Autodesk on Tuesday unveiled at the Game Developers Conference the 2011 editions of Maya and its other 3D creation software aimed at animators, game developers, and others in creative field

Jonathan Schwartz, who was CEO of Sun Microsystems from 2006 until last month, on Tuesday published a blog post that leads off with: “I feel for Google – Steve Jobs threatened to sue me, too.” Why? In 2003, he unveiled Project Looking Glass, a prototype Linux desktop, and Mr. Jobs called to threaten a lawsuit because Sun was “stepping all over Apple’s IP.”

The Associated Press on Tuesday said it has hired Nick Ascheim, who previously ran The New York Times’ website, to oversee development of apps for the iPad and other mobile devices. The AP already offers a free app for the iPhone and it said it’s hoping to charge a fee for the iPad one, “although it may be offered for free initially to help build an audience that would attract advertisers.

Hewlett-Packard has released a pair of videos touting its forthcoming Slate tablet, which it introduced in conjunction with Microsoft at the Consumer Electronics Show in January. Both of them tout Slate’s ability to “access the full web, not just a part of it,” as Adobe’s Alan Tam says in the video while demonstrating Flash and AIR, which lets Flash applications run outside of a browser.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has posted the full text of Apple’s previously-secretive iPhone Developer Program License Agreement, thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request after NASA released an app. The EFF found the document so draconian that it ran the news under the headline “All Your Apps Are Belong to Apple.”

If the preference is set, our desktop shows us the names of all our mounted volumes.  Lurking beneath the surface, however, some of those volumes can take on a strange set of numbered suffixes.  It isn't a problem until another piece of software, say, a backup program sees these suffixes and causes confusion for both it and the user.  Fortunately, these suffixes can be dealt with.

Google and Dish Network are teaming up to create a set-top box that will use the former’s Android operating system, but the Wall Street Journal piece announcing the development is thin on details, simply citing anonymous sources who said the new technology “allows users to find shows on the satellite-TV service as well as video from Web sites like Google's YouTube. It also lets users to personalize a lineup of shows."

Apple's Time Machine, introduced with Leopard, is a welcome tool.  It makes the process of backing up a user's boot drive painless. Recovering deleted files is similarly trivial.  However, there is one often overlooked non-feature of Time Machine, lurking, that can cause a major headache -- the recovery of secondary volumes folded into the Time Machine archive.  This article explores the pitfalls and solutions.

Apple’s recent lawsuit against handset maker HTC may have had a chilling effect on the development of so-called “iPhone killers,” according to The Wall Street Journal’s Matt Phillips, who referenced a research report from Oppenheimer analyst Yair Reiner as saying: “Our checks suggest that the combination of warnings and legal actions are having their intended effects and are causing a number of competing handset programs to be shaken off-course.”

Six months after its introduction, the iTunes LP format, which offers music buyers expanded cover art, videos, lyrics, and other digital bonuses, is only available for 29 albums, a dozen of which were available at roll-out. “It’s something most people will look at once,” a disappointed industry source told GigaOM.

Toon Boom Animation introduced Toon Boom Animate 2 on Tuesday. The new version of the professional animation application added several new tools along with the ability to directly import scanned drawing and SWF export support.

Apple's iPad will hit store shelves on April 3, and Broadpoint AmTech analyst Brian Marshall thinks it will become a great recurring sales platform for publishers, broadcasters and app developers.

Valve is bringing its game lineup to the Mac, and today TMO readers are offering their take on what that means for Apple's computers as gaming machines.

U.S. cell service provider and Apple iPhone partner AT&T stepped into the Google Android world with the addition of the Motorola Backflip to its mobile phone lineup.

FileMaker announced the immediate availability of FileMaker Pro 11 on Tuesday. The new version of the relational database application added a long list of features such as new chart styles and new dynamic reports.

Waterfield Designs introduced its new Smart Case and Slip Case for Apple's iPad on Tuesday. The cases are available in several colors and are designed to fit in Waterfield's Muzetto metro bag.

The Mac Observer's own Bryan Chaffin will be speaking at the CapMac Macintosh User Group meeting on Tuesday, March 9, in Austin, Texas. He'll be sharing his thoughts on the upcoming release of Apple's iPad, Macworld Expo, and the online news world.

Macgamestore.com on Monday announced that it has added Murder, She Wrote to the Mac games available on its site. Players assume the role of murder mystery novelist Jessica Fletcher as she navigates five new cases, complete with hidden objects to find and mini-games available in each scene.

