When the iPod was introduced last October, we recall being completely, utterly, 110% sure that Apple priced it at $399 purely with the aim of bleeding as much cash as possible out of us poor "early adopters" with impulse control issues during the holiday shopping season; we fully expected a price drop for the "regular people," perhaps to $299 or so once the feeding frenzy ended in January. But January came and went, and the iPod remained stubbornly at $399. Then March rolled around, and with it came Macworld Tokyo. Ah-ha! Surely that event would bring an iPod price drop, right? Wrong. Once again, the original iPod stayed at $399, while Apple introduced a 10 GB model at the even less affordable price point of $499. Sheesh, whose scrollwheel do we have to spin to get a cheaper iPod around here?

Well, wonder no longer, folks, because now that the iPod has been shipping for just over five months, Apple has finally seen fit to toss all you starving digital music lovers a frickin' bone-- in the form of a new promotion called "Music on. $100 off." Yes, as that oh-so-clever title implies, you can now pick up an iPod at a net cost of $100 less than the standard retail price, which means that you'll effectively pay $299 for the "iPod Classic" and $399 for the new 10 GB version. That's still not exactly the sort of purchase that qualifies as an impulse buy in the check-out lane, unless you're the sort of person who's been hearing the phrase "trust fund" all his or her life and can therefore toss a $400 portable music device in the cart along with two packs of Juicy Fruit and a box of Tic Tacs-- but it is a price drop, of sorts.

We say "of sorts," of course, because there are a couple of catches. First of all, in keeping with the grand Apple promo tradition, that $100 off is actually in the form of a mail-in rebate-- which means that it won't do you much good if you can't scrape together the funds to buy the thing at full price in the first place. Worse yet, even if you do manage to hock your kneecaps or something for the up-front cash, you're still not getting that hundred bucks back unless you somehow raise and fork over at least $799 more-- for a new Mac. Yep, the rebate requires that you buy both an iPod and any new Mac between now and June 30th. You don't necessarily have to buy them together, but still, this is one of those irritating scenarios in which you have to spend roughly triple what you originally considered to be too much money in the first place before you can get those hundred clams back in the mail.

On the plus side, of course, if you can find some way to pull it off, you'll wind up with the iPod of your dreams plus a spiffy new Mac-- and a $100 check in your mailbox in six to eight weeks. It's actually a super deal for newbies and fed-up Wintel sufferers who are finally looking to join the Mac community, so we're not going to complain. Still, it's not much help to the financially challenged who are jonesing for an iPod. Pretty much all we can do about that is mention three things: 1) the $339 refurb iPod in the "Special Deals" section of the Apple Store; 2) the $369 iPod available via the Apple Store for Education; and 3) eBay. Or maybe just hang in there a bit longer; since this promotion ends on June 30th, maybe real price drops will accompany the 20 GB iPod that'll probably surface soon thereafter-- that is, unless Apple prices the 5/10/20 GB line at $399/$499/$699 just to annoy you.

Wow, it's rather uncharacteristic of the folks behind a staid and well-respected publication like MacInTouch to initiate rampant speculation about unannounced upcoming Apple product intros based on nothing more than a sprinkle of sketchy evidence-- but that doesn't mean we don't love them for it. Seriously, ever since Apple's Greg Joswiak squelched our collective hopes and dreams of shiny new Macs at the Tokyo show by publicly announcing that the company's product line was "set for some months now," the usual rumormongers have been moping around with dazed looks on their faces and vacant despair in their yellow, watery, red-rimmed eyes. It's rather sad to see. And kinda gross, too.

But it's worth noting that Joz spilled those particular buzz-killing beans way back in early February, which means that a time span accurately describable as "some months" has passed, so we can shrug off the weight of his dire proclamation and once again don our Rumor Caps. Personally, we were perfectly comfortable interpreting Joswiak's comments to mean that we shouldn't expect new Macs much before Macworld Expo this summer, but like we said before, if you're itching for some speculatory fodder, MacInTouch has what you need. There's an intriguing note on its home page from a reader who claims that last week, distributor Ingram Micro went from having over 200 PowerBooks in stock to having zero, all in the space of about two hours. A sudden run on TiBooks, perhaps? Nope. Abduction by aliens who need titanium to power their ship's return to a faraway galaxy? Closer, but still no cigar. Allegedly Apple "took the inventory back."

