She'll be OK, I think

Thanks to Viv for the magnolia tea tip. And thanks for all your concerned emails. Even the one from "AAPL Anna" up in Mille Lacs. The lady offered to run down with dried "infusion" leaves from her magical fence screener plants (Yah, can you believe it? At the next cc I'm gonna ask why there's no background checking on Apple shareholders.)

Anyway, Violet was so agitated by the time I got over there she insisted on calling her lawyer. She wants to start a class action against Sprint.

So I had to tell her Sprint has a big ass hole in their bucket.

That didn't go over very well. OK . . . it was a disaster. So I'm blogging from Regions ER . . . they say it will be just five stitches.

Oopsie Daisy

My cousin Violet is a sucker for deceptive TV ads.

By age three (1988) we had the diagnosis. It was the year of the "Oopsie Daisy" fad, a "smart" doll that crawled, fell down, cried "Mama", then righted herself and continued crawling.

Saturday morning TV Oopsie ads were Violet's gateway drug. Cue the music to "Pop goes the Weasel". "Oopsie daisy's learning to crawl, she's such a pretty baby...oop! oopsie daisy!"

To sane adults -- which her parents were at the time -- it was nauseating. But little Violet HAD to have that doll, a fact she reminded her parents about until it drove them to distraction.

So on Christmas morning, 1988, her father took it from the box and quickly installed two C batteries (while Violet was jumping up and down and holding her crotch). Dad turned on the doll and set her into crawl position.

Violet started screaming. The relatives were baffled, and had trouble yelling over the gear grinding noise coming from the toy. The same noise that was scaring the bejeezus out of Violet. She began to cry. "That wasn't on the TV commercial", she wailed.

The Oopsie Daisy Christmas was just the beginning. No matter how hard we work as a family to help her overcome this addiction she periodically falls into the trap.

So Violet saw the latest Sprint Blackberry Pearl "smart" phone ad, the one that features a guy on a moving sidewalk in an airport. He's using a combination finger/laser pointer to write words in the air, which are magically transmitted as text messages or email or something.

Violet bit for it. You bet, I got the call this time. Her parents couldn't be bothered; they were busy logging on to hypnosisdownloadsfortraumatizedparents.com.

Anyway she said it's all Apple's fault. After all, they show how the iPhone works on their TV ads, with the touches and all. The Blackberry ad didn't have tiny print disclaimer on the screen, you know, "Dramatization -- don't try this at home" or whatever. Violet assumed Blackberry had honestly invented air writing to beat iPhone. It looked so cool, she said.

Ugh. I'm going over with oolong magnolia tea to help Violet through this latest "oopsie" episode.

Those Berenstain Bears!

Folks I've mentioned the Berenstain Bears and their imploding tree house here numerous times, so when Toni Sacconaghi blustered about missing iPhones and iPod sales recently I didn't even bother to mention it.

Yes, the chump analyst spoke out of turn.

Stay the course investors. Great things to come.

So last week I called Apple

and offered to send TC to the Goldman Sachs Tech Symposium. Joanie, in Investor Relations said, "It's ok, we've got him. He can hit. He can pitch. He can make a triple play." Imagine my surprise when it turned out to be Tim Cook. And oh yes, he hit it out of the park.

Papparazi Task Force

Thanks to all the Minnesota Oscar winners. I can move around town in relative obscurity for a couple weeks.

Hey, how about them Coens were trying to low key it? They'll be hiding behind Diablo as they trot through the airport (after all, the shine is off the Craig Memorial Men's Bathroom Stall). Heck, them Coens are pretty smart. They bought into Viv's set up to get Diablo Cody into a Wilma Flintstone dress. Ex-strippers from Minneapolis in bad fashion will trump. Folks are already starting a pool to guess the location of the other tattoos. You bet, the local Pap will be swilling her faster than frat boys on a keg.

Hang in there Apple investors.

Apple announced a new product recently, and it's selling, and not cannibalizing other product sales --- Good, right?

Wrong. The media types *cue Jaws music here* have to "angle" it, and what better way than by comparing the new product's sales to another existing blockbuster seller?
The result is here.

Katie buried the Munster money quote at the bottom of the article: "[For these] reason[s] resellers indicate that sales of the MacBook Air have been additive to their overall Mac sales in the quarter," Munster advised clients. "The MacBook Air addresses the need for mobility unlike any other Mac, and as such we believe it is not cannibalizing sales of other Mac laptops."

Better headline: Apple Taps New Mobility Market with MacBook Air.

Motorola Dead, Nokia in Denial

and strangled chokes are emanating from the Blackberry company (RIMM):

"Clear! Clear!"

Research might be in motion, but disaster recovery needs to check into rehab.

New Charity Buyout Candidate: Sony

See here. The author wonders out loud why Apple doesn't just buy Sony.

You betcha -- Apple is dying to buy Sony to get their hands on that advanced joystick technology. Does the writer work for Microsoft? Because buying Sony would be the fastest way to dilute Apple's focus and slow the innovation machine. Apple management isn't a bunch of whiplash sadists foaming at the mouth to experience the pain of Sony's culture. Yah, Mr. Pesek, you got that one right.

