Its is being reported that Steve Jobs, Apple CEO, was questioned with his attorneys present, by investigators presumably from the Department of Justice that is investigating Apple’s backdating of stock options.

Apple took an $84 million charge relating to the issue last quarter and internal company investigators cleared Jobs of any wrong doing, but Department of Justice Investigators are digging further for their own reasons.  Steve Jobs has not admitted to any wrong doing and several senior Apple insiders have left the company, even though they do not admit to any wrong doing either.

The back dating scandal at Apple does not yet seem material compared to Apple’s bottom line, but investigators unlike auditors have to look into the criminal aspect as well.

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I am reviewing a software designed to make it easy to generate drill down menus on web pages and blogs.  This is a task that I have done quite a bit of html work with in dreamweaver and even some work in flash.  However, I am always on the lookout for something that makes this task easier and much more practical.

AllWebMeus can be downloaded for free in a limited edition and full licenses are available for $29.95 (lite versions) and $39.95 for the full pro version, plus bundled option that include templates created by the software creator, Likno for various additional amounts all under $100.  Likno provides DHTML Menu Maker software program available for download.

For anyone that has ever spent hours creating menus and fine tuning them only to go back and revamp them when a new page or button is needed, these prices may seem rather cheap compared to the time saved.

I’m looking forward to trying out the trial version, and hope even to generate some groovy menu butttons here on the Maven Mapper’s Information blog.  If it turns out good, I’ll even recommend it to my web design customers!

I do have to admit that I am very excited to try out this product.  Likno is sponsoring this article, but regardless they are offering up a great idea.

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Here is a five minute video of the NYTimes coverage of the iPhone including Steve Jobs keynote speach.  The video does not include any coverage of the lawsuit that followed the launch of the device shortly there after.

The iPhone may or may not be a success, but this keynote is definitely a great example of the right way to launch a product and demo it to a crowd that already expects the device.

It is almost unfortunate that Apple was not able to put aside some of their other regulatory and legal trademark issues that are now detracting from the launch.  Funny how LG, didn’t have the same problem nor the same buzz for its very similar device that doesn’t hold a name trademarked by a different company.

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This week when I attended the Consumer Electronics Show, myself and several people at the show had a group epiphany about High Definition television as  we watched a HD TV at the Samsung booth. 

The HD TV on display (one of several dozen) was playing The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe (aka Narnia for those that haven’t read the book).  I was standing next to a buyer from a retailer.  As I watched the pivotal battle scene at the end, I noticed that the makeup on the characters looked ludicrously fake.  Many of the characters looked like they had just walked in from trick-or-treating to cameo in the battle scene.

These were not extras or animated characters but supporting role type characters.  The HD TV provided such clear definition that you could see that the makeup was very fake.  The blurred line between fiction and reality had been removed and the reality pretending to be fiction was revealed. 

I started speaking about it with the buyer and he and a couple other viewers commented as well that the Movie Industry would need to up their game to keep up with the technology.  The more I thought about it, the more I realized that the Movie and TV industry would have to get better, but TV manufacturers, distributors and retailers might experience some pain as well.

After all who wants to spend several thousand dollars on a TV only to have a film revealed as a cheap looking fake.  There is no fun in watching a magic act if you can see the slight of hand in every move transmitted in vivid detail as it happens and the same goes for HD TV and the movies and shows they play.  It is an incredible medium for watching reality from sports to nature shows, but staged events and movies are more closely being revealed for the fakes that they are. 

The puppet masters are going to have to find a new method for guiding a puppet without any visible strings.

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Every now and then in corporate life, you are doing some work, possibly some research, possibly you just need a quick download tool and the company’s IT jackbooted thugs have setup some type of protocol that prevents you from doing something entirely reasonable.

You just can not get past the firewall, you can view a video, you can not get a plugin download or you can not get to a website that is attacking your company to confirm that the offense is happening before you call the lawyers.  Sometimes even worse you can not get to you supplier or customer or partners website to perform some critical step in the wee hours of the night.

You can get past these blocks with a web based proxy tool from our sponsor ProxyUnlimited.com.  Their site will allow you to bypass proxy controls setup by the neo IT nazis such that you can get to the information that you have to have.

