Remember a while back the whole backdating thing at Apple? You know, where the CFO and former general counsel, Nancy Heinen, backdated stocks in 2001? Yeah, that one. I didn’t really pay much attention to it when it came out. I figure, someone making that kind of dough can handle whatever it is they dish out for themselves. Well, Heinen and SEC “settled” on an agreement that she pay some $2.2 million which includes more than $400K in interest and a $200K civil penalty. She released a statement today (through her lawyers of course).

I cherish the great people I worked with at Apple, and am proud of my contributions to its historic turnaround and current success. With this lawsuit behind me, I look forward to addressing the greater challenges of social justice and economic disparity.

From Former Apple general counsel Heinen agrees to $2.2M backdating settlement – East Bay Business Times

Hmmm, interesting. I don’t really think she feels that amicable about the whole ordeal. I actually have a copy of the real statement she wanted to release before her lawyers got a hold of it.

I loath those pretentious freaks I worked with at Apple, and am pissed that those assholes didn’t have my back after all of my contributions to its historic turnaround and current success. With this bullshit behind me, I look forward to harassing Steve in the name of social justice and wish nothing but economic disparity on his whole family. Thanks for nothing asshat!

You heard it here first…

Today saw the announcement of the new 3G iPhone from Apple. It looks very promissing and the price cut to $199 USD sounds like a really good price point to get more people to jump on the iPhone bandwagon. Afterall, this thing is twice as fast, but half the cost.

What was not mentioned in Job’s keynote was AT&T’s iPhone 3G plan pricing. And, why should they; AT&T and Apple have severed their revenue sharing deal they had with the initial iPhone release one year ago. However, don’t let the $200 discount on a new iPhone fool you. Let’s do some math…

The old iPhone plans started at $59.99/mo. If you signed a two year contract you would pay roughly $1,440 over the life of the contract. The new plans, according to the press release, start at $39.99 voice plan PLUS $30 per month for unlimited data. Now you’re looking at $1,680 over the live of the contract. That’s $240 more (per contract) than the previous iPhone plans. Still feel like you’re getting a good deal? You just spent $240 to save $200. No word on family plan pricing or if they have family plans for the iPhone.

Will I get one? Probably. :\

Update: Looks like there’s no special treatment for new iPhone users and the standard plans and rates apply. It makes it a little easier to swallow a family plan at $59.99/mo for two lines of service but I have yet to find out if the family plan is available for the iPhone 3G. Interesting thing I found looking for answers to the question What plans are available for the iPhone? I Suppose they should update this if it’s not true.

Update #2: I just spoke with a Karen George in AT&T customer service and from what she told me the iPhone plan is the same, just going up in price $10/mo (this kind of contradicts the press release though). She also confirmed that the family plans are available for the new iPhone. I asked if the new iPhone plans will still include the 200 text messages and she said yes. I also asked if the MEdia(TM) Max Unlimited data plan (which, at $35/mo includes unlimited data and texts, seems to be a better deal) would be available for the iPhone and she said yes. I’m a little skeptical about what some random customer service rep says at this point, so take it with a grain of salt. Especially when she tells me they (customer service?) are not being told ANYthing about the details of the new iPhone and/or plans.

NB: If you’re wondering about the ‘AT&T Gets the Skins’ bit of the title, I’m referring to the San Bromista Cat Ranch.

See here, Bullet point number one:

Logging in with an account originally created in Mac OS X 10.1 or earlier that has a password of 8 or more characters.

Mac OS X 10.1 came out just over six years ago in 2001. If you’ve been using the “upgrade” option every time you update your OS X version, I think it’s time you performed a fresh install. Especially on such an old system (what do you have, an original Quicksilver? No? Older?). If you’ve made it this long without having to do a clean install, congratulations. You’re one of very small number of people. Hell, I haven’t kept a computer for longer than two or three years.

I bought my first Apple in 1997 — PowerPC G3 300Mhz (of the Beige kind). I bought my second Apple in 2000 — Quicksilver 733Mhz (non-shiny doors). Sold the G3 in 2002 (or so). I bought my first Powerbook in 2003 (G4 1Ghz Titanium) slightly used from a nice girl (with buyer’s remorse) in San Francisco. It took a dump about two years ago and I succumbed to way of cheap x86 hardware and Linux. But I redeemed myself about a year and a half ago when I bought my second Apple laptop (Macbook Pro 2.16Ghz).

I digress. What I’m saying is that, even if you’re lucky enough to have the same computer for the last six years (or more), I doubt you’d be as lucky going through four separate system upgrades (assuming you upgraded every version). Even if you didn’t and you went from 10.1 directly to 10.5, I highly doubt Apple spent much time testing that upgrade path (if at all).