This just popped into my inbox….

Dear Apple Community,

For the first time in a decade, I’m getting to spend the holiday season with my family, rather than intensely preparing for a Macworld keynote.

Unfortunately, my decision to have Phil deliver the Macworld keynote set off another flurry of rumors about my health, with some even publishing stories of me on my deathbed.

I’ve decided to share something very personal with the Apple community so that we can all relax and enjoy the show tomorrow.

As many of you know, I have been losing weight throughout 2008. The reason has been a mystery to me and my doctors. A few weeks ago, I decided that getting to the root cause of this and reversing it needed to become my #1 priority.

Fortunately, after further testing, my doctors think they have found the cause — a hormone imbalance that has been "robbing" me of the proteins my body needs to be healthy. Sophisticated blood tests have confirmed this diagnosis.

The remedy for this nutritional problem is relatively simple and straightforward, and I’ve already begun treatment. But, just like I didn’t lose this much weight and body mass in a week or a month, my doctors expect it will take me until late this Spring to regain it. I will continue as Apple’s CEO during my recovery.

I have given more than my all to Apple for the past 11 years now. I will be the first one to step up and tell our Board of Directors if I can no longer continue to fulfill my duties as Apple’s CEO. I hope the Apple community will support me in my recovery and know that I will always put what is best for Apple first.

So now I’ve said more than I wanted to say, and all that I am going to say, about this.

Steve

Found this in my inbox… couldn’t resist posting it…

TAVARES, Fla., Jan. 2 /PRNewswire/ — "The Stupidest Statements Awards" have been bestowed again upon the famous by Mega Genius(R), "The Man with the Perfect IQ(TM)." His sixth annual prizes of recognition for "crash-and-burn lapses in intelligence" are just for fun.

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Writing up a best iPhone/iPod Touch list is very difficult since there is a huge repository of apps on the iTunes Store. For this article, I took a sampling from a few dozen of my iPhone carrying compatriots. These are some of the apps that they recommend reside on your iPhone/iPod Touch.

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We would like to wish you a joyous and happy holiday, and hope that Santa brings you everything on your list.

We will be back on Friday the 26th, as we will be spending time with our families and celebrating the holidays.

We wish you and yours a safe and happy holiday and a very merry Christmas.

Portable audio players or MP3 players are a hugely popular product, it seems everyone these days has one, and for good reason we like our music, be it for entertainment or just to get away from things like crowded buses. There are of course good and bad in all products, but it’s the time of year to let you know the best of 2008 according to how you the user and experts have ranked them. As for continuing trends this year, we got the ever popular Apple players occupying two spots, and a couple other surprises as well.

So we present you the Best of 2008 in audio players.

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There’s a plethora of products out there today to choose from when it comes to things we want or need, and we’ve compiled a list of things that we want and think should be on your holiday wish list this year.

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So, a little bit ago the Alpha 400 Netbook got here from Geeks and I immediately broke out my video camera to do the unboxing, so here it is, I’ll have the review up once I get it charged and play with it for a bit:

Alpha 400 MIPS 400MHz 128MB 1GB 7" Linux Ultralite Notebook

$169.95 at Geeks.com

Features/Specifications:

    * General Features:
    * Ultralite notebook
    * Netbook form factor
    * Linux 2.4 Operating System
    * MIPS XBurst 400 MHz 32-bit CPU
    * 128 MB RAM
    * 1 GB NAND Flash Storage
    * 10/100 MB Ethernet interface
    * 802.11b wireless
    * Supports External Hard Drive up to 160 GB
    * Supports SD Card up to 32 GB
    * Xiptech application software packages (Xip office, Flash player)
    * 7-inch digital panel 800 x 480 true-color
    * Keyboard with TouchPad
    * Supports File Sizes up to 8 MB
    * Built-in SD Card slot
    * Battery Charging Time: 4.5 - 5 hours

    * I/O ports:
    * Three (3) USB ports
    * RJ-45 Ethernet port
    * Headphone in
    * Microphone in

    * Dimensions (closed):
    * 1.1 x 8.25 x 5.6-inches

So we recently received a few new products from a company called Proporta, as I was was browsing their site I found what has to be the coolest and most useful gadget of the year for the Lion in your life…

… at least the funniest anyway.

It’s not serious of course, but it’s something to brighten up your Monday morning!

Big Cat Hunting Stilts

The Proporta hunting stilts are made from seasoned mahogany and fitted with rubber grip souls and AntiNana(TM) banana-skin grip souls.

Supplied in a handy pack of four, you’re guaranteed to remain king of the jungle.

Don’t let lanky quadropedal prey get away this holiday - stay on top of the situation and let technology do the hard work.

The Proporta hunting stilts have collapsible telescopic front knee joints to assist in killing and feeding.

FURTHER TO COMPLAINTS WE HAVE NOW FITTED A DOUBLE LOCKING MECHANISM TO ALL COLLAPSIBLE KNEE JOINTS TO AVOID EMBARASSING ‘DIRT-EATING’ INCIDENTS DURING THE CHASE.

The cost for these is a cool Million Dollars!

Price: $ 1,000,000.00

Click HERE to visit the page if you want to check it out and of course browse their site:

Most sites, us included, are putting out ‘best of’ lists this year, well we don’t want to forget the stuff that wasn’t too good do we? Teh Suckage of this years products, the ones that FAIL, the ones there were just Pwned by reviewers… We wanted to compile a list of things to be avoided, things that you just don’t want to see under the tree or in your stocking, things that we don’t want old Santa delivering this year. It was hard, there are just so many, but we picked a few for your reading enjoyment, enlightenment and entertainment.

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So we’re back again with another best of list, this time we’re taking a look at what you and the experts voted as the best best digital cameras (Entry Level type DSLR cameras) in 2008. There’s no brand winner this year really, as it’s sort of one from everybody in the top five.

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Pantech announced their new phone today, the C630, so I figured I would toss up the unboxing video for you. In about a week the review will be up as well…

The Full press release is over in our forums section HERE, there you’ll also find all kinds of news and other press releases as well.

Continue on to read the basic specs and features as well..

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So last week ATI was kind enough to send me over their new Catalyst Drivers, version 8.12, for testing, not only does it include several improvements but also the new AVIVO Video Converter Program that utilizes the ATI Graphics Chip for faster encoding of videos. This version isn’t due out until the 10th, but I’ve been hard at it testing the performance in several games for comparison between version 8.11 and version 8.12.

So read on to learn what I learned, I tested with many games including FarCry2, Crysis, Crysis Warhead, Call of Duty World at War, Fallout3 and Spiderman Web of Shadows as well…

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