You know, rumormongers catch an awful lot of flak in this industry. Sure, some people don't take the "entertainment" factor of rumors seriously enough, and actually plan product purchases based on a third-party piece of anonymous, alleged "inside information" they read on some web site somewhere, but we hardly think that's a good reason for the responsibility of slow sales of a particular Apple product line to be placed squarely on the shoulders of people who like to whisper about new Macs around the water cooler. Besides, when every analyst on Wall Street is dishing dirt about Apple's upcoming product line, why isn't anyone blaming them for Apple's troubles?

They are? Oh. Well, never mind that-- take a look at all the juicy stuff The Register threw together about what might be in store for us Mac geeks. Apparently the analysts are nattering about Apple like it's an episode of Dawson's Creek or something. Charles Wolf of UBS Warburg says to expect "great things" when Steve hits the Macworld Expo stage in three weeks. Steve Fortune of Merrill Lynch hints at both new products and new "retail partnerships." The Register uses these two deliciously vague snippets as a springboard to mention just about every Expo rumor you've ever heard, including: a 17-inch iMac; a G4-based iMac; a speed-bumped Power Mac G4; news about the release of the Mac OS X public beta; and the possibility of Apple's own retail stores, á là Gateway Country. Oh, and let's not forget the revival of a classic: the fabled Apple "set-top box," which once had Apple Recon foaming at the mouth for months. And here we thought that rumor was dead and buried.

With the exception of the set-top box rising from its grave, it's all pretty pedestrian stuff, though it's nice to see it all stacked neatly in a pile like that. Personally, though, while we'd welcome just about any of these predictions noted by The Register, we'd hardly classify any of them as "great things." We're hoping that Charles Wolf trips on his NDA and accidentally spills something good before the show-- provided it really is "great." Then again, there's something to be said for surprises, and given how early we're going to have to get up to get keynote seats, it had better be something worth staying awake for.

You know, Apple's made some pretty serious strides in the realm of public relations over the past few years, what with the transformation of its standard press description from "beleaguered" to "once-beleaguered" to "resurgent" and beyond. The media, in general, seems to think that Apple's back and one to watch. Wall Street concurs. The average consumer no longer thinks Apple went out of business, and probably even thinks that one of those new-fangled iMacs would look real purty in the den, if they weren't so much more expensive than one o' them Celeron thingies. In fact, we'd be willing to hazard a guess and state that the only group of people that still holds a primarily negative opinion of Apple is-- strangely enough-- the Mac community.

Now, when we say the Mac community, we're overgeneralizing a bit. We don't mean, for example, "everyone who uses a Mac." We mean the hardcore fans-- the ones who used to bleed six colors back when there were six colors to bleed. We're talking about the folks who are so crazy about all things Macintosh that they might even tune into a daily soap opera about the subject, or, in extreme cases, produce one. This is the Mac community to which we refer: the fiercely loyal band of longtime Mac users who are simply in love with the platform, and have stuck with it even through the bad times. So why, pray tell, does this group have a problem with Apple?

How much time ya got? No, seriously, right now we'd have to say that the biggest reason to love the product and loathe the company comes down to just two words: legal action. None of us minds much when Apple's gung-ho legal department tackles Wintel cloners who seek to sully the iMac's distinctive design with cheap knock-offs, or defends Cupertino from spurious billion-dollar lawsuits that threaten the future of our beloved platform. But this increasingly frequent tactic of strongarming fans for copyright violation, well, that's getting more than a little tired. When MacCards got shut down, we understood why, but chafed a little at the hard-nose manner in which Apple's lawyers steamrolled a loyal fan. (The proprietor's new site, EyeCards, is a hoot and a holler, though.) When Apple went after that German ad agency for printing that "We love you" ad without permission, we felt Apple probably wasn't stern enough, though we could see why some Mac fans were peeved.

But now Apple's legal eagles have gone after AdCritic, so this time it's personal. We love AdCritic; it's an invaluable source for scads of cool commercials, and they're all in QuickTime format. But now this is simply yet another instance in which Apple has threatened legal action against an entity that's showing its support for Apple's own technologies; according to MacNN, AdCritic has pulled all of its Apple commercials at the demand of Apple Legal, posting instead links to several ads served from Apple's own site. It may not seem like a huge deal, since most of the commercials are still available elsewhere, but we have to say, the zeal with which Apple seems willing to threaten its supporters and alienate its user base is more than a tad disconcerting.

We understand fully that Apple needs to protect its copyrights and trademarks or else risk losing all such legal protection, but the way its gone after actual supporters of its own products and technologies seems really harsh. Is there a reason Apple couldn't grant AdCritic a license to serve those commercials? It's free advertising, and if AdCritic would then be serving the content legally, where's the harm? Unless, of course, Apple really does have a pathological drive to torment its loyal supporters, in which case we figure we're all in trouble...

Okay, now this just makes us mad. It's one thing for Dell to mimic Apple's every move-- colored WebPCs like iMacs, colored laptops like iBooks, ad infinitum-- but it's another thing when the press treats Dell's copycat moves as innovation. For example, do you remember what Dell did right after Apple made a huge media splash with the announcement of its AirPort wireless networking technology? Suddenly Dell introduced a wireless networking option on its business laptops; customers could buy a system complete with one of those 802.11 PCMCIA cards. It wasn't the best solution, obviously, since those things need an antenna, so there's an unsightly bulk hanging off the side of the laptop when the card is installed, but at least it was something, and it got CNET talking about Dell as "the first leading PC manufacturer to offer wireless networking with business notebooks."

Technically that was correct, since the iBook isn't a "business" notebook, though we still consider it an Apple slight. But now CNET's gone way over the line, gushing over Dell's new plan to "stay ahead of its rivals... one year after bringing wireless technology to PC notebooks." See, apparently in September Dell's going to ship a line of laptops with "fully integrated wireless networking and internal antennas." Reportedly "these upcoming notebooks will come wireless-ready from the factory. Oooooooh. That sure doesn't sound like anything Apple's had going for the better part of a year already, does it? Heck, at this point, every single product in Apple's line of Macs has an internal AirPort antenna and can be ordered from the Apple Store with a $99 AirPort card pre-installed. (We even called 1-800-MY-APPLE to confirm this fact, and a very nice woman named Linda indeed stated that if you order a PowerBook with an AirPort card, it will be installed and ready when you pull the system out of the box.) Yet CNET makes a big thing about how "Apple Computer already offers internal antennas on its PowerBooks and iBooks, but Dell will also integrate the other major part, the wireless LAN component, inside the box. Apple's LAN card comes separately." Grrrrrr...

Infuriatingly, the author goes on to state that "the move increases the pressure on Apple," despite the fact that Apple's been there, done that, read the book, and seen the made-for-TV movie. And if you really want to hurl, check out the part about how this move "signals a dramatic shift in how Dell conducts its business": "The PC manufacturer is known more as an imitator than as an innovator... but things may be changing for Dell." Well, we'll say this much: Dell has certainly innovated in the field of just how blatantly a company can rip off Apple and still get the press credit for being inventive. Sometimes you just can't win.