Ah-- the student has surpassed the master, grasshopper. We all know that for the last several months, Mike Dell's tacitly recanted his infamously catty comment about Apple ("If I were running the company, I'd shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders") by seemingly trying to make his company as much like Steve's as possible. Dell's got iMac-inspired "cool" consumer PCs on the way, consumer-targeted laptops in two colors available now, and even offers wireless networking options on its laptops. Heck, Dell even issued an earnings warning for its most recent financial quarter, reminiscent of Apple's scene-stealing buzzkill from a couple of months ago. It's almost spooky. We hear that Mike's up for the title role in the upcoming remake of All About Eve, and if the studio can't sign Steve Jobs to play Margo Channing, we understand that Noah Wyle is very interested.

In fact, Dell's emulation of Apple is now so complete, the Educational Computing crown appears to have changed hands-- er, heads. According to a Reuters story, assuming that Dataquest's numbers can be believed, Apple's longheld position as the number one computer seller to the education market has reverted to Mike's minions. That's right; when it comes to educational sales, Apple finally lost its bragging rights in the first quarter of this year, when Dell beat out Apple's numbers by a full five percent based on unit shipments. Worse yet, Dell maintained that five-percent lead throughout the second quarter, so it wasn't just a one-time fluke. Ye gods-- Dell supplanting Apple in our nation's schools? We haven't heard anything quite so disturbing since faithful viewer Barry Hamill pointed out William Shatner's rendition of "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds."

This revelation comes hot on the heels of the news that Dell also recently overtook the beleaguered Compaq to become the top seller of personal computers in the U.S. overall. We don't think Compaq should be all that worried about Dell, though-- after all, becoming the number one seller of PCs isn't a particularly Apple-like thing to do, and we wouldn't be terribly surprised if Mike Dell's rampant Steve Jobs obsession soon leads him to force Dell's overall market share down into the 10% range. And as for Apple taking the silver in the education race, there's every chance that the new iMacs and the iBooks may restore the company to gold status in coming quarters. Keep your fingers crossed-- the future of the world is at stake.

While we've been talking a lot about how Dell's copying Apple, it's worth noting that now Apple's copying Dell-- or at least that's what the rumors say. Not that a bit of Dell emulation is anything new to Steve and the gang. For the past several quarters, Steve has frequently trotted out Apple's astonishingly low inventory numbers, proudly pointing out that Apple now maintains even less inventory than Dell, who once led the industry in that area. And then there's the whole Apple Store thing-- build-to-order Macs configurable from the comfort of one's own web browser. That's unquestionably a page from Dell's book, even though Steve's NeXT engineers built Dell's online store before Apple assimilated NeXT.

Now, though, whispers of a new Apple sales paradigm are gathering strength. It was one thing for Apple to launch an online store, but the fact of the matter is that splitting sales between a direct-to-customer model and the standard retail channel isn't terribly effective. Apple's currently riding two horses, and the retail one's getting tired. Look at IBM, who's bailing on selling PCs at retail outlets because the price competition is killing them. Look at beleaguered Compaq-- 'nuff said. But then look at Dell, whose direct-sales-only model is making Compaq look like a dinosaur; they've got the sales figures to prove it. So rumor has it that Apple may be looking to put the pain of CompUSA and Sears (and Best Buy and everyone else who has undersold the Mac) behind them and more closely adopt Dell's strategy of selling computers straight to the people who want to buy them.

The interesting bit in all of this is, of course, what would happen to all of Apple's existing authorized resellers-- including small vendors who stuck with Apple through the Dark Days-- if such a move were to come to pass? Well, an "On The Register" article in MacWEEK has some intriguing ideas. For one thing, if Apple is going to succeed with a mostly- or all-Apple Store sales strategy, it's more than likely that the company would need a retail presence, even if they won't actually sell in retail stores. So at least some existing retailers might turn into "AppleCenters," similar to those Gateway Country stores that don't actually sell computers, but let you test-drive them and order them directly from Gateway. In addition, these AppleCenters could sell third-party software and peripherals that Apple wouldn't sell themselves. It's an interesting concept, though if Apple gives it a shot, you just know that existing retailers aren't going down without a fight. We'd anticipate a backlash with a rating of 7.7 on the Jobs scale. For reference, the "Blue Blocker" scandal generated a 6.6, "G4 Speed Dump" was a 7.2, and the Clone Wars peaked at 7.5. So if Apple really plans to prune most of its resellers in favor of a mostly direct-sales model, get ready to take cover...

Well, how about that... they're barely on the shelves, yet, and people are already talking about the Next Big Thing. Not a day after we wished for a Graphite iBook Special Edition, rumors have surfaced that the iBook rev. B might be just that. Faithful viewer Michael LeRoux sent us to an iBook-User article which claims to have preliminary specs for the revised iBook, supposedly due a few weeks after January's Macworld Expo. iBook-User claims that Apple will split the iBook line into two distinct models, much the same way that the iMac now comes in three configurations: the "basic" iBook will be much like it is now, but with a 350 MHz processor, a 6 GB hard drive, 64 MB of RAM, video-out, the new ATI Rage 128 Mobility graphics chip, and a slot-loading CD/DVD drive. Well, okay, maybe it's really not all that much like the current iBook after all...

The specs for the "enhanced" model, though, are even more droolworthy; imagine a 400 MHz G3, an 8 or 10 GB hard drive, 96 MB of RAM, and a FireWire port in addition to the features listed above. Oh, and it'll be Graphite and white. Now that's an iBook to dream about. Unfortunately, we have a feeling that dreaming about it is all we'll ever get to do, because we're very skeptical that Apple would sell an iBook so loaded with features. Really, look at the specs for this supposed Graphite iBook. If it became available, would anyone ever have a reason to buy a PowerBook instead? Sure, the screen would still only be 12.1 inches, but with video-out that's hardly a major problem. And remember what the iMac revision B added? A Rage Pro, some extra video RAM, and a slightly larger hard disk-- nothing more. So a rev. B iBook with so many new features sounds unlikely to us.

On the other hand, the folks at Mac OS Rumors have posted their own specs for a new iBook, due "by the early second quarter of 2000," and while they're not identical, they're close enough to iBook-User's list to make you wonder. MOSR lists three models instead of two, processor speeds running from 333 to 366 MHz, hard disks ranging from 4 to 8 GB, RAM from 32 to 96 MB, a possible FireWire port in the high-end model, trayless CD or DVD drive, depending on configuration, and Rage 128 Mobility in the "Best" config. In fact, the biggest difference between the two lists is that MOSR states the iBook will gain a built-in microphone, while iBook-User says it won't. So what do you think, sirs? There's no doubt that Apple's cooking up something in the iBook department, but we sure don't pretend to know just what...