It's iLife Day! It's iLife Day! iLife '04 officially became available today, and now Mac users all over the world are blissfully experiencing the unprecedented thrill of scrolling through more than two dozen digital photos without lag time. They're re-editing all of their home movies to add that scrolling Star Wars text at the beginning. They're wondering how much more money they can charge for their homemade porn DVDs now that they can wedge an extra half-hour of smut on each one. They're looking at iTunes and realizing that it's the same thing they already had.

But most of all, they're looking at the new new stuff. Loops. Software instruments. Virtual guitar amps. Let's face it: most people shelling out 49 clams on the first day of availability aren't buying iLife for the ability to play more than one song during a slideshow; this is the stuff the preorderers were really jonesing for. So, above all else, everyone's getting down and funky with their bad selves via the musical magic of GarageBand.

Sorry, did we say "everyone" was getting down and funky? We should have said "everyone but faithful viewer David Green," because despite the fact that MacNN reported that some readers had received "confirmation of shipment of iLife '04" as of Wednesday morning, poor ol' Dave got some email from Apple last night informing him of an "unexpected supply delay." As a result, his preordered copy of iLife "will now ship on or before 01/21/2004," so unfortunately he's going to have to sit out the global iLife Day celebration. But at least he's not alone; according to MacFixIt, another customer named Bobby Sussman also had his iLife order bumped back to the 24th. We have no idea what caused the delay (the Apple Store Cambridgeside had about eleventy-twelveteen copies on the shelves today), but maybe Bobby and David can pass the time by playing Connect Four until their software arrives. "Pretty sneaky, sis!"

Or maybe they should prep themselves by scoping out some of the first GarageBand reviews floating around out there. So far most of them are pretty favorable; Jon Fortt of the Mercury News writes that GarageBand is a "powerful tool" that "might break new ground in how simple it makes the process" of scraping together your own music. Writing for The Mac Observer, Bob Levitus walks us through his first night with the software as he slaps together his first song, and calls GarageBand "one of the best computing experiences [he's] had" in over 17 years with the Mac. In the New York Times, David Pogue (being an actual music guy dontcha know) offers some good specific criticism of the 1.0 release while affirming that GarageBand is an "exciting breakthrough" that could catapult unknowns to stardom. (Incidentally, both Fortt and Levitus had the guts to post their first GarageBand-produced songs with their reviews. Something tells us we're going to see a lot of that sort of thing pretty soon.)

As for us? Well, we didn't want to risk any "unexpected supply delays," so we picked up our Family Pack at Cambridgeside today. Of course, we haven't actually had any time to do anything so crazy as install it yet, but when we do, we'll let you know what we think. In the meantime, our iLife Day celebration consisted of stroking the box and saying "Ooooooooo." Oh, and Connect Four. Lots of Connect Four.

Some of you listen to all the hoopla and hand-wringing over Apple's decline in education sales over the past several years and wonder what the fuss is about. After all, we're talking about students-- not exactly a demographic with thousands of dollars to fritter away on expensive Macs and an iPod or six. Most of the younger ones probably wouldn't even be able to qualify for a loan (although in this economy, that isn't a given; yesterday we saw a banker offering a 2.9% 30-year fixed rate mortgage to a cocker spaniel). So why the hubbub, bub?

Well, the answer's pretty simple: indoctrination. We believe the children are our future-- future consumers, that is. Get 'em hooked on Macs while they're in school, and there's a better chance that when they grow up and suddenly find that they have oodles of cash sitting around in rakish piles, they'll toss some of that green Apple's way for gear of their very own. Oh, sure, it's a pretty mercenary way of looking at things, but such is the world in which we live. We save the idealism for other aspects of our lives. Like sandwiches. If you want to make 'em right, it's really important that you start with a good, hearty bread as a solid foundation. Crusty is good; don't be one of those people who makes the fatal mistake of cutting off the crusts. You lose structure.

Okay, we seem to have wandered a bit.