The Macworld All Star Band plays once a year at the Cirque du Mac party during Macworld Expo, and MacVoicesTV caught the performance on video. The video of the band in action is available at the MacVoicesTV Web site.

John and Dave back this week, and John's done a LOT of upgrades on his end. There are a ton of tips to share, too. Don't miss it!

Tale of Tales’ indie title The Graveyard and THQ’s action puzzler de Blob: Revolution led off the slate of new games at the App Store on Monday.

Last week, Senator Richard Durbin rebuked Apple, Hewlett-Packard, Facebook, Twitter, and McAfee for declining to send representatives to the second session of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on Human Rights and the Law, which supports free commercial and political use of the Internet in countries with authoritarian governments, including Venezuela, Iran, and China.

In Apple’s recently-filed lawsuit against HTC, patent filings will play a large role in how the legal proceedings play out. By that metric, the company is “heavily armed,” according to Fortune’s Philip Elmer-DeWitt, with 3,013 patents in its portfolio.

Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster on Monday released a report in which he looked at recent figures from research firm NPD and noted: "We expect the strong year-over-year growth in NPD data that we saw in January to continue in the month of February. We believe this represents a buying opportunity ahead of NPD data for the month of February on March 15."

Ending speculation that reached a fevered pitch on Monday, Valve confirmed that it will bring Steam, as well as its library of games, to the Mac next month. “The Mac represents a great opportunity,” Valve co-founder Gabe Newell told Wired ahead of the opening of the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco on Tuesday.

Portal 2, the sequel to the acclaimed first-person shooter included in Valve’s Orange Box collection, is headed to Mac, PC, and Xbox 360 this fall; the news was confirmed by scans from the April 2010 issue of Game Informer magazine.

A price listing on the U.K. cell service provider O2's Web site showing fees for iPhone video calls was actually an error, according to company representatives. The listing appeared over the weekend, and led to speculation that the next generation iPhone would include a front facing camera for video phone calls.

If you are sick of the handful of overused, cartoonish ringtones included with your iPhone, iRingPro offers three unique collections of sophisticated, high-quality, and thoughtfully designed ringtones.

The Mac Observer's own Bryan Chaffin will be speaking at the CapMac Macintosh User Group meeting on Tuesday, March 9, in Austin, Texas. He'll be sharing his thoughts on the upcoming release of Apple's iPad, Macworld Expo, and the online news world.

Even with a fast computer, fast Internet connection and a good browser app, Web pages can still load slower than they should if you aren't using good Domain Name Servers. Figuring out which DNS servers will point you to the pages you want to view most efficiently doesn't have to be a trial and error process thanks to a clever Google Code project called namebench.

Today TMO readers are talking about different ways to synchronize iTunes music between multiple computers without losing artwork or metadata.

U.K. iPhone partner O2 raised a few eyebrows over the weekend with tariff listings that show per-minute pricing for iPhone video calls. The tariff listing has many speculating that Apple's next generation iPhone will offer video call support.

Kabuki Vision announced the immediate availability of Smooth Movie 1.0 for Apple's iPhone 3GS on Monday. Smooth Movie applies image stabilization to videos captured with the iPhone's built-in camera.

Many potential iPad buyers have been hoping that they will be able to share their iPhone's wireless data connection with their new tablet, but that isn't going to happen, according to Apple CEO Steve Jobs. Mr. Jobs confirmed the lack of tethering support in an email response to a customer's question.

Apple's first iPad commercial made its debut appearance during the Oscars event on Sunday. The ad follows the formula used in many iPhone commercials where features are quickly highlighted, such as viewing photos, managing email messages, and reading books.

When prolific App Store publishers ngmoco and Freeverse came together on February 22 in an acquisition of the latter by the former, both companies said that the fledgling free-to-play business model played a major role in the deal. So-called “freemium” games, which ngmoco started releasing last year and which Freeverse plans to begin publishing soon, are free to download but require gamers to make in-app purchases of items needed to keep playing.

“Look at the download numbers for Paid vs. Free apps on the App Store,” Freeverse vice-president Colin Smith explained. “There are ten times the number of people on the Free side. We think US$0.99 is a pretty ridiculously cheap price for the games we make, but if we can get ten times the audience, and make more money at the same time, then that's pretty awesome.”

In this week's installment of Free on iTunes, Vern Seward takes a stand on three podcasts; Stuff They Don't Want You To Know, Weird Week, and Geek Entertainment Television.

Changes on The Moscone Center's calendar of events show that an unspecified "Corporate Event" that could be Apple's 2010 World Wide Developer Conference  has been moved from June 28th - July 2nd to June 23rd - June 24th. Sun Microsystem's JavaOne Conference had been scheduled during that time frame, but that event is no longer on the calendar.

