Here's a quickie that borders on the surreal: eagle-eyed faithful viewer Joey Nelson spotted something rather interesting about Apple's Pro Mouse White Paper. On the surface, the PDF document does pretty much what you'd expect: it describes the features of the new Pro Mouse in commendable detail. The bulk of its eleven-page length explores the advantages of the optical mouse over its more traditional ball-based brethren, describes the innovations Apple made to the existing technology (including improvements to the onboard digital signal processor and a redesigned lens), and explains the other features the company added to this impressive little rodent-- like a thinner USB cable for easier handling, the unique "buttonless" design, and the handy tension dial on its base to allow for easier clicking by users with smaller hands and/or a lighter touch. That's all well and good.

The bit that got us wondering, though, was the small-print legal statement on the last page. After the copyright info and the standard disclaimer about the material being provided for "information purposes only" and Apple assuming "no liability related to its use," there's a somewhat startling conclusion: "Apple does not recommend allowing an elephant to operate a Mac in any environment." Now, apart from our gut reaction that such a statement seems woefully unfair to the Mac-using elephant population, we couldn't help wondering, like Joey, whether Apple's legal department may indeed have a sense of humor after all.

Incidentally, the appearance of the elephant isn't as bizarre as we may have made it sound. The page before the disclaimer is devoted to the Pro Mouse's durability, noting that the outer shell "can withstand 700 pounds of force," which is allegedly strong enough that "an elephant stepping on the shell would just mush [ed. note: obviously an engineering term] it into the ground." So the elephant doesn't just come from out of nowhere (though that'd be a neat trick). Still, we can't help but wonder whether Apple's legal team is less stony-faced than its recent actions may have led us all to believe. Unless, of course, that elephant disclaimer was made in earnest, but that's too far-fetched a scenario even for us to swallow.