Hey, we at AtAT may not know much when it comes to the stock market, but if you watch a particular stock long enough, certain truths become self-evident to even the most clueless observer. For one thing, apparently not all analysts carry the same weight. If you've been following Apple's stock performance at all over the past year or two, you're probably aware that in that time frame analysts have been tripping all over themselves to upgrade their ratings on AAPL. For a while there it was apparently the hot new trend on Wall Street: rate Apple a "Buy" because everyone else sure seemed to be doing it. And why not? The company's a lean, mean, fightin' machine. Everything's coming up roses in Cupertino, and those roses are candy-colored and translucent, to boot.

And yet, the Street's reaction varied considerably from upgrade to upgrade. Usually AAPL's price would rise a few points, and maybe level off a bit over the next day or so. Sometimes there'd be a more dramatic spike, but those typically leveled off more, and sooner. Overall, of course, anyone investing in Apple is making some serious bank, because those incremental price increases really stack up; until Wednesday, AAPL's price had tripled in a year. How could anyone not love that performance? (Unless, say, you passed up a chance to buy big at $13...)

And then the overdrive kicked in. We were working hard, oblivious to the market all day long, when faithful viewer Matt Steinecker wrote in to tell us that AAPL was up over fifteen points. Ever skeptical, we pulled up a ticker-- and lo and behold, Matt was right: AAPL closed at just over $130. (Our apologies to Matt for our unspoken gut reaction to his missive; having confirmed his news to be correct, we can now state with a high degree of confidence that he's almost definitely not on crack.) And what sparked this massive run-up of AAPL's price? Not an announcement of a 17-inch iMac, not rumors that Steve Jobs is selling off Pixar to run Apple full-time, not even a press release by Imatec's Hanoch Shalit saying "What was I thinking?" The monumental event that raised Apple's stock price to a new all-time high was one analyst basically saying that Apple's probably going to have a good quarter.

Yeah, that's about it. According to a Reuters article, Kevin McCarthy of Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette issued a report forecasting a "strong March quarter." Heck, the guy didn't even upgrade his rating on AAPL or up his estimates for Apple's end-of-quarter results. All he did was point out that retailers report brisk sales for Apple's new products, including the faster G4s, the Pismo PowerBooks, and the rev. B iBooks. He also mentioned that EarthLink's picking up lots of new Mac subscribers, too, which translates into a cut of the proceeds going to Apple. Bickety-bam, just like that, AAPL's up over $130. Can it possibly last? (Update: Probably not-- at broadcast time on Thursday, AAPL was down about seven points. Don'tcha just love this game?)

Rumors and hearsay, that's the stuff on which we thrive. It's the non-dairy creamer in our coffee, the extra shell in our twelve-pack taco kit (True! Best thing that ever happened to us!); call it what you will, it all rocks. Especially when said rumors and hearsay are gossip about behind-the-scenes strife between two corporate giants. Nothing beats dishing the dirt on relationships gone sour, right? That's why we're tickled pink over what Mac OS Rumors is saying about IBM and Motorola. Publicly, those two companies have to keep a civil attitude, what with being all chummy in the PowerPC AIM alliance and all. But every once in a while a company rep lets something slip that shows the cracks in the shiny happy facade.

According to a Rumors source, an IBM representative recently got a little catty during a presentation of the company's RS/6000 Unix workstations. Apparently IBM's got a prototype RS/6000 with a 650 MHz G4 running at its core. Yes, you read that right: 650 MHz. We in the Mac world are drooling all over ourselves now that we can finally buy what was originally announced way back in August-- a G4/500-- while IBM's reportedly sitting on a chip that's a solid 30% faster. Sure, we understand what "prototype" means, but when this IBM rep was asked when that 650 MHz G4 would hit the market, the response was "when Motorola pulls its head out of its ass and lets us ship them." Yeek, strong words, but understandably so; apparently since the G4 (or, more properly, the PowerPC 7400) is a Motorola chip design, IBM's been put on ice until the Moto-folks can catch up. IBM's not allowed to ship a Moto chip that's faster than Moto's own implementation.

We should probably reiterate our standard "Just a rumor, folks!" warning at this time. Remember, this info appeared on a rumors site, it came from an unnamed source, and it may all be hooey-- but that doesn't mean it's not entertaining as all get-out. We love the idea that a befuddled Motorola might still be trying to break through the 500 MHz barrier, while IBM's waiting impatiently to ship the better technology. Okay, so we're not loving it as much as we'd love to see Apple shipping a G4/650, but still, it's the next best thing. And we wouldn't be quite so prone to believe Motorola could be capable of such incompetence if it weren't for the little fact that the company made the brilliant decision to ditch all its PowerPC-powered Macs in favor of Wintel systems-- a move that just screams, "We make 'em, we sell 'em, but we sure as heck wouldn't want to use 'em!" Imagine if the Coca-Cola company were to put Pepsi machines in the company cafeteria; catch our drift? With that level of stupidity involved, anything's possible...

Remember about a month ago when word broke that Diego Piacentini, Apple Europe's veep, was leaving for greener pastures? Or damper pastures, at least-- Diego's moving to Seattle to work for Amazon.com. Anyway, it seems that the man made some interesting comments during his farewell dinner with the PowerBook Owners Club. A MacProf article delivers the goods, but a MacNN article homes in even more tightly on the "good bits." Namely, Diego's apparently the man behind that whole Apple Expo 2000 fracas.

You know the one we mean. For years, now, Apple's had it in for UK expos, either declining to show up for the event or just outright cancelling it-- a neat trick, since the company doesn't actually run the show. Apple Expo 2000 was supposed to break the streak and make amends for past sins; it was to be the largest UK expo ever, and Steve Jobs himself was slated to make one of his famous keynote addresses. Then, suddenly, Steve cancelled his gig, opting instead to speak at another conference. And then Apple announced that it wouldn't attend Apple Expo 2000 after all. Since an Apple Expo without Apple isn't much of a draw, the whole show collapsed, generating much ire throughout the Mac community in the UK.

Well, guess what? Diego's accepting the blame: we quote, "It's all my fault." So there you have it, folks; stop blaming Steve, because Diego's the fall guy. Unless, of course, you want to consider the possibility that Diego's taking the blame expressly because he's on the way out, thus acting as a diversionary heat sink for Steve-- sort of a "final duty." Hey, stranger things have happened. Have we mentioned our bonus taco shell?