Hey, let us throw a hypothetical at you: say you're running a multibillion-dollar international technology company. And say this company consistently earns millions of dollars in profits, and just posted its best fourth-quarter results in nine years. Let's also assume, for the sake of argument, that said company's stock price is currently up 122% for the year and has performed better over the past half-decade than Intel, Microsoft, and even Dell. Now let's say that all you get in return for producing all these spiffy financial accomplishments (aside from a boatload of stock and options and the occasional free jet) is a salary of one dollar each year. Yes, one measly buck. So where's your real compensation come from? Answer: cheesy awards!

Now, the super-astute among you may have clued in to the fact that we weren't really dealing in hypotheticals at all, but were in fact describing Steve Jobs as CEO of Apple. (Oooh, tricky.) Well, it seems the universe is due to make its quarterly payment in cheap kudos, because the Billboard Digital Entertainment Conference & Awards has announced its nominees, and while there are the typical nominations for Apple and its products (iTunes is up for "Best Downloadable or Subscription Music Service," while Apple's up for "Innovator of the Year" for creating iTunes and "Brand of the Year" for just being Apple), Steve himself is on the short list for walking away with a title seemingly tailor-made for his turtlenecked frame: assuming there's any justice in the world, come November 5th Steve Jobs will officially be "Visionary of the Year."

Of course, we're not actually convinced that there is any justice in the world, so it's probably worth mentioning the competition. First up is Mark Cuban, the chairman of HDNet, whose "vision" is apparently a cable service with all high-def programming-- you know, like the federal government has mandated all broadcasters do by the end of 2006 anyway. Sure, the odds of the feds actually enforcing that deadline are looking slimmer than a stick insect after liposuction, but still, we're not sensing much "vision" in moving to an existing standard before the government makes you do it anyway. Next.

Well, how about Will Wright? This is the guy behind the smash hit game-type thingy called The Sims, which we have a copy of here at the AtAT studios that Apple sent to us for free when we renewed our .Mac subscription last year. We've never even taken the shrinkwrap off of it, mostly because we're told it's like crack for people with God complexes, and we sleep little enough as it is. But we're perfectly willing to accept that modernizing the "ant farm" concept by switching to virtual people and then including a magnifying glass and a can of lighter fluid takes vision. The Sims is the best selling game-type thingy of all time, after all, so Will may well be worthy competition for Jobs on the "visionary" front.

Last and so darn least he needs to take off his shoes to brush his teeth, we've got-- can you believe this?-- Rob Glaser of RealNetworks. Yes, the same Rob Glaser whose "vision" was to pitch repeated hissy fits to the press because Apple refused to license the iPod's DRM to him, when Apple had zero earthly incentive or obligation to do so. The same Rob Glaser whose shining moment of inspiration was to liken Apple's policies to those of "communist Russia." The very same Rob Glaser who then decided to reverse-engineer the iPod's DRM without Apple's permission and tried to claim public support for the move by launching a "Freedom of Music Choice" web site so ill-conceived that the only people who cared enough to post did so to inform Glaser that he was a nimrod. Oh, and let's not forget his brilliant idea to sell songs at half-price for three weeks to double Real's share of the music download market-- while losing two million dollars in the process. Now that's vision, baby!

The winner will be announced on November 5th, and while we hope Steve wins, we'll be perfectly gracious should he not take the title. Unless, of course, he loses to Glaser, in which case we're flying to L.A. with a nail-spiked Louisville Slugger we've lovingly named "Cluebringer."