionally tacky awning (which you can’t get rid of unfortunately).

I perused the categories, surprised to find a wide spread of apps I hadn’t come across. However I was extremely disappointed to find out that Bodega isn’t really a store, but more of an app aggregator. There’s no built-in payment system that we’ve associated with the iPhone App Store. Instead of being brought through to a payment page, I was crushed to see a little tiny browser pop out of the top, and open the developers site.

Bodega merely links you to the developers website to use their custom payment system

Why use Bodega then instead of simply going to the developers site? Well Bodega does help you save your receipt and license inside the app, but it also works as an update manager. If you have software installed that’s also in the Bodega store, it will show up in an Application list with any available updates. There are also rating and review features similar to Apple’s App Store, which allow users to rate and give feedback on apps.

This is a great first start, but Bodega isn’t the true app store that you would expect it to be. On the Bodega website IDFusion touts the direct-from-developer system as a feature:

“Bodega lets you buy direct from developers, so you’re certain to get the lowest price while making sure your software dollars end up in the pockets of hard-working programmers, not middlemen.”

However, this complicates the purchase process. It’s like going to a big retail store, and being told you have to drive across town to pay for a product.

Hopefully in Bodega 2, or other app stores, we’ll get the one-stop experience we’ve grown accustomed to in Apple’s App Store.

]]> http://macapper.com/2009/08/05/news-new-app-store-on-the-block/feed/ 2 http://macapper.com/2009/07/15/baseline-1-5-released/ http://macapper.com/2009/07/15/baseline-1-5-released/#comments Wed, 15 Jul 2009 10:00:08 +0000 Joe Turner http://macapper.com/?p=8928 Disk space is a very important issue for all. A lot of us basically ‘live’ on our computers, so we don’t want to see that we have such low disk space that we can’t do anything. Well, with bigger hard drives, this is less of an issue, but you would still like to know if there was some space you could get back, wouldn’t you? A year ago we talked about an app called Baseline that did exactly that. A major upgrade, 1.5, has just been released, bringing in one major feature: Multiple File Deletion.

In previous versions of Baseline, you had to delete files separately, which could be a tedious process when freeing up space. Now, Baseline allows you to select and delete multiple files at a time, making it much easier to get rid of large files. No more select and delete, select and delete… This is a pretty important feature though, but at least it now is in Baseline’s feature-set.

Along with that, Baseline also now supports multiple levels of undo, meaning you can easy undo many deletions. Again, this seems like it maybe should have already been there, because it’s very important in preventing data loss. Nonetheless, it is there now.

Another major-ish new feature is Baseline’s use of zip to compress files. This means, when you select some files, and go to File>Compress, these files will be put into a zip archive: The preferred archive type.

Along with this new features are stability fixes and minor memory fixes. I had never noticed memory issues with Baseline before, so it seems it was very minor. It may have also speed up the time it takes to scan your hard drive, which was already very fast.

As always, you can download a free 14-day trial from it’s site, and buy it for $20.00. Now that OmniDiskSweeper is free (which was one of Baseline’s major competitors), you may want to check it out too. It has a few less features, but it is also free. So, if you don’t need some of Baseline’s features, it may be perfect for you.

Please excuse the missing images, we are having some technical issues and are currently working to sort them out. We appreciate you stopping by and hope to see you again!

From all of us here at MacApper, have a happy and prosperous New Year!

We also have instated a strict integrity policy for reviews and have a strict boundary between ad sales and the reviewers which is described in detail in our new review policy. We strive to provide reviews the Mac community can rely on and trust. In addition to reviews, we will also be covering news on the Mac software front. As a part of our newly relaunched site, we have cleaned up the forums (to be re-skinned in the near future) and added a section for developers and development talk. We hope to see all of you active in the comments and the forums.

Some plans we have for the near future include reviews of iPhone apps as well as the reintroduction of the MacApper Podcast. The podcast will be a weekly discussion between our editors about our favorite stories of the week as well as features on the Mac community and interviews with developers.

