Is it just us, or has Apple's legal team been hotter than a pistol lately? That billion-dollar patent infringement lawsuit filed by Imatec was finally dismissed in January. Over the past several months, Apple secured preliminary injunctions in three out of four of its suits against the iMac cloners and settled those cases favorably. And now, according to an Apple press release, the company's legal eagles have done it again: Microware's "OS-9" suit against Apple has been dismissed as well. Apple Legal: the irresistible force in search of an immovable object.

Some of you may have forgotten all about the Microware suit by now-- it didn't exactly get a ton of press. (Perhaps Microware should have hired away Imatec's Hanoch Shalit to issue press releases every fifteen minutes.) Basically, Microware objected to the way that Apple called its latest operating system release "Mac OS 9," since Microware has held the registered trademark "OS-9" for over a decade. What's more, Microware's OS-9 is also an operating system that runs on PowerPC processors, even though it's targeted at a very different market. Still, we'd originally heard that Apple was not going to call its next OS release "Mac OS 9," precisely because of the Microware product. Apple surprised us by using the name-- and Microware didn't surprise us by filing suit. Luckily for Apple, the court shot down Microware's request for a preliminary injunction and instead dismissed the case, saying that Apple used "good faith" in the use of the name and had no intention of capitalizing on OS-9's reputation. A MacNN special report has plenty of details on the case and its resolution for those who want to get caught up.

So Apple's lawyers prevail again. Note to Steve Jobs: rein in the legal team a bit, or have 'em throw a few minor cases or something. All this positive press is sure to attract the attention of a certain beleaguered software giant with deep pockets; the last thing you want is to find out that your whole stable of lawyers has been hired away to handle the appeal after what is almost certain to be a crushing defeat in "Redmond Justice." C'mon, think about it... Microsoft's current "lawyers" fumbled that case so badly, the higher-ups have got to be considering replacing the whole team with fresh talent. Granted, Apple's recent cases have been a lot easier to win than Microsoft's (it's amazing what being in the right can do), but still, we figure Steve had better keep the Cupertino Dream Team well-paid...

Hallelujah, Apple was finally posted a fix for the dreaded iBook/PowerBook disk corruption bug. You've heard about this, right? In a nutshell, if you turn on the "Preserve memory contents on sleep" option in the Energy Saver control panel, you run the risk of permanently scrambling all the data on your hard disk in "certain low-memory situations." The upshot of this is, if you get struck by the bug, you open your iBook to find it crashed. When you restart, you're left staring at the dreaded blinking folder icon. Not a pleasant way for any Mac to wake up (or fail to).

Despite the fact that iBook users the world over were losing data left and right, it took Apple an inordinately long time to acknowledge that this bug even existed; interestingly enough, the Tech Info Article that finally described the problem seems to have since been deleted. But that's okay, since Apple's now fixed the problem. The company claims that the newly-released Sleep Memory Extension "eliminates the bug," but don't expect the "Preserve contents" feature to work as advertised: all the extension does is make the "Preserve contents" checkbox "dimmed and unavailable." Hey, why fix a broken feature when you can just disable it altogether?

Is it just us, or does this remind you of the guy who goes to his doctor and says it hurts when he raises his left arm? The doctor's response is, "Don't raise your left arm." (Ba-dum ching.) Apple's fix delves even further into the realm of absurdity, though, being tantamount to duct-taping the poor guy's arm to his side. That said, we're pretty confident that this is just an interim measure until Mac OS 9.0.4 finally gets out the door. At that time, we'll probably see one of two scenarios. The first is that the "Preserve contents" functionality will be restored and it'll work properly, without Osterizing one's data. The other possibility is that "Preserve contents" won't be dimmed-- it'll be gone altogether. Hey, amputation's a harsh cure for a mild touch of bursitis, but it is a cure, isn't it?

Okay, this is just too weird to pass up... By now you're all aware that Steve Jobs has bailed on his commitment to deliver the keynote address at the Spring Internet World conference in a couple of weeks. What you probably don't know is why Steve is ducking out. After all, he pretty much let the entire Apple Expo 2000 London show collapse in order to give the Internet World keynote instead, and he's been vocal in the past about his desire to attend more Internet-centric conferences. So why the sudden change of heart, which has left conference planners a mere two weeks to find a replacement? Well, as always, take this with a big grain of salt-- but Mac the Knife claims that Uncle Steve bowed out not because of family commitments, not because of an important corporate event, but because of ceiling height.

Yes, ceiling height. Reportedly, Jobs feels that the ceiling at the LA Convention Center (where the keynote is to be delivered) is just too darn low. Too low for what, you ask? Search us. Maybe Steve's unaware that a giant ego doesn't literally translate into a head the size of a Winnebago. Or perhaps it's got something to do with his fabled Reality Distortion Field-- his mild-altering rays affect large audiences by radiating out the top of his head at an angle and bouncing off the ceiling onto the adoring crowd, so he needs plenty of headroom to reach the poor slobs in the cheap seats. Or perhaps there was a childhood trauma involving a trampoline and a low ceiling. Who knows? In any event, despite the fact that the Internet World web page still lists Jobs as a speaker, it's clear now that he won't be taking the low-ceilinged stage.

Incidentally, MacWEEK reports that Internet World has found a replacement speaker for Steve Jobs: AOL's Steve Case will be delivering the keynote instead. Here's hoping that the show planners have fully disclosed the convention center's ceiling height to Mr. Case ahead of time. It'd be tremendously unfortunate if there's some kind of unwritten "high-tech CEOs named Steve and low ceilings don't mix" rule in effect, and Case would have to back out at the last second.