If anything separates Apple from the rest of the computer industry (other than startling attention to detail, a real concern for the user experience, and the ability to treat design as something other than an afterthought), it'd have to be fashion. Certainly since the first iMac made its Bondi Blue waves, the rest of the box-makers have been playing catch-up-- at least as far as looks are concerned. That's not to say that some of Apple's more daring visual experiments aren't a little questionable; the jury's still out on whether we, as a community, should consider "Flower Power" a Fashion Do or a Fashion Don't. But even as that debate rages on, Apple's softer, saner, default iMac hue just racked up an award.

It's true, people; according to Macworld, the International Color Committee has named Indigo the "color of the year." Who cares, you ask? Well, to a certain extent, you should, since the ICC decides what colors you'll have to choose from when random consumer goods show up on store shelves. Delegates from the US, the UK, Japan, Italy, and Germany have banded together to crown Indigo as the reigning Hue King, and thus you can expect a whole lot of muted blue stuff to surface over the next couple of years. If you're in the mood for some truly over-the-top analysis you should be aware that the editor of Viewpoint magazine has gone so far as to call Indigo the new white; it'll be everywhere this decade, contributing to a "blue minimalism." And that's good, see, because Indigo is "like the moment dawn breaks. That moment of translucency like an Indigo that's back-lit."

Bro-ther. Okay, yeah, maybe Mr. Viewpoint is laying it on a little thick, but still, we're happy to see that once again Apple is ahead of the fashion curve; the Indigo iMacs first strutted their stuff on the runway last July, and now they're the hippest thing out there, color-wise. We only see one downside to that fact; does this mean that in a year everything from cars to swimwear to coffeemakers and the kitchen sink is going to be Flower Power? Because we're not sure we could handle something like that...