Look forward to this and more as we continue to improve MacApper. With you, we hope to make MacApper the premier destination for Mac and iPhone application reviews.

We are always looking for writers enthusiastic about OS X applications and similar Apple based geekery. We are currently seeking highly motivated individuals to contribute Mac related articles on a weekly basis. Qualified individuals will be asked to contribute articles and reviews, collaborate with colleagues, and help coordination of weekly columns and articles. We are looking for expert knowledge of OS X and the Mac platform and the ability to write engagingly about our subject matter.

Writers at MacApper are paid for their efforts. We currently pay between $6 – $12 for quality articles (depending on your seniority), with bonuses given out every month for outstanding work.

For those interested please submit a writing sample including a sample review article as well as a shorter news piece along with a personal note about how you can contribute here. You can use our contact page or email us directly at macapper [AT] gmail.com.

There are 6 apps that are a part of the AppStoreGems site right now, from 5 developers. The apps are as follows:

1. Sketches
2. Where To?
3. Groceries
4. FileMagnet
5. Kineo
6. Pennies

Each developer is donating their revenue to a different charity, from the following list:

• Prevent Cancer Foundation
• UNICEF
• Oxfam International
• Teach for America
• American Humane

John Casasanta posted a blog post to the taptaptap website detailing this event, and the AppStoreGems website. Personally, I think it is great when developers get together and hold an event like this. The developers get exposure for their application, and charities benefit in the process.

We are always looking for writers enthusiastic about OS X applications and similar Apple based geekery. We are currently seeking highly motivated individuals to contribute Mac related articles on a weekly basis. Qualified individuals will be asked to contribute articles and reviews, collaborate with colleagues, and help coordination of weekly columns and articles. We are looking for expert knowledge of OS X and the Mac platform and the ability to write engagingly about our subject matter.

Writers at MacApper are paid for their efforts. We currently pay between $6 – $12 for quality articles (depending on your seniority), with bonuses given out every month for outstanding work. Contributors also have the opportunity to sample some great Mac related products, and sometimes get some free schwag in the process.

For those interested please submit a sample of an article you would write for us along with a personal note about how you can contribute here. You can use our contact page or email us directly at macapper [AT] gmail.com.

You can buy this great bundle until April 29th, however, remember that only the first 3,500 bundles sold get WhatSize!

MacApper is a promotional partner with MacUpdate. Bundle sales through our link benefit MacApper financially, and provides a way for readers to directly support this site.

If you are looking for a way to establish yourself as a tech writer, learn about group publishing, or just interested in being part of a great team of passionate Mac fans, this could be for you.

Writers at MacApper are paid for their efforts. After being published here, your article is awarded a pay grade based on quality, creativity, and popularity. Payouts happen every 2 weeks, and currently we pay between $5 – $10 for articles, with at least $100 in bonuses given out every month for outstanding work. Contributors also have the opportunity to sample some great Mac related products, and sometimes get some free schwag in the process.

Fore more information you should check out our post on Pro Blogger.

For those interested please submit writing samples along with a personal note about how you can contribute here. You can use our contact page or email us directly at macapper [AT] gmail.com.

I decided to hit Koh Tao, this year, a really great island in southern Thailand, until the end of this month. I know some of the other guys are tied up with family, vacations, and other merry making. I can’t speak for all of the writers here but I would expect blogging here at MacApper to slow down until the holidays are over, as we all can use a well deserved break.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2008 everyone! Keep it safe.

The industry is changing. People now find pirating music, movies, and software the norm. Many can’t imagine paying a cent for a piece of software. How is a developer to make money in an industry like this? An industry where torrenting and P2P are so normal that it almost feels right. They can’t go on selling software the same as they have before. There has to be a different way. Sure, buying software in a box works well for Final Cut Studio, Adobe CS3, and iLife. But what about smaller applications like Rapidweaver and TextMate and Delicious Library and Disco? How are they to attract new customers?

