There are now only just over two weeks left until the next Macworld Expo kicks off with the ever-popular Steve Jobs keynote address, and Apple watchers everywhere continue to wrack their imaginations trying to predict what big surprises the iCEO has in store. Last year's big surprise wasn't an announcement at all, but rather a miraculous feat of teleportation, as Jobs-- scheduled to broadcast his speech live via satellite from California-- casually sauntered on stage amid thundering applause; after that entrance, he could have read numbers from Microsoft's quarterly earnings report and still held the crowd's rapt devotion. (Well, okay, maybe he's not quite that good.) But this year, Steve's scheduled to appear live and in person, and everybody with a semi-functional optimism gland is fully expecting the introduction of the long-awaited consumer portable Mac. So what will the surprise be?

On the strength of a single unsubstantiated rumor, we at AtAT have been banking on some kind of big "non-Mac move." (Hey, if your speculation stems from actual facts rather than pure, unadulterated rumor, you're missing half the fun.) See, the nice thing about focusing on a "non-Mac" announcement is that it opens the doors to all sorts of fun possibilities. Jobs might introduce a permanent CEO, or finally take the job himself. Some kind of big partnership or merger might emerge between Apple and Oracle, or Palm, or-- dare we say it?-- Disney. Apple might reveal plans to expand into hitherto uncharted consumer territory by releasing lines of furniture, carpeting, wallpaper, drapes, and breakfast cereal specially designed to complement the fruit-flavored translucent plastics of the iMac and the Power Mac G3. It could be just about anything. If you limit yourself to a Mac-centric surprise, what is there? Sure, we'd welcome a next-generation iMac as much as anyone, but we all know that's coming at some point-- for now, we'd rather chew on some less pedestrian concepts instead.

That's why the increasing evidence of an Apple Internet service is so intriguing. The very idea of Apple jumping back into the ISP game after the spectacular collapse of eWorld a few years back was once limited strictly to rumors sites and nutcases like us, but now even legitimate news sources like MacInTouch are posting tips about such a venture. According to one of their readers, Apple is "about to close a big deal" with Portal, a company that "develops, markets and supports real-time, scalable customer management and billing software... for providers of Internet-based services." Verrrrry interesting, no? And while we're hard-pressed to think of what Apple can offer in terms of Internet service that the gazillion other ISPs out there could not, we have enough faith in the "new" Apple that we strongly doubt they'd leap into the fray without a distinct differentiating factor up their collective sleeve. Too bad Internet service can't come in translucent fruit flavors...

This shouldn't really be news to anyone here, but for some reason we still feel compelled to note it: the Seattle Times has a lengthy article on the past business shakiness of Microworkz, the company who recently announced a super-cheap $199 "iToaster" that aims to be the ubiquitous Internet computing appliance. The iToaster, which runs a custom hybrid of Linux and the BeOS, features an interface so simple that the only people who'd have trouble working it are the same people who find making toast a touch-and-go process. Basically, the interface is reminiscent of At Ease or the Launcher-- big buttons to click for different web sites and applications. With its alleged ease of use and low price, the iToaster stands poised to do battle with other set-top-box systems like Microsoft's WebTV-- and general-purpose consumer computers like the iMac. The latest eyebrow-raising buzz about the iToaster is the way that megagiant AOL has reportedly been sniffing around, possibly interested in making a deal involving non-Windows low-cost AOL PCs.

But for the iToaster to get off the ground, Microworkz is going to have to outrun its reputation for disappointing its customers. Last year, Microworkz was at the forefront of super-el-cheapo PC systems, hawking its Webzter line of sub-$500 computers; unfortunately, lots of people who placed orders for those systems never got their merchandise-- and had to jump through some serious hoops to get their money back. Apparently there were thirty-seven consumer complaints lodged against Microworkz at the Washington Attorney General's Office since last summer. One couple ordered a system in mid-February which never showed up and, after logging lots of phone time, they only finally got their money back at the beginning of May. Another gentleman ordered a Microworkz system in March and, describing the whole experience as "a nightmare in hell," still has gotten neither his computer nor a refund; Microworkz chief exec Rick Latman says the check is in the mail. And it turns out that Microworkz isn't the first business venture that has landed Latman in hot water; his bridal shop stands accused of having taken customer deposits without delivering gowns, and he's also being sued by former associates over a web site deal. Hmmm.

So when (if?) the iToaster is released on July 15th, we'll be interested to see if Latman has fixed his company's availability problems or not. Since the iMac represents Apple's current weapon in the price-sensitive consumer arena, it's important to see how well these lower-cost systems fare. But with Microworkz' past problems (and the Future Power E-Power now the subject of an Apple lawsuit), it's possible that Apple doesn't have too much to worry about-- from those particular competitors, at any rate.

For those of you who observed our complete lack of broadcasts and surmised that we slacked off all Independence Day weekend, let it be known that our non-AtAT-producing hours weren't spent in idleness. On the contrary, we spent almost every waking hour watching scads of mind-numbing TV, which, in our business, qualifies as grueling professional research. In fact, we barely took enough time out away from the tube to fetch some much-needed groceries and do some very much-needed laundry. Oh, sure, we also wrested our hard-working eyeballs away from the television long enough to focus them on all them purty fireworks that went "boom" over the Charles River, as was our patriotic duty, but beyond that, you can rest assured that we were working our buns off flipping between "Before They Were Rock Stars" and "The Price Is Right."

But all work and no play makes AtAT a pack of single-phrase-retyping axe-wielding homicidal maniacs, and so we forced ourselves to pry our workaholic butts off the couch so that we could march them over to the cinema and plop them down in movie theater seats instead. The cinematic masterpiece we chose to view was one of the most eagerly-awaited titles of the decade: South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut. Be warned: this R-rated romp was somehow lewder, cruder, and ruder than even we were expecting. If your sensibilities are any more delicate than, say, a grizzled ex-sailor with ten years' experience in the hardcore porn biz, you're probably going to want to steer very clear of Stan and the boys' big-screen debut. That said, we loved it-- we found it to be a delightful musical distraction for a summer evening, plus lots of swearing, racial epithets, misdirected anti-Canadian sentiment, and bedroom scenes starring Saddam Hussein and the devil. It was sort of like "Bye Bye Birdie" with Tourette's Syndrome. Not for everyone, to be sure, but people who like South Park for the right reasons will love it.

So why are we mentioning this at all? Because there's a very tenuous connection to a sentiment that's shared by a great many AtAT viewers. We don't want to spoil things for anyone, but we feel compelled to note that Bill Gates himself makes a brief walk-on cameo in the movie that met with hearty audience approval; while the crowd laughed throughout the film, the Gates scene was the single instance in which everyone broke out into spontaneous applause. That's all we'll say, except that the ten seconds that Gates is on screen would have been worth the price of admission alone. So if you're a South Park fan and not easily offended, we definitely give the film a thumbs-up.