The Deal Brothers noted that Apple is offering the refurbished Apple Time Capsule 500GB Wireless Hard Drive for $139.99, and that's $20 less than the previous price. The unit ships for free and includes one year of AppleCare.

In this week's amassing of technical news debris, John points to several essential references for Apple customers, one comic relief item, a very telling SAI Chart of the Day and finishes with a question for the readers about the iPad.

Several photographs of Microsoft's not-yet-announced Courier tablet device have been leaked to Engadget. The photos of what could be Microsoft's answer to Apple's iPad show a two panel device that folds shut like a book that is reliant on pen-based input. 

The world of broadcast, cable and Internet TV is in an extreme state of chaos.  While it seemed like a good idea to provide many avenues for consumers to obtain TV content, those many channels have also led to money squabbles and abrupt changes in programming. For example, Viacom, on March 9, will pull The Daily Show and The Colbert Report from Hulu.  Is there a way out of the chaos?

Shares in Apple Inc. moved into record territory on Friday on the news that Apple had announced a shipping date for its iPad. The company said the device would ship April 3rd, 2010, and be available for pre-order on March 12th, and the news sent the stock to US$219.49, a gain of $8.78 (+4.17%) on heavy volume in the early afternoon trading session.

Apple's iPhone grew into more than just another smartphone after it was launched, and that's exactly what UBS analyst Maynard Um thinks is about to happen with the iPad, too.

Digital certificates make it easy for a company to let you know they are running a legit Web site -- meaning they're letting you know the Web site you're visiting isn't a cleverly crafted page designed to trick you into giving up personal information. There are ways, however, for people to get certificates for their Web site even when they shouldn't, so now we have Extended Validation certificates that require additional screening before they can be issued.

With Intel's i5 and i7 processors available, TMO readers are talking about when they think Apple will update the MacBook Pro lineup again.

Apps & More Software Design announced the immediate availability of Job Timer for Mac OS X on Friday. Job Timer lets users track the time spent on client projects with having to remember to start or stop timers.

Apple finally announced an official launch date for the iPad: April 3. Customers will be able to pre-order their iPad starting on March 12.

PC maker Asus is planning on bringing its own iPad-like tablet computers to market some time this year, and the company expects it will be able to capitalize on what it sees as weaknesses in Apple's design

Apple revamped its Mac OS X Developer Program late on Thursday, and the most notable change was a substantial membership price reduction. Instead of paying at least US$499 annually to participate in the Apple Developer Connection Program, memberships now cost only $99 a year.

Ludia on Thursday invited players to come on down for The Price is Right 2010 (US$4.99) on iPhone and iPod touch. Other new games include Chillingo’s shoot-‘em-up title Radio Flare REDUX ($2.99), the racer Raging Thunder 2 ($4.99), and a port of the Nintendo Wii shooter Cocoto Magic Circus ($0.99). In addition, MeanFreePath has released a Vendettas update for its MMO Turf Wars, allowing lower-level players to compete with established ones for turf and resources.

Apple has once again been named the most admired company by Fortune magazine, and it did so with the highest margin of victory the magazine has ever recorded for a number one - Apple scored a 7.95 on the index system used by the magazine, while number two Google scored a 7.70. To get its list of the Top 50 Most Admired Companies, , Fortune's survey asked businesspeople to vote for the companies that they admired most, from any industry.

Electronic Arts on Thursday announced that this June it will launch the second Sims 3 expansion pack, Ambitions, for Mac and PC, allowing players to not only pursue new careers but also make choices while at work, such as being a heroic firefighter. Those decisions impact Sims’ lives when they return home.

Sony is working on a smartphone that leverages the company's entertainment assets, such as the PlayStation Portable. The device would combine other features of the smartphone genre with the addition of being able to download and play PSP games, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Thieves staged what is being described in the mainstream media as a "Hollywood Heist" to steal some US$26K in Apple laptops from a Best Buy location in South Brunswick, New Jersey. NJ.com reported that the thieves used a gas pipe to climb onto the roof of the store, cut a hole in the roof with a saw, a suction cup to remove the roof piece, and then rappelled down to where the laptops were in such a way where the security cameras in the store were obscured by banners, all without touching the floor.

The Deal Brothers found a deal on the Epson WorkForce 1100 Wide Format Printer for $125.49, after $50.00 in instant savings. Shipping is free.