Look around you this Christmas season. Look at all the Mac bundles and discounts. They are everywhere you look. On blogs. On websites. In ads. The bundles attract you with a low price (around the $50 range), and give you a bunch of applications. Some that you want, and others you’ve never heard of. But the bundles give the developers exposure, and next time the app gets updated, the customer may pay for an upgrade. It seems to works well for everybody – the consumer and the developer. The consumer gets a bundle of new Mac apps and saves a ton of money, while the developers get their apps into the hands of their customers.

The key to this system is in the way these apps are marketed. Let’s take a look at some of the bundles and discounts that are around this holiday season.

The MacUpdate bundle is new this year, and is comprised of seven applications valuing over $230. You can have all of these apps for $49 – almost an 80% savings. And as more people buy this bundle, even more apps will be unlocked, and included in the bundle for free. The apps aren’t all small apps. The MacUpdate bundle includes ForkLift, RapidWeaver, Xslimmer, PulpMotion, and even XMIND 2008 Pro which retails for $300! However, there are also some apps that you may have never never heard of. After you download them and try them out, you may love them and swear by them, or never use them again. Nonetheless, it give these developers the opportunity to get their apps into your hands, and then let the apps speak for themselves. Better hurry though, the bundle ends December 11th.

MacSanta is not new to the discounted apps scene. They started last year, and were very successful in capturing the Mac community’s attention. The idea behind MacSanta, was to get a bunch of developers together, and give consumers 10%-20% savings on their apps. This way, all the money goes directly to the developers. Each day, they feature different apps that you can buy with a coupon code and save 20% on. They offer a wide variety of apps from many different developers. The deals are only featured for one day however, but if you miss the day, you can still get the apps with a 10% discount until December 24th. Already, I have discovered many new applications that hadn’t heard of by visiting their site every day.

Givegoodfood2yourmac is a very interesting new idea put together by a bunch of European Mac developers at WWDC07. The idea behind it, is that you should ”feed” good apps to your Mac. The website allows you to make a “custom menu” of apps that you want to buy from a list of developers. This is actually one of the only bundles that lets you choose what apps you wish to buy. The more apps you put on your “menu”, the more money you save, as the discount increases. You can save anywhere from 30% to a whopping 70% off your meal, and you get to choose the apps you want. But again, like the other bundles, this will only last for a few more days.

Macheist is really the idea that started this whole movement of offering apps for a discounted price, or even for free, in order to attract mac users to shareware apps. Although it has received a lot of criticism, its success speaks for itself. Last year, they sold over 16 000 bundles generating them over $800 000 in revenue. They were able to pay the developers, donate $200 000 to charity, and still pay themselves. The consumers got a great deal on software, and got a lot of entertainment out of it. To this day, I still buy software from developers that I had first heard of from Macheist. The idea behind Macheist is to have heists and puzzles that the members must accomplish by scavenging the internet. It is challenging and mind-bending, but as a reward for completing the heists, the members get free applications from developers. Why would developers give away free apps? Because they know that their apps are good enough, that the users will love them and come back time and time again to pay for upgrades. As Erica over at TUAW notes, Macheist II has just launched, and will be going on throughout this Christmas season, leading up to the final bundle that will be sold starting January 9th, 2008.

I think the entire Mac development market is changing. It is no longer good enough to make a good app. Developers (except for maybe Panic) must learn to let go a little, and market their apps. Participate in bundles, giveaways, and heists. Plug their apps on websites and blogs. Get their apps into the hands of consumers. I think this year is the beginning of a revolution in the Mac market – both for consumers and developers. Developers are realizing that there is more they can do to promote their apps, and get them into the hands of consumers, while consumers are finally getting used to paying for good quality Mac shareware.

What do you think? Do these bundles and discounts encourage you to buy apps and support developers? Or does it have the opposite effect?

So without further adieu: the 2007 Edition of MacApper’s Staff Picks.

Taylor Sternberg
Perian – Whenever I am helping someone set up their computer, I always go to Perian first. It is the “Swiss Army Knife for Quicktime”, which means that it installs additional codecs. More codecs = more videos are compatable with Quicktime.