Recently Rumored Apple Buyouts

Takeover Target	Less Obvious Reasons to Buy (Compliments of Team Munster Research)
Yahoo!	Just to piss off Microsoft
Palm	1. Newton Nostagia Move 2. Ensure the historical preservation of gray-on-green screens
Disney	1. Burning desire to build "his and her" Minnie and Mickey Macs 2. To piss off Time Warner/AOL
Nintendo	1. Convert old joystick technology to multi-touch 2. To piss off Microsoft
TiVO	1. Rhymes with early prototype codename for Apple TV, which was "STEVO" 2.To piss off Comcast
Napster	1. To hold customers hostage for monthly rental payments 2. After all, loan sharking is illegal
Motorola cell phone biz	1. College marketing interns wanted to work on selling ROKR ("we can sell it, we know we can!")
Universal Music	1. iTunes has already captured all earthbound music 2. To piss off RIAA
Sun	1. Revenge against IBM for the G4 processor 2. To put it out of its misery.
Adobe	1. To kill Flash 2.To piss off Microsoft
Sprint/Nextel	1. Idea from the young engineers at Apple -- they missed Walkie Talkies the first time around
Google	1.Why buy Yahoo when you can get the Alpha dog? 2.To piss off Microsoft

Droids are Lost in Space

As I've previously mentioned and re-mentioned, the Google Android smart phone software development effort is a teen skateboard-park project.

Latest news is the deadline for the Developer's Challenge (aka "Developer's Nightmare") has been delayed due to significant updates to the SDK (System Developer's Kit).

Anyway, if you didn't know this was going south the day they announced the whole thing, it was crystal clear when they implemented an "Issue Tracker" system. This is never a good sign, because these systems don't get installed until there are about 150 "issues" piled up in the queue. Trust me on this. I've been there.

And Viv -- God Bless her because she's always right about these things -- said "Gene, anything with "roid" in the name is gonna be a pain in the butt. Guaranteed."

You betcha, she called it right (again).

A New Vista!

It's called Yahoo!, and Microsoft hopes it will be delivering Net-based applications to a machine (which will likely be running Mac OSX or Linux) near you.

They paid $44 billion for this latest shot in the dark.

It's not over until Klondike Kate sings

See here.


And is it just me, or did the losing Klondike Kate contestants show up at the Queen of the Snows competition?

Last one out, turn off the lights

Well, is Palm's CEO Holigan still so sure that the " "PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They're not going to just walk in''? Seems Palm is closing virtually all their stores. Must be because sales are killing?

The company's biggest threats may be its rivals. Research in Motion's BlackBerry smartphones have proven extremely popular with businessmen and other professionals, while the general public is taking to Apple's iPhone, favored for its storage and simpler user interface despite a $400 pricetag. Analyst Avi Greengart of Current Analysis argues that while Palm is by no means out of the fight, the company's prospects may depend on the release of a new Linux plaftorm, expected by the end of the year.

Linux. Yeah, that'll do it.

MOT. PALM.

RIM, are you watching this?

OK, Chew On This: Did CDs Survive iTunes?

Apparently not. Money quotes: '"I sure am going to miss the CD," said Paul McCartney, whose Beatles are one of the last groups to refuse to sell their albums on iTunes. "On the bright side, new technology means that Beatles lovers now can buy our albums for the third or fourth time."' Among reasons to ditch CDs: "No more cellophane wrap. Those genius scientists figured out how to cram 10,000 songs onto an iPod small enough to hold in your butt crack, but could never invent a plastic wrap on CDs that didn't take minutes to get off, dangerously heighten your blood pressure and occasionally require stitches when you resorted to scissors."

Will Netflix Survive iTunes Movie Rentals?

That is what Seeking Alpha wants to know.

No.

Apple Earnings Sucked Into Black Hole

and the focus was on guidance, released into a blinding snowstorm and hastily gathering energy. Sell orders triggered more sell orders. Prices collapsed as a distressed market fed on itself.

Risk management and stop loss systems around the world had been triggered by Societe General's sell actions early in the week.

Financial institutions with liquidity problems have put their traders on a "short leash", leading to imposition of daily trading limits which shorten investment horizons. Think of troubled hedge funds and institutions. Naturally they will take measures to protect themselves from what has increasingly become daily news shocks (bank write downs, rogue traders, subprime/housing news, falling dollar, dogs and cats living together).

Naturally such institutional actions exacerbate volatility in markets.

So, you betcha, this driving wind is fear of the future -- fear of liquidity shocks, fear of recession and falling consumer spending, fear of rising oil and commodity prices, etc. These events may or may not come to pass but fear of them causes a run on the equity market today.

And, don't cha know, many good companies with excellent fundamentals and growth prospects are caught up in the blizzard.

But snow melts. Spring will arrive. Now it's time to venture across the river and visit Winter Carnival.

The French Connection

Rogue: Having savage or destructive tendencies

French Rogue: Ditto, on a global scale

Bottom is in

How do I know? Client emails which include:

•Wall Street is nothing but a bunch of crooks!
•I am writing a letter to Apple IR!
•Why isn't Steve releasing a PR to defend us?
•I just threw up.

I saved a spotlight search that looks for these terms in my inbox, and sure enough they coincide with the bottom of the other aapl selloffs.