Crucial announced the immediate availability of its Crucial RealSSD C300 solid state 2.5-inch drive on Thursday. The drive supports read speeds up to 355MB/s, and is available in 128GB and 256GB capacities.

CAZE announced the immediate availability of its new JADE Polish Rainbow Swarovski case for the iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS on Thursday. The see-through case includes 50 Swarovski crystals in a rainbow pattern.

Today TMO readers are talking about Apple's patent lawsuit against smartphone maker HTC and what impact that could have on the market and consumers.

RealNetworks and several movie studios have reached a settlement where the software company agreed to kill its RealDVD application and pay a US$4.5 million fine. The settlement wraps up a multi-year lawsuit where movie studios, the DVD Copy Control Association and Viacom accused the RealNetworks of selling software that let users steal commercial DVDs by making copies of the discs.

Reports that China's government was behind cyber attacks on Google and several other companies may be wrong, and instead was the work of amateurs, according to the technology security company Damballa.

The judge overseeing Apple and Nokia's patent violation case in Delaware has temporarily put the proceedings on hold while waiting for a U.S. International Trade Commission investigation to run its course.

Apple has gone into a protective mode with iTunes, according to Billboard magazine, asking the major record labels not to participate with Amazon's Daily Deal on its MP3 download store. At issue is frustration at Apple for working to promote major new releases, and having those new releases available at a steep discount on Amazon the day before its iTunes release.

The Wall Street Journal is coming to the iPad, and the newspaper has a unit to work with that is kept under lock and key, and Apple keeps the key on a chain around its neck. This according to News Corp's CEO himself, Rupert Murdoch, who commented on the iPad during a press conference announcing a new section covering New York City for the Journal.

On Wednesday, Valve took a page out of Apple’s playbook and distributed teaser images that hint pretty strongly at its upcoming plans, namely, that at least some, if not all, of its games are headed to the Mac. With Game Developers Conference planned for next week in San Francisco, it seems likely that the publisher will have more to say then.

The Washington Post launched an iPhone app Wednesday that offers access to the newspaper's content for US$1.99. That price covers one year of access.

One of the reasons we are fans of Apple is that an implicit proposition of being a customer is that our computing life will be simpler, less vexing, and more productive. With iTunes, however, that promise is broken in part.

TiVo announced Wednesday its new line DVRs, the Series 4. The new product line features an HD interface that takes advantage of the higher resolution HD screens on the market, several new features, tighter integration with third party services like YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, and Blockbuster, support for Pandora, and larger hard drives for storage. The company is introducing two models in the Series 4 line, the Premier for $299 and Premier XL for $499.

There isn't any official word from Apple yet on when customers will get their hands on the iPad, but that isn't stopping the rumor mill from claiming the company's retail employees will get their hands on the multimedia tablet on March 10. Apparently Apple employees will get to see the iPad early for training, according to anonymous sources.

GameStreamer Inc. on Wednesday announced that their digital distribution web site now also sells Mac games. Available titles include PlayFirst’s Diner Dash series and other puzzle, adventure, and hidden object games from several publishers. GameStreamer said it will add more publishers in the coming months. Meanwhile, evidence recently emerged that Valve may be releasing a Mac version of its Steam digital distribution client, although there's no concrete proof that Mac versions of the company's games could be on the way.

Apple filed a lawsuit and ITC complaint against smartphone maker HTC for iPhone-related patent violations on Monday, and some legal experts think the move could ultimately hamper innovation instead of protecting it.

John and Dave dig and then dig some more to tell you about all the Cool Stuff Found that crossed their paths over the past few weeks. Then it's off to sharing your tips and answering your questions in this excellent episode of Mac Geek Gab!

The scanning software in Delicious Library 2.4 (currently in beta) does a much better job of detecting barcodes than the prior version. Read more to find out why...

Apple's iPad is said to be the device that's going to change the media delivery market. Today TMO readers are talking about what impact they thing the iPad really will have.

Adobe Flash may be a part of many Web sites, but not the redesigned Virgin America site. The airline recently dropped Flash in favor of HTML in a move to improve site performance and to offer support for a wider range of devices, including Apple's iPhone.

Despite a report claiming significant delays in iPad production, the companies that are supplying parts for the multimedia tablet and ebook reader for Apple, say everything is on track for Foxconn to build up to 700,000 units in March.

Need a good inexpensive het of headphones? You may be interested in what Vern Seward has to say about the V-Moda Faze headsets.

Ian Page released Mactracker 5.1 for Mac OS X on Wednesday. The update for the Apple product database added the company's most recent hardware releases, and added a new search engine, too.