All you have to do is go to their website at www.proxyunlimited.com and enter the destination web URL that you are attempting to get to and their web tools will handle the rest for you.  When you click enter, you will see the actual site you are trying to get to, but the URL in the address bar remains listed under proxyunlimited.com plus a code that looks like an encryption key.  So basically the URL is masked and you free to get the information you have to have and justify yourself only if need be and with the results you deliver.

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Apple has proved to be a marketing genius of a company over the years, but they have also made some rather silly and sometimes juvenile mistakes, like taunting The Beatles into litigation by naming their music software with a name that sounds like “Sue Me.”

This week they may have made another juvenile mistake with the launch of their iPhone.  It appears that they failed at least to get all of their ducks in a row.  According to reports from Cisco, Apple and Cisco had been in talks concerning Apple’s use of the iPhone trademark owned by Cisco, who recently released a VOIP phone with the same name.

It would appear that the parties were close to a deal.  However, close is not typically considered good enough for most corporate lawyers and so when Apple rushed to launch their iPhone at MacWorld without first signing a release from Cisco, Cisco seemed to have little if any other choice than to sue Apple to protect their trademark or risk defaulting on it all together.

Apple responded with indications that they thought Cisco was being silly and that they were the first to offer a cellular phone with the name of iPhone as opposed to the wireless phone that Cisco had offered with the same name.

Let’s hope that Bill Clinton doesn’t represent one of these companies in a battle over the definition of what “is wireless” and what “is cellular.”  The technologies are obviously distinct, but this would raise other questions of products that are similar, like a sandwich shop that offered a Whopper of a Submarine sandwich.  Could they argue that a submarine sandwich named the whopper is nothing like a Burger King Whopper that is a grilled cheese burger?  What if the whopper comes with Lettuce?

Regardless Apple seems to have embroiled if not invited itself into litigation that is frittering away shareholder value.  As such it would seem that they may have been in a rush to launch this product and may have phoned in the iPhone like they phoned in the iRokr.

Maybe Apple just isn’t ready to play in the phone market?

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There was a great gadget at CES this year that really showed how convergence could bring out the inner super geek in attendees.  It was the R2-D2 DVD Projector from Nikko Home Electronics, a specialist in RC Cars and vehicles.

This is a very functional little droid.  It offers a built in projector that displays an image right out of R2-D2’s eye socket.  Instead of a semi transparent, holographic image, this projector instead provides a more terrestrial flat image on a wall or a projection screen.  The display image can range from 24 inches to 80 inches.

But that’s not all, this droid also packs a CD/DVD player that will play music or a video through that projector. 

You can control your droid with a remote control shaped liked the millennium falcon even with a pop out/slide out keypad.

And not even the rebel alliance can get by without making their droids compatible with an iPod.  So R2-D2 has a little docking bay that hides or pops out of the belly of the unit so that you can play your iTunes or even see the video display of MP4 videos through the projector.

Now this isn’t just some shaped like a robot type of device that you might see in Radio Shack, this little guy is actually pretty functional.  The remote control can make R2go forward, backwards, right turn, left turn and pivot turns and the head of the unit (with the projector) can swivel 90 degrees to the right and 180 degrees to the left.

The unit plays 11 different random R2-D2 sound effects, and one of the effects plays each time a compartment opens.  The device even has a memory card reader that will let you project images with the unit anywhere in the house.  When I say anywhere that includes the ceiling as R2 can recline his legs so that the projector will point at the ceiling at a 65 degree angle.

R2 has a built in 20 watt stereo system and an Fm wireless audio transmitter as well.

It looks like a toy and is a lot of fun, but really you getting a lot of functional electronics components converged into your Star Wars fantasy gadget for just $2500 (which isn’t too much more than a decent projector in the first place)

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Maven Mapper’s Information is undergoing a review of many different Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing Services, service providers and consultants. 

Today we are reviewing DiscountClick Online Marketing Services.  DiscountClick provides a suite of SEO and SEM services from link building services to SEO consulting to Natural Search Engine Optimization and PayPerClick Management.  Their SEO promotion includes an optimization consultation to analyze a clients company, their website and competitor websites.  From this point they will build a strategy with a targeted cost point to generate results and return on investment.

