Homina homina yikes, the recent spate of bad news just keeps on coming-- and the only upsides we see are a seemingly-limitless Fountain o' Drama™ and the happy circumstance of being able to use the word "spate" a lot. On top of a Panther intro marred by FireWire data loss and displays in the long-awaited 15-inch aluminum PowerBooks sprouting white spots like someone infected with the rare but dreaded Albino Chicken Pox (oh, sure, you laugh-- until you die), now rumors are spreading about a significant restructuring of the way Apple actually gets people to open their wallets. If we're understanding the alleged situation correctly, there may be real consequences to Apple's sales figures... especially since this is all coming just as we sail toward the holiday shopping season.

First of all, we've got Think Secret reporting that Apple is "firing many of its Representative Apple Executives (RAEs) across the U.S., replacing them with existing inside phone liaisons." RAEs apparently handled Apple's relationship with its Apple Specialists, those small dealers who are finding it increasingly difficult to compete with Apple's own online and retail stores-- and they're about to find it even tougher, since Think Secret asserts that Apple also plans to require that Apple Specialists sell AppleCare Protection Plans for a staggering 40% of all Macs they sell in order to qualify for discounts on demo equipment. (The conspiracy theory du jour is that Apple wants the dealers to sell more AppleCare so that the company gets the names, addresses, and other contact info of Specialist customers it can then snipe for direct sales later. Ooooo, sneaky.) Sounds like the pool of Specialists might be getting a mite shallower not long from now.

While alarming, that's not even really the scary part, at least as far as holiday sales go; specialists generally sell to niche-market professionals, and it's the average shmoes that drive holiday purchasing. But what's this? AppleInsider is reporting that Apple has severed its ties with MarketSource, those folks that put together Demo Days promotions and planted "Apple Representatives" at non-Apple Mac-selling retail chains. Granted, there aren't nearly as many non-Apple Mac-selling retail chains these days, but the ones that remain are reportedly going to find themselves sans Apple Reps real soon now. (Not CompUSA, though-- they're "said to be unaffected.") We all know what happens when potential Mac-buyers go shopping in a retail store without an Apple Rep: the personnel steers them toward whatever Wintel dreck is currently offering the highest sell-through bonus, and before they know it those potential Mac-buyers have sold their souls for a frickin' Presario or something.

Now, with luck, these changes (assuming they're true) don't reflect panicked cost-cutting on Apple's part, but rather the company's improving success with its own online and retail stores. Apple's got more retail locations sprouting up all the time-- two new stores opened over the weekend, and another one just outside of Chicago launches this Friday-- and we wouldn't be entirely surprised if the company it working toward eventually phasing out everyone else entirely, other than a few select retail chains and online/catalog resellers.

Crazy? Maybe. Crazy like a Jobs.

Okay, we don't really know what we mean by that.