Adium – This is another app that I adore. It could be considered the Firefox of Instant Messaging applications (although that could change), with plugins and customization galore.

Quicksilver – Move over Spotlight! This is the best way to search for items on the Mac (even with the improved Leopard Spotlight). Although I have not yet unleashed its true power, it still remains my favorite application. I always feel silly when I try to invoke it on another person’s computer.

Miles Evans
Coda – Coda by Panic has changed the way I work on my web based projects and significantly increased my productivity.  I can’t say enough about this app, if you do any webdev at all just buy it and thank me later.

kisMac – No l33t h4×0r’s Mac is complete without a packet sniffing and WEP cracking tool like kisMac. Also check out Nmap.

Keynote – Of all the Apple apps, keynote is likely my favorite. I do a few presentations per year and keynote makes me look way more professional than I truly am. 10 stars!

Steven Owens
Adium – Has many more features than iChat and allows me to utilize multiple IM protocols.

TextMate – The ultimate text editor for any application. Literally supports every type of syntax highlighting out there. Very extendable with plugins.

NewsFire – Allows me to get all my RSS feeds in one place. Interface is intuitive and easy on the eyes.

Will Holmes
NewsFire – The best RSS Reader? It’s really well designed and easy to use.

Pages – It’s cheaper than Microsoft Word and if people gave it a chance I know they’d love it.

Quinn – It’s a really fun tetris style game. What more can you say!

Victor Johnson
NetNewsWire – Simplistic interface, offers just enough features without bloating the interface and confusing the end-user.

Aperture – Combines two very important things: Professional image editing and image organization. I used to have to resort to using both Photoshop and iPhoto, but now I am down to one application.

Mail.app – The one application that is never closed on my Mac. It plays well with IMAP as well as .Mac rules and mailbox syncing.

Alec Feld
Awaken – I would be out of school if it wasn’t for Awaken. This trusty little tool wakes me up everyday to my music choice, and acts as a full function alarm clock. The Apple Remote functions as a sleep/snooze controller, and the full screen mode is perfect for glancing at the time when waking up. Awaken is a great app from Jerry Brace at Embraceware. Jerry’s always working hard to improve the app and listen to customers, and his work shows in the app.

Remote Buddy – This app is perfect for those lazy days or weekends. With Remote Buddy, I can effortlessly navigate and control my Mac from my sofa. Need to launch a video? With Remote Buddy, it’s no problem. Navigate through it’s amazingly organized menu, find the app you want to launch, and choose the file. Remote Buddy supports a bunch of apps, and is bound to support more in the future.

1Passwd – Sometimes, filling out login forms or order forms can be tedious. With 1Passwd, forms are filled in a click. 1Passwd securely saves all of your login information for various sites, and even saves identity forms, great for quickly completing orders. To fill in a form, click the 1Passwd button in your browser, and the form is instantly filled. This app is a true timesaver, and is incredibly helpful.

Van Lam
Mozy – Free automatic online backup. I’m no cryptologist, but it seems pretty secure to me. The interface for scheduling and retrieving backups is easy and intuitive as well. It’s free for 2 GBs, or you can pay a mere 5 clams a month for unlimited storage.

Pzizz – It may seem like a silly idea to pay for sounds waves crashing on a beach and weird ambient tones, but I’ve found that this app actually works. I now sleep a total of four hours a night, up from 2 hours. Lovely.

Nocturne – A night vision mode for your mac . It does everything OS X’s built in Cmd+Option+Ctrl 8 does, in addition to shadow & desktop background removal, and color correction. For the hacker personality, obviously.

Darcy Fitzpatrick
Final Cut Pro – There are other major Non-Linear Editing applications on the Mac that many Apple zealots may not be aware of, like Adobe Premiere Pro and Avid, but Final Cut Pro schools them irregardless of where your loyalties may lie.

Celtx – The do-everything pre-production tool. It’s ten years ahead of the screenwriting application curve and includes server-side collaboration features. Best part: it is free.