They also offer a Search Engine Optimization Tutorial guide that can help companies and potential clients gain a better appreciation for the importance of Search Engine Optimization and the work and art combined to create successful Search Engine Marketing results.

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I’m going to cover the new Apple iPhone in several articles as there are many different angles to consider for this device.  I’m going to start by laying out my assumptions on the product and the industry in this first article.

Apple Computer had built up a great many years of experience in the personal computer industry that they helped launch after receiving a vision of what the personal computer could be from Xerox PARC.  That early vision and many years of dedicated hard work and marketing led to the successful launch of their 1984 campaign.  Yes the marketing was key, but it was backed by almost twelve years of research and experience. 

Apple later offered up the iPod in 2001.  They moved into a market full of many different MP3 players and devices.  They later settled a lawsuit with Creative over technologies that they had apparently received a vision within the creative devices.  Apple leveraged this vision from Creative along with its excellent personal computer platform, marketing skills, and product design skills to launch the product and the iTunes service, convincing its customer base that it was cool again to pay for music at the pre-established industry rates of approximately $12-15 per CD.  The primary difference came in the form that buyers could by one song at a time.

Apple has now watched for several years as cell phone makers have begun to offer MP3 players of many varieties including an iTunes variety have entered the marketplace.  Apple had to enter into the cellphone business or face a converging force of cellphone MP3 players that would eventually remove the iPod to a level of obscurity recently witnessed by Palm PDA’s.

Apple made a serious false start in this direction stumbling over the iRokr in a collaboration with Motorola, that left both companies embittered and pointing fingers at each other.  Almost two years later Apple has now offered up an Apple iPhone and immediately launched itself into controversy.  A new lawsuit from Cisco, that owns the Trademark to the name iPhone is reminiscent of the 25 year legal battle between Apple Computer and Apple Corps. 

It should also be noted that Apple has not been entirely on its game this last year.  Its been restrained by a legal quagmire that has brought to light a stock options scandal.  The scandal led to an internal review by Apple, which has absolved Steve Jobs of any wrong doing.  However, the Justice Department of the United States, an external legal body that does not play to the tune of the Apple Board of Directors, announced that it is investigating the situation further as they prepare to question lawyers no longer employed by Apple.

Regardless of whether or not this new external legal investigation turns up anything, the entire scandal and investigation has been a large distraction for Steve Jobs and for Apple as a whole.  With these distractions occurring at almost the same time the company has prepared to launch what Steve Jobs considers a device as important to Apple as either the Mac or the iPod, we have to wonder if Apple may have missed something in this new device.

Many people have held MP3 players up to the standard of whether or not they will be iPod killers.  The truth is probably one that the iPod like any consumer electronic device has a predestined product life cycle.  It is not necessary to kill the iPod as it will die a slow and natural death of its own.  The iPhone will only serve to slightly extend this life cycle if it does anything at all.

In addition to all of these background items, its important to consider that Apple partnered with Cingular Wireless, which will be rebranded under the AT&T name this year.  Cingular as a brand name has held up a certain cool factor with youthful buyers.  However, AT&T, while it has a huge amount of brand recognition, definitely does not have a coolness associated with it.  In fact it could more aptly be associated with the dinosaurs of technology.  Apple has provided some undisclosed exclusivity arrangement with AT&T(Cingular) and this apparently has constrained the design and functionality of the device, a fact that we will cover in future installments.

Since the iPhone will be limited in distribution to AT&T customers, we have to wonder right away if the product will have much impact at all.  AT&T’s wireless business is large, but it does not cover the entire USA not to mention it has very little play outside of the United States.  This leads us to wonder if Apple in its distraction may have sold its soul to get the iPhone project out with a carrier that would accept it, under a trademark name owned by a different company where negotiations had failed, and at a price that will cost $400-$600 to get the device out of the store with a minimum two year contract at a monthly service fee of at least $80 per month.

At the end of the day how many people really will buy an iPhone for close to $2,400 when they could just as easily buy a Nano and a cell phone for less than $200 total on a $30 per month cell phone plan for a total 2 year cost of $920.  Is the iPhone really going to be worth a $1500 premium for Early adopters?  For Anyone? 

We’ll explore this greater detail as we proceed forward covering the Apple iPhone.

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