Have you been waiting for Pismo for so long you're starting to think it's just an elaborate hoax? Granted, an unannounced product with no specified release date can't be late, but it can be "late." And right now Pismo, the long-awaited revision to the PowerBook G3, is almost as "late" as the original Wall Street model was. Long-time Apple-watchers know about Steve's mischievous nature and his penchant for "disinformation." Is it really so far-fetched that Pismo might just be a decoy to distract the rumormongers from what's really going on?

So we were halfway through constructing an intricate theory describing Pismo's phantom role as mere misdirection to draw attention away from the horrible experiments taking place in Apple's secret underground labs when, to our surprise, we received assurance that Pismo is real. Really real. As in, so real it's done. One of AtAT's most trusted sources "on the inside" relayed a harrowing tale of his stolen time spent with a purloined Pismo. Since the case is virtually indistinguishable from that of the current "bronze" PowerBook (!), this brave soul was actually able to grab the sleeping Pismo and leave his own PowerBook in its place, with no one the wiser. For a while, at least...

So, without further ado, here's what we were told. Pismo's got an iBook-style UFO-looking power adapter. It's got dual USB ports, dual FireWire ports, and video-out. The particular model in question was labeled as having a 500 MHz G3, a 14.1-inch screen, 128 MB of RAM, a 12 GB hard drive, a DVD-ROM drive, and AirPort built right in. And what's this about the Pismo being used on a 400 Mbps FireWire network? Sounds like something worth waiting for. And hopefully we won't have to wait too long, since the intrepid soul who risked life, limb, and sanity to get us this info states that the unit he used was "obviously a manufactured, finished good" and not a prototype. Take all this as you will; believe it or don't. We admit, the bit about Pismo looking just like a current PowerBook has us wondering, too. All we know for sure is that it's a darn good story, at any rate. And we didn't even get into the ensuing chase scene with the ninja death squad-- this report was hastily filed via AirPort as our operative hid underneath cardboard boxes as security goons launched an extensive search. Here's hoping he makes it out alive; good spies are hard to find.

Pismo's imminent, we're told-- due any day now. And it's about damn time, too, given how long the PowerBook's been waiting for a refresh. But what about Apple's other product lines? The iBook's still going great guns in its current configuration, so even though a Graphite iBook DV is all the rage in the rumor circles, we're not expecting it anytime soon. A new iMac? Well, there's that 17"-screen mutant we keep hearing about, but again, we haven't any strong feeling on when-- or if-- it'll ever surface. Which brings us to the Power Mac. The G4 premiered last August to much fanfare and good press, but serious availability problems soon cast what we can only describe as an "icy pall" on what should have been a spectacular product introduction. And then there was that infamous "speed dump," dropping the clock speeds of the whole line by 50 MHz because the high-end 500 MHz chips were harder to find than a bellybutton on "I Dream of Jeannie."

Ever since then, we've been waiting for G4 chip availability to improve to the point where Apple could finally announce a speed increase-- at least back to the originally-announced levels of 400, 450, and 500 MHz. Foolishly, we expected such an announcement back at last month's Macworld Expo, eternal optimists that we are, and of course we were piteously disappointed. Since then, sites such as AppleInsider have painted a bleak picture of the G4 situation; reportedly Apple's total cache of 500 MHz G4 processors numbers in the neighborhood of 10,000 or so, which is apparently not quite enough to let them announce and ship G4/500 systems.

Or is it? Several faithful viewers who buy lots of Macs at once are reporting that their dealers are putting the brakes on G4 orders. And some of these dealers have loose enough lips to state the reason: a planned "speed bump" of the G4 line in one week. Truth or wishful thinking? Heck, we figure it's not out of the question; after all, AppleInsider's figure of 10,000 G4 processors may be inaccurate, or perhaps Motorola's kicked out the jams since then and found a way to produce 500 MHz G4s at a rate quicker than the original pace, which we've since christened "Anesthetized Slug." So we're going to wait and see if, perhaps at Macworld Expo Tokyo, Steve takes a fantabulous time trip back to last August, and once again announces brand spankin' new Power Mac G4s-- running at 400, 450, and 500 MHz. Charge the flux capacitors!

"Redmond Justice" may be dragging its way to a slow and grinding close, but fear not, antitrust drama fans: there's a spin-off in the works. Yes, just as Baywatch begat Baywatch Hawaii, everyone's fave trustbusting show is already looking to push into strange, new realms. Specifically, having tapped the American justice system for just about all they could get, the show's producers are looking to set the sequel in Europe. We haven't heard what the new show will eventually be called, but right now the decidedly lame working title appears to be "EuroJustice." No word yet on whether David Hasselhoff will be joining the cast.

Faithful viewers Al Barten and Porsupah both noticed that news of the show's production has made it onto sites such as Wired and The Register. So far, the pilot's plot seems to be standard sequel fare-- same story, new set, a few new faces, more car chases, bigger explosions. This time around, instead of the United States government slapping Microsoft with an antitrust lawsuit, the Redmond Giant is being investigated (er, "probed") by the European Union. And instead of allegations of tying in Windows 95 and 98, the EU is looking to the future; they're alleging violations in the still-not-quite-released-yet Windows 2000 which may allow the company to "gain a stranglehold over server software and ultimately electronic commerce." Something to do with proprietary APIs preventing competitors from being able to make their applications run as well as Microsoft's own on a Windows 2000 server. Drafts of later scripts allude to "forced changes" of Windows 2000 to alleviate the problem.

Now, while the premise is somewhat intriguing, personally, we have to wonder how well this spin-off will fare without most of the cast that made the original show a spectacular success. No David Boies, no Judge Jackson, no Dick Schmalensee ("SCHMALENSEE!!"). Heck, even Microsoft's bumbling legal team will likely be replaced by a European counterpart. We wish the new cast and the new show the best of luck, but they've got some mighty big black sneakers to fill. On the plus side, at least we won't have to endure hackneyed sequel tactics like hearing Boies say "I'm getting too old for this sh..."