VLC – Plays everything. ‘Nuff said.

Fraser Drew
iTunes – Simplest way to manage music in OS X Period.

EyeTV /Aurora combo – Best Alarm Clock in the world. Why have *beep beep* when you can have TV!

Adium – Microsoft MSN on OS X is terrible, so until someone does MSN A/V (whether it be Adium or MS), I can’t live without it!

Michael DeLeon
Amadeus Pro – One of the best audio editing apps on the mac at a fraction of the price of other popular apps on the Mac. For podcasters, you’ll love the id3 tag editor and exporting straight to mp3. Good interface, easy to use, feature-packed and only $40.

Final Cut Express – New version out with even more features. Still wondering how they can sell an app like this that in now way seems like a “lite” version for $200.

Visual Hub – Previously used sites like media-convert.com and zamzar.com to re-encode videos to a format which I could work with. Visual Hub does that and a lot more and won’t take nearly as long.

Michael Mistretta
iChat 4.0 – I just love the tabs, and the ability to have my AIM, MSN (through Jabber) and Google Talk contacts. Video chatting and Audio chatting rock and the quality has been greatly improved. iChat theatre make sharing presentations and slideshows so simple, and screen sharing is so much fun, and is implemented wonderfully.

CoverSutra – Awesome iTunes controller, that allows you quick access to rate, skip, play, and shuffle songs. Beautiful interface, and and only there when you need it.

Skitch – Allows me to easily and visually share what I’m doing to someone else over the internet. Takes screenshots, annotates them, and allows you to upload them in one click. Amazingly easy, and changes the way I communicate my ideas to others.

Austen Saltz
Quicksilver – It’s the definition of simple, yet still has many advanced features. My favorite uses are iTunes keyboard shortcuts and Camino bookmark indexing. I simply can’t live without them. And now, it’s open source!

Schoolhouse – My homework is a lot easier to process and complete with this app. Not only does it help you keep track of assignments, but it can color-code different courses, and allow you to track your grades over the course of the semester.

NeoOffice – Cheaper than MS Office, cheaper than iWork, cheaper than pretty much anything, NeoOffice is a free, native office suite for Mac based on OpenOffice. It integrates well with OS X, and performs all the functions that I need from an office suite.

Andrew Brigmond
FontExplorer X – Simply put, this is the best font management program I’ve seen in a long time. Extremely stable in a harsh working environment and carries no price tag what so ever. Free software just tastes better.

Parallels Desktop – While Apple is an amazing company there’s still plenty of things you can’t do without a Windows machine handy. I use Parallels daily for everything from troubleshooting to gaming. The performance is amazing and new features are added often.

REALbasic 2007 – Support for the OS X platform is rapidly growing and new applications are being developed all the time. Yet sometimes what you need just hasn’t been made yet, so why not just create what you need? REALbasic 2007 lets you do just that with an easy to understand programming language and user friendly interface. And if you also happen to be a PC user still it can automatically build Windows and Linux binaries along with your OS 9/X application. This one I definitely couldn’t live without.

Sébastien Arbogast
ForkLift – The next level of Finder, I use it all the time to access remote servers like FTP, SFTP. It even handle Amazon S3 remote storage. There’s even a “delete application” button to uninstall apps properly.

Pages – Every time I send a communication to my colleagues, like an invitation for some business meeting or a newsletter, I just prepare the content in plain text, and just before sending the final version, I copy/paste it into one of the layouts in Pages. And I always some feedback like “hey, you must have spent some time on it!”. And I say “no, I’m just using a Mac!”.

Remote Buddy – Thinking about other ways to use your WiiMote? This is the application you need. It allows you to do everything on your Mac from a remote distance. You can even reprogram buttons on the Apple Remote.

Greg Healy
RapidWeaver – Whenever I need to throw together a quick website, nothing beats RapidWeaver. Being able to add a video gallery, flash slideshow, and blog with one click sure is better than doing it by hand.