But before the sandwich thing, we intended to point out that indoctrination probably works better the earlier you can get someone sitting in front of a Mac. Virginia Tech's G5 supercomputer does a great job of attracting geeky grad students to our platform, and that's all well and good, but there you're looking at a rational choice and not the sort of deep-down brainwashing that gets Apple a customer for life. Henrico County tossing iBooks at all of its high school students? Well, it's a step up, but even in their mid-teens kids aren't quite as susceptible to corporate influence as befits a really solid lifelong customer. The state of Maine putting iBooks in the backpacks of every one of its seventh- and eighth-graders is better still, but there's still room for improvement, right?

Absolutely! Faithful viewer Arne pointed out that in Canada at Peace River North, they've been doing this iBook writing-program thingy with seventh- and sixth-graders, which is really starting to get down into seriously effective brain-conditioning territory. The teachers, kids, and parents are thrilled with how the iBooks have improved "achievement, motivation, and attitude"; "in one year, as a result of this program, we saw students' pretest and posttest data scores improve dramatically." So students get better at writing and Apple gets a slew of 12-year-olds who are now accustomed to having an AirPort-equipped iBook around. Everybody's happy!

Of course, the next logical step is to introduce iBooks into third-grade classrooms, and, eventually, kindergarten. Sources reveal that Apple is working on nap-time alarms for iCal and virtual finger-painting software as we speak. It's only a matter of time before children are issued iBooks at birth; now there's some long-term unit growth potential. Bring it on.

Well, we held out almost as long as we could, but we have to say, we're really starting to despair over the prospect of this whole Super Bowl thing. Not the game itself, of course; we don't even know who's still in the running. Come February 1st, it could be the Denver Broncos versus the Smurfs and Swamp Thing for all we care. We're talking about the commercials, here-- and the fact that twenty years ago Apple stunned the world with a Ridley Scott-directed bit of futureshock that heralded the advent of our own beloved Macintosh. And while said commercial didn't have a Mac anywhere in sight, it had an Orwellian Big Giant Head on a screen. It had shaven-headed drone people. It had a cryptic voiceover done by some guy with an English accent. It had a hot blonde chick in a tank top swinging a big hammer in slow motion. In other words, it had everything.

So now, twenty years later, you'd expect Apple to follow that up with something huge, right? C'mon, the Mac is two decades old and looking better than ever before. Mac OS X has attracted the attention of the nerds; together with the Xserve, it's attracted a glance or two from the suits. The Power Mac G5 is arguably the fastest personal computer available. At a time when people are increasingly looking for mobile solutions, Apple has a PowerBook lineup that drops jaws on sight. The iPod changed all the rules of portable music; the iTunes Music Store changed the rules of buying music altogether. In other words, Apple is picking up steam and rattling cages. So there has to be a new Super Bowl commercial, right?

Wrong. Maybe it's because Apple doesn't think it can ever match the power of "1984," maybe it's because the company won't have a breakthrough new Mac ready in time, maybe it's because Steve would rather spend the $4.6 million for sixty seconds of airtime on further digitally enhancing the original commercial by adding a pony, two goats, and a choo-choo train alongside the iPod he's already given Anya the Hammer Chick-- for whatever reason, CNN/Money reports that "a spokesman for Apple Computer said the company doesn't have any plans to advertise during the Super Bowl to mark the ad's 20th anniversary." Mac OS Rumors claims that Apple has chosen to stand down and let Pepsi blow the ad bucks instead; you may recall that the 100,000,000-song Pepsi-iTMS giveaway starts on February 1st, and Pepsi has already committed to Super Bowl ad time to spread the word to the 40% of the country that'll be watching.

Nice, sure, and it'll get Apple's name out there just fine-- but it's just not the same as a real honest-to-goshness Apple ad to commemorate the Mac's 20th birthday. But if you need closure on that anecdote, you don't have to give up yet; there's still two weeks left until the big game, and the thinnest sliver of hope for those of you desperate for some sort of 20-year payoff: reportedly Apple "did inquire how many ad spots were left." It's not much to go on, but it does leave the door open a nanometer or two. But if a 20th anniversary Mac ad doesn't come to pass, ask yourself this: isn't no ad better than one that completely and totally muffs it? Sometimes you just have to acknowledge perfection, back away slowly, and let it belong to the ages.

Then again, if perfection times two is too daunting a goal, as long as any new commercial included a hot blonde in a tank top swinging something heavy, the fans would probably be pretty happy.