That's certainly suspicious enough in its own right, but even more interesting is the fact that resellers apparently can't even backorder PowerBooks right now, which is reportedly very unusual, even when Apple is preparing to introduce a new product. And according to the same tipster, yesterday build-to-order PowerBooks configured at the Apple Store were showing an estimated delivery time of fourteen days, which, amazingly enough, coincides exactly with the kickoff of next month's Worldwide Developers Conference. Since Apple has unveiled new products at WWDC in the past (new PowerBooks, even), the conclusion you're expected to draw is obvious. Speed-bumped, SuperDrive-packin' PowerBooks at WWDC, anyone?

Of course, you might hit a teensy bump while barrelling down that road, since when we configure a PowerBook at the Apple Store, our reported lead time is a mere ten days, which kind of throws off the blinding synchronicity a bit. But still, if you're really hurting for a dose of semi-informed speculation, don't let a little thing like that stop you. Just amend your frothing Apple forecast from "new PowerBooks at WWDC" to "new PowerBooks at WWDC-- and it's starting three days early!" See? Piece o' cake. Have fun with it, kiddies.

You know what really makes a courtroom melodrama great? Nifty guest appearances. Why, back in its heyday, "Redmond Justice" used to entertain us daily with an endless parade of guest stars that made the antitrust case look better than daily back-to-back episodes of "The Love Boat" and "Fantasy Island." Nothing against Charo, of course, but "Redmond Justice" once had Avie Tevanian himself on the stand. Oh, and some guy named Bill Gates.

Actually, though, Bill's original guest spots on the show were limited to videotaped deposition footage-- albeit incredibly entertaining videotaped deposition footage. Perhaps you'll recall that Judge Jackson actually laughed at Bill's depo, which consisted mainly of heated arguments over the meanings of such mind-bendingly complex English words as "we." Making a stony-faced federal judge laugh in court? Clearly the boy has talent. So start stretching your giggle muscles, because faithful viewer Jeremiah Bornemann informs us that Bill's first real live appearance on the stand was apparently a hoot and a half. An Associated Press article paints some of the broader strokes, and shows Bill warming up the audience by claiming that if Microsoft is forced to port Office to other platforms and open up Internet Explorer, that would allow Gateway (yes, Gateway) to create its own clone of the Windows operating system. Yessirree, the man's in rare form this week!

Of course, his act wasn't all smiles, and if you're the type who's so obsessed with Macs that even a Bill Gates standup routine bores you to tears unless there's a direct connection to Apple in there somewhere, fear not; entertainment is at hand. Just check out the nasty threat that Bill made against Apple, as detailed in another Associated Press article brought to our attention by faithful viewer justin: "When Apple Computer chose a rival Web browser over Microsoft's, Gates called Apple's chief executive to ask him 'how we should announce the cancellation of' Microsoft's translation of the Office business suite for Apple's Macintosh computers." Eeeyowch! Evidently the guy's not always funny.

Probably the highlight for us, though, came in the form of yet another Associated Press story forwarded to us by faithful viewer Daniel Blanken, in which it's revealed that one of Chairman Bill's biggest concerns about the draconian penalties proposed by the holdout states is that they "would keep Microsoft from releasing timely security updates to its Windows operating system." Heaven forfend! Because lord knows how horrible a world it would be if Microsoft products were full of security holes, right? According to Bill, the proposed remedies wouldn't allow Microsoft "to recall or replace a version [of Windows] if a major security hole was found." "If" one is found? Stop it, you're killing us! So Bill's a standup comedian, too-- who knew? Is there no end to the man's talents? But, you know, that's why he gets paid the big bucks. Here's hoping he takes the stand again soon; he was lots funnier here than he was on "Frasier."