The little mouse that could, did.

Generate a lawsuit that is. Apple Inc. and CBS are being sued by a Maryland-based company called Man & Machine for use of the name “Mighty Mouse” for Apple’s innovative little input device. Apparently Man & Machine had dibs on the name as it pertains to input devices, as in waterproof and chemical-resistant industrial-strength mice.

It’s a very circuitous story, actually. I thought naming Apple’s new mouse after the super-rodent we all know and love might result in legal tussles, but when they never materialized I figured Steve took care of it ahead of time. And he did. Apple bought the rights to the name from CBS, who had owned it since 1955, for their new benippled, buttonless wonder.

Then, suddenly, out of a blue sky swoops in Man & Machine, coming to save the day. Apparently they came out with their hospital/lab-friendly version of Mighty Mouse more than a year before Apple’s version, and they now claim that the name, in the context of computer peripherals, belongs to them, thereby compelling themselves to sue both Apple and CBS for the injustice. Man & Machine wants to block Apple’s use of the Mighty Mouse name and get some cash for their trouble. (I think we all know why they took this long to sue, don’t we?)

If they succeed, any suggestions on a new name for it? Mightier Mouse? Rodent Roller? Mouse-k-Steer?

(Via 9to5Mac)

Apple CEO Steve Jobs has made the Time 100 Most Influential List again in the Builders & Titans category, hitting No. 82.

Quoting from the Time piece about Jobs by Barbara Kiviat:

Steve Jobs is great at playing the countercultural icon. He’s a college dropout who once backpacked around India looking for spiritual enlightenment, and he takes only $1 a year in salary. There are righteous battles to fight, and with Macs and iTunes and iPhones, Jobs fights them, taking on the entrenched megaliths that try to dictate our tastes in computers and music and mobile phones.

But don’t let the black mock turtleneck and denim trousers fool you. More than anything else, Jobs is a canny CEO who knows how to sell product. Steve Wozniak was the technical genius behind the first Apple computer; Jobs saw the marketability. He now presides over a company with $24 billion in annual sales and 22,000 employees. Jobs, 53, is revered by tech and design geeks, but the world’s business-school students may have the most to learn from him. Apple’s stock has shot up more than 70% over the past year, thanks to Jobs’ strategy of focusing on his most profitable customers and coming up with new things to sell them—the ultra-thin MacBook Air most recently—rather than just chasing more market share.

Jobs may be a celebrity CEO, but he doesn’t jump out of airplanes or traipse around Africa with bundles of cash. He is always in character and always on message, so much so that when late-night TV parodies him, he’s invariably rolling out some new iProduct . Jobs gets called mercurial, egomaniacal, a micromanager. If that sounds a little like a CEO doing his job, maybe that’s because he is—and a mighty fine one.”

See the Time 100 listing here.

You are what you make.

Some guy rendered Steve Jobs‘ face using Apple products. For the big picture, click here.

Apparently the new Movie Rentals feature is exclusive to newer hardware like the iPod Touch, iPhone, 3G Nano and iPod Classic. Does that mean the 5 and 5.5G iPod videos are out in the cold?

Yep.

I went back and rewatched the keynote and Steve-O did say it was for “current generation iPods”, but just once, and quickly. It’s one of those things that you hear, but is so unbelievable in the back of your mind you go, Nooo, that can’t be true, he must be kidding, so you gloss it over and pretend you didn’t hear it. That must have been Steve’s plan all along.

TUAW speculates that this is being done to prevent easy and casual piracy (as in jack it out via the video cable to a recorder, and boom, there goes the neighborhood), and I see where they’re coming from. But still, man. Millions will be up in arms.

I was about to tell my brother, who’s got a 5G, the good news (though he owns an iPod he’s a die-hard Windows guy and not a rabid Mac fanboy like me - must’ve been adopted - and doesn’t keep up with keynote addresses), but I think I’ll leave off telling him he’s SOL like a lot of other 5/5.5G owners out there. Better he finds out for himself.

Far be it for me to start blogging about Windows topics in a Mac blog, but this one is a special case. Yesterday at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Bill Gates, Microsoft Chairman and CEO gave the Keynote speech. Which, incidentally, is also his last one as he is retiring from Microsoft.

It’s interesting to note in comparison with a Steve Jobs Keynote how an MS Keynote would progress. For one thing they have more gimmicks and entertainment mixed in. They have to work harder (I guess because they have less interesting points to share), and there is a lot of creative stretching involved as well. Nothing to write home about though.

Our favorite gadget and tech sites gave it equal time and had online real-time coverage of the Bill’s CES Keynote, just like the Macworld Jobs keynote speeches. It’s kinda odd reading though, specially if you’re used to following Macworld coverages. Check out the live reportage of Gadgetell and Engadget.

One of the more entertaining moments is a seven-minute produced clip about Bill’s last day at Microsoft, with appearances by Matthew McConaughey, Jay-Z, Steven Spielberg, George Clooney, Jon Stewart, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and even Apple stalwarts Bono and Al Gore (Apple board member). It’s one of those things Apple could have done, but it’s a bit surprising Microsoft did it. Gizmodo’s Brian Lam says “this video makes Bill Gates look cooler than Steve Jobs”, and I agree (up to a point: Bill wore a pink shirt and a purple sweater to the Keynote).

I enjoyed the video immensely, and you can watch it for yourself here.

Bill, you old coot, we’re going to miss ye.