ImageWell – As an Editor here at MacApper, I sometimes have to resize the images in some contributor’s posts. ImageWell makes this as easy as dragging the image onto it’s icon in the dock, typing in my restraints, and then clicking “Send.” Couldn’t be easier.

iClip – This application has become invaluable to me. Being able to have multiple clipboards is a life and time saver. If you do not have iClip 4 or an application that allows you to have multiple clipboards, I suggest that you go and download one right now!

Well that about wraps it up! What are your 3 favorite OS X apps?

The deal works by buying the 7 program bundle at $49.99 within the 9 day cut-off point (started just now). So right off the bat you get $234 worth of software for $49. That’s quite a savings.

In my opinion the bundle is well worth $49 for licenses of Forklift, Rapidweaver, and Yep alone, but that’s just my me, and the bundles apps might not appeal to everyone.

The cool part is that when 1,000, 2,400, and 5,000 bundles are sold, a free application is added to your bundle at each threshold. Check out the list pictured here from the MacUpdate Promo page to illustrate.

I think this bundle will be a real success with some great unlocks. Mind mapping tool XMIND Pro 2008 at a retail price of $299 will be a sweet bonus at 1,000 bundles sold. iStabilize is also a really great video stabilization tool and retails for $67 at the 2,400th sale. And finally at 5,000 bundles PulpMotion ,the slideshow creator ($45), gets added to the mix. Regardless of whether these thresholds are met you really can’t go wrong with the software included at $49.

Good luck to the guys over at MacUpdate on some great software savings for the community.

Aiding the decision I also saw that one of the founders of MacApper, Glenn Wolsey, had already gotten involved. With dozens of active staff members at MacApper it made it a bit painful that I was not able to let any of my writers know what was up, but if I had let anyone know I knew the cat would be out of the bag very fast. So the decision was made to keep quiet and nobody was told aside from a couple close friends.

So last Tuesday I followed Phil’s instructions, took MacApper down for a day leaving the prebuilt defaced page, and I felt good knowing that I was part of such a goofball stunt. I figured MacHeistII would be a smash success, developers would sell Mac software, and we would all get a laugh out of it when Phill and the guys revealed the plot.

I never received any money to help out Phil and the MH crew, and I don’t think Glenn did either. I was glad to help out because I know that when we do cross blog promotion (as we have in the past), it’s always great to have support from your peers. I also know that Mac software is what gives MacApper its subject matter, and helping developers sell software has always been a part of our modus operandi here. I wanted MHII to be a success, and helping Phill out was an easy decision.

Alright so the entire story seemed air tight until those crafty Norwegians over at mac1.no (nice!) started to poke some holes in it. This was when I made a really bad and stupid mistake for which I feel awful about. In a blog post I tried to justify the hacking by blaming it on my Wordpress install. This was a really stupid thing to say, and it honestly didn’t occur to me at the time, but I inadvertently scared the crap out of thousands of WP users. For this I am genuinely sorry and apologize to Wordpress and anyone who I annoyed or scared with my comments. Which was a sh*tload of people.

So in retrospect the other people I ended up hurting are both the readers and writers here. I really hadn’t thought out how angry you people would get if the plot was uncovered early, which is what happened yesterday. I guess I just want to say that none of the writers here at MacApper knew about the stunt. In fact keeping it away from them was not that easy, and a few of them are not happy with me today. The stunt did not go over as we thought it would and I hope you understand that I couldn’t let anyone in on it without risking the entire story unravelling on us. I also wasn’t willing to ‘blow the whistle’ until the Macheist guys spilled the beans as I wanted to honor my commitment to their promotion. So this made it kind of difficult on all of us.

So I guess in closing I will just say again that my intentions were not meant to draw attention to MacApper in a shady attempt to gain readers, or sell out to an advertiser, or to screw over the good people at Wordpress in any way. People will draw their own conclusions about the whole thing and if people feel compelled not to visit MacApper anymore, nothing I can say will change that. I guess I would just remind those people that MacApper is the result of dozens of voices, of whom I am just one, and I really hope that one bad apple doesn’t spoil the lot.

