A Mexican airline is renting iPods to passengers aboard its flights as part of a marketing promo to differentiate itself from its competitors. Reuters reports that Mexican flight attendants aboard Volaris now serve fistfuls of salted snacks, carbonated drinks and, for about $5, iPods. "By renting the iconic music and video device to passengers, low...

SendStation Systems on Friday announced the SendStation Dock Extender for iPod, which enables iPod & iPhone users to dock and connect their device with iPod speaker systems and docking stations, as well as FM transmitters and voice recorders, without prior removal of its protective case. The Dock Extender is designed to work with all iPod cases wit...

Last week it was the music labels, this week it was teacher unions. Apple cofounder and CEO Steve Jobs on Friday spared no words in criticizing the state of public schools and the teacher unions, saying that schools were never likely to improve until principals could fire bad teachers. The Associated Press notes that Jobs shared the stage with riv...

Briefly: Apple has posted news about the DST changes in Mac OS X, while Sony is close to announcing its first direct competitor to the iPod nano and Panasonic is working on the "world's smallest" digital camcorder at just 4.5 inches long and 1.2 inches thick.... Apple has outlined the DST changes in its latest Mac OS X update, noting that the dayli...

Apple today withdrew a discount voucher for its online store a single day after it was issued, offering no reason for the withdrawal at first. In an email titled "Welcome Back" and signed by "The Apple Store Team," the company said that its exclusive online eCoupon promotion had been withdrawn and that users who received the coupon would not be abl...

MumboJumbo has released Luxor 2, the sequel to the no. 1 casual game of 2005. The action puzzle game takes players on a voyage through the land of ancient Egypt, offering 88 new levels set amongst pyramids and temples that time period. Players use a mystical winged scarab to shoot and destroy the approaching magical spheres before they reach the py...

ActiveState today released Komodo Edit 4.0, enhancing the feature-rich editor for the full range of Komodo-supported dynamic languages. Komodo Edit 4.0 supports Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, and Tcl as on Mac OS X, Linux, and Microsoft Windows systems. The software also offers support for client-side languages and Ajax technologies including JavaScript,...

In brief: Target appears to have begun selling pre-owned iPods at discounted rates. The store's offerings include 1GB ($89.99), 2GB ($109.99), and 4GB ($149.99) first-generation iPod nanos alongside pre-owned 30GB ($219.99), 60GB ($269.99), and 80GB ($319.99) video iPods. Target is also offering pre-owned second-generation iPod nanos in 2GB ($129.9...

GraphicConverter 5.9.5 ($30) adds vnt import support to the graphical conversion utility. The latest revision of GraphicConverter includes a context menu entry to delete the maker of notes, and adds a dcf export to export submenu in the context menu. The update also enables users to import JPEG files from PowerPoint documents. [Download - 17.9M...

FastMac today began shipping a plug-and-play internal Bluetooth upgrade for all Mac Pro systems. The upgrade adds Bluetooth wireless connectivity between the Mac Pro and a growing number of Bluetooth-enabled personal digital assistance (PDAs), cellular phones, cameras, printers, headsets, keyboards, and mice. The module fits directly into the syste...

BBEdit 8.6.1 ($125) is popular text and HTML editor, with features particularly geared towards professionals. Version 8.6.1 is primarily a maintenance release addressing dozens of bugs, such as hanging when JSP files were detected by the HTML scanner; the update does however highlight the ".strings" format in syntax coloring, and supports the LaT...

Australian-based telco Telstra has offered a word of warning about Apple's iPhone, and is likely to bring some significant operational challenges when it makes its Australian debut some time next year. "There's an old saying - stick to your knitting - and Apple is not a mobile phone manufacturer, that's not their knitting," said Greg Winn, a big pr...

Apple in January of 2007 was ranked no. 11 in comScore Media Metrix' list of Top 50 properties, garnering 38.6 million unique visitors in the U.S. alone since the same time last year. The company's traffic declined by 1 percent from December to January -- in line with with other slight post-holiday declines seen at retail as well as consumer-orient...

Rodney has a question about converting Opus music files:

Hi. I have several songs created in Opus, an old Classic music composition app by Sincrosoft (now Allegroassai). The file format was proprietary, and apparently the software company no longer offers the app. I am looking for some piece of software that can convert these to another, currently-supported format so I can work with them. Are there any third-party apps that do this, or an archive somewhere online that offers the aoftware? I've googled but I can find nothing but old, decrepit archives. Thanks for any leads - I need these songs desperately!

In brief: MacNN has reviewed the Gecko Pro-sleeve13 ($50, shown at right), a sleeve for Apple's 13-inch MacBook that functions as a standalone case or as a sleeve to place in another bag. The case is made from ballistic nylon used in military uniforms and harnesses, and features firm edges that maintain the mold even under stress.... Apple has repl...

X.org has released X11R7.2, a new version of the X Window protocol. From X.org site:

The X.Org community is proud to announce the release of X11R7.2, the third modular release of the X Window System.

X11R7.2 supports Linux, BSD, Solaris, Microsoft Windows and GNU Hurd systems. It incorporates significant stability and correctness fixes, including improved autoconfiguration heuristics, enhanced support for GL-based compositing managers such as Compiz and Beryl, and improved support for PCI systems with multiple domains. It also incorporates the new, more extensible XACE security policy framework.

The full source code is free to use, modify and redistribute and is available from http://ftp.x.org/pub/X11R7.2/ and mirrors worldwide.

For more information on the X Window System, including how to get involved with development, please see http://wiki.x.org.

Apple's implementation of the X Window protocol, X11.app, is based on X11R6.6.

Apple is reportedly developing a miniature sub-notebook, and is expected to re-establish itself as a leader in the field of compact computing as it reminds the world of its renowned PowerBook 2400. AppleInsider reports that despite the 10 years since Apple offered up a sub-notebook to consumers, the company is planning to unveil a new mini MacBook ...

BitJazz has released new native Intel versions of SheerVideo, its cross-platform real-time lossless software video codec. Claiming to be "fastest video codec in the world," the company says that SheerVideo lets users work twice as fast at half the uncompressed file size--with what it says is "absolutely perfect fidelity to the original video and di...

Macrovision has offered to help Apple implement its FairPlay DRM copy protection technology, saying that Apple CEO Steve Jobs' call to abandon music DRM is a bit short-sighted and misguided. In an open letter posted to its webiste, the DRM developer said it believes that the piracy is the result of poorly implemented and consumer-unfriendly DRM tec...

Briefly:: MacNN has reviewed FormZ, which is described as "a superb general-purpose 3D solid and surface-modeling tool with powerful features, and excellent rendering options for realizing almost any 3D vision." Version 6.1 enhances many existing tools and adds several new ones, including a revamped animation system as well as adds Universal Binary...