Now if you’ll just excuse me while I slip into this asbestos layered suit.

Update: MacApper was not really hacked! None of the following blather about Wordpress is true in any way. We love you Wordpress!

Anyways I took the liberty of analyzing the hack a bit in the hopes it helps others prevent this from happening to them. Although we had updated our blog to the latest version of Wordpress, near as I can tell the hack was accomplished via an XSS (cross site scripting) exploit. By executing some malicious code in the query string the hacker was able to write to our .htaccess file the following:

#this is for rotten mac fanbois - suck it down.
#RewriteRule ^divider.png$ /rotten/divider.png [L]
#RewriteRule ^rotten.jpg$ /rotten/rotten.jpg [L]
#RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/rotten.*
#RewriteRule !rotten/index.html$ /rotten/index.html [L]

The problem is that the exploit appears to be unknown to Wordpress as far as I can see (I will be reporting it to them), so other Wordpress blogs may be susceptible. I wish I could offer more help. I’ll try to post more as we pour through the logs. Also if anyone is interested this is the defacing I woke up to this morning if you missed it:

Thanks to Marvin Sum and all of the other kind people attempting to notify me last night, and my apologies for the interruption to our readers.

If you are looking for a way to establish yourself as a tech writer, learn about group publishing, or just interested in being part of a great team of passionate Mac fans, this could be for you.

Writers at MacApper are paid for their efforts. After being published here, your article is awarded a pay grade based on quality, creativity, and popularity. Payouts happen every 2 weeks, and currently we pay between $3-$10 for articles, with at least $100 in bonuses given out every month for outstanding work. Contributors also have the opportunity to sample some great Mac related products, interface with industry mavons/developers, and sometimes get some free schwag in the process.

For those interested please submit writing samples along with a personal note about how or why you would be a good fit here. You can use our contact page or email us directly at macapper AT gmail.com.

Originally slated for an early 2007 release, Leopard contains the most updates compared to any previous OS X system. A completely redesigned dock and Finder bar are just the beginning. Other additions include a new viewer capable of opening almost any format for your quick and easy perusal. iChat has also been revamped to allow photo sharing among other things. But enough about the software, you want to know when you can get your hands on it.

While rumors of possible release dates vary from this week to the 26th of the October, the only information provided by Apple currently, is simply “October”. The rumors of an imminent release are prompted by Apple’s delay of many hardware shipments this week, a sign that they may be preparing to load them with Leopard prior to shipment. The latest build of 10.5 is receiving rave reviews from beta testers and could very well be the proper candidate for the gold master that will provide the rest of us with a stable Leopard release.

Just to be on the safe side, we’d recommend waiting for an official release date before purchasing any new Macs. There’s no sense in trying to file a lawsuit, just because Apple released the new operating system the day after you spent all your hard earned cash on a quad-core Mac Pro.

So what’s your guess on a Leopard release date?

If you are looking for a way to establish yourself as a tech writer, learn about group publishing, or just interested in being part of a great team of passionate Mac fans, this could be for you.

Writers at MacApper are paid for their efforts. After being published here, your article is awarded a pay grade based on quality, creativity, and popularity. Payouts happen every 2 weeks, and currently we pay between $3-$10 for articles, with at least $100 in bonuses given out every month for outstanding work. Contributors also have the opportunity to sample some great Mac related products, and sometimes get some free schwag in the process.

For those interested please submit writing samples along with a personal note about how you can contribute here. You can use our contact page or email us directly at macapper AT gmail.com.

Doesn’t this look better than the default image?

With a simple plugin for most publishing software you can add Gravatars to your blog and here at MA we set our Gravatars to cache locally, so it doesn’t depend on the Gravatar website, cough, staying alive. Why not set up your own Gravatar for use on MacApper, and many other blogs. It takes literally 1 minute and most importantly it’s a great visual reminder of who is taking place in the discussion.

Feel free to use this thread to test out your own Gravatars but keep in mind that the caching system is set to cron every hour, so your image may not show up right away.

For more information on how to implement Gravatars into your projects see their implementation guide.

If you are looking for a way to establish yourself as a tech writer, learn about group publishing, or just interested in being part of a great team of passionate Mac fans, this could be for you.

Writers at MacApper are paid for their efforts. After being published here, your article is awarded a pay grade based on quality, creativity, and popularity. Payouts happen every 2 weeks, and currently we pay between $3-$10 for articles, with at least $100 in bonuses given out every month for outstanding work. Contributors also have the opportunity to sample some amazing Mac related products, and usually get some free schwag in the process.

For those interested please submit writing samples along with a personal note about how you can contribute here. You can use our contact page or email us directly at macapper AT gmail.com.

As I’ve said before, there are some fantastic written articles by some very talented people, and this one’s no different. We were also delighted to get so many entries from the ladies out there, and that the guys did not run away with both prizes. Soooo your second winner is…

Caitlyn Imburgo for her piece ‘A Female Apple Lover Looking to Expand her Horizons‘. Gratz Caitlyn! We will be in touch with you shortly. Here is Cait’s article, click on the images for a larger format.

So before announcing the winner I just wanted to thank all the great companies who made this possible, and just congratulate everyone who entered and posted about it on their blogs and websites. Once again the Mac community really pulled through. Also a huge thanks to Miles, Josh, Kyle, Kiro and the other great contributors here for coming together on this effort with your time and expertise.

Now for some great news. Our senior editor, Miles Evans, has promised he will reward 1 more switcher’s piece with a special runner up prize of $100 US dollars. So many of you have emailed asking us to unveil the winners on MacApper, we decided that we would publish the best entries, and the readers will vote for who deserves the $100 prize. So watch for these home brew articles all this week, and be sure to place your vote.

And without further ado, the grand prize winner of the MacApper Switcher’s Contest 2007 is: ‘Peter Gets a Mac’, by David and Peter Carpe. Congrats guys – you just won large and you totally deserve it! We will be in touch with you shortly.

But wait! Isn’t there also a lucky winner to be announced at random? Like a lucky draw? Did you think we forgot? You’re right, there is still 1 more winner, picked at random, lined up to take home 23 apps and a t-shirt – Check back tomorrow for that announcement guys!

As many of the writers here are still in high school or college, I think that advertising here is a bit of a unique opportunity for other companies to share in our youthful outlook on Mac products and applications. Check out our advertising page to learn more about how we can help get your message out.

MacApper averages around 5000 unique users/day and we did 1.26 million page views in April. Feel free to check out our traffic logs for last month.

We are growing at a really quick pace so why not get on board today? As always feel free to let me know if you need any help or have questions.

Also it is worth mentioning that we are expecting lots of attention this month as we will be running our Switcher’s Giveaway entries right away. It was a huuuuuge success and I am positive you will be surprised by some of the creative entries. Stay tuned for that!

As I write this there are only about 12 hours left, so get your entries in as soon as you can. As it stands there are around 125 submissions, with about 15% of them using some form of rich media. Remember we are picking two winners to receive over 23 apps and a t-shirt – one for the best entry and one chosen randomly. That means that right now every submission has a 1:125 chance to win HUGE.

If you have been away and just caught wind of this contest now, You still have plenty of time to get an entry in, but you had better get cracking. Good luck everyone and thanks so much for those participating. Choosing a winner will not be easy!

Speaking of the contest, time is running out to get your entries in so I will give you a little update. As of tonight we have just a few videos, but a couple really stick out. We also have a few audio clips, and some unique imagery. I will say that right now anyone with a good idea and a few hours to kill on their Mac, could easily run away with this huge giveaway. I’m not sure why more people aren’t submitting funny or satirical type of entries as a switcher’s story contest pretty much begs for it.

Only 72 hours left for submissions! If you have a good idea for a quick 3 minute video or audio clip, better get on it now. Remember any reasonable entry will be added to the draw for a random winner. Thanks again to those competing and submitting entries, its been tons of fun wading through these all week.