“Come See Our Latest Creation.”

That is the Apple event tag line for the event happening tomorrow at 10:00 am Cupertino time, which has only fed the rumors of an Apple tablet computer which have been swirling for years, but has only really gathered significant steam within the last several months.

Of course, any self-respecting Apple fan knows what they do right near Apple events: Make predictions! So, I’ll give out the likelihood of the major rumors and then throw out a few of my own.

Before I start, I want to throw out this warning. Any likelihood percentages are my arbitrary values only in order to give some sort of numerical value to the likelihood of items appearing. And as far as any speculation, all of it is just me thinking out loud, I have absolutely NO information that gives credence to my predictions.

The first rumor is the Big Kahuna, the 900-pound elephant in the room, the fabled Apple tablet. I, along with many in the Apple fan community, use this term rather loosely. By “tablet” I mean whatever Apple’s got up their sleeves, whether or not it resembles an actual “tablet” computer, per se. I will be interested to see what Apple is going to call it, and if this DOESN’T get unveiled tomorrow, I will be totally surprised.

However, I am more interested in what the tablet DOES, as well as the price point. I’m more interested in what Apple will do for e-books and other forms of e-publishing. I also want to see what Apple does in terms of self-publishing, ie whether Apple makes it easier or harder to self-publish your own books and/or cookbooks. And the price point for a device of this magnitude is equally important, if not more so.

My prediction for this is that Apple will enforce their own definition of “sub-$1,000″ (ie $999) for the price of the tablet. I will be totally surprised if the tablet is anything less than that. Of course, I’m not exactly believing Alex Albrecht of DiggNation on this (he’s @AlexAlbrecht on Twitter if you wish to follow him). Alex Albrecht said, to recap, that we would be “surprised at [the Apple tablet's] price tag”. If he (somehow, against all odds to the contrary) proves to be right, I will bow to him publicly on Twitter.

LIKELIHOOD OF APPLE “TABLET”: 99.9999%

The next one is one that has been sort of bandied about over the last few months, but has only gotten serious credence within the last 2-3 days, and that is the rumors of Apple + Verizon Wireless, either for the iPhone or otherwise. All I am going to say on this is (since I have many friends as well as some family on Verizon Wireless) it’s about time. Whether it’ll be immediate or not is another thing entirely. This is likely, but not half as likely as that Apple “tablet”/netbook thingy.

LIKELIHOOD OF APPLE + VERIZON: 75%

Third, we have iLife (and implied iWork) updates. Since this is an annual thing right around this time (except for 2007 and 2008), this is an almost certainty that we’ll see this, probably before the Big Kahuna is revealed. However, while I don’t have ANY idea what is in these updates, and whether it’ll be called iLife/iWork ‘10 or iLife/iWork X remains to be seen, I have some issues with iLife in particular that I sincerely hope Apple fixes. Yes, I am going to be blunt on at least one of these, but seriously, these are just plain common sense ideas.

#1, iMovie ‘09 is awful and absolutely inadequate for 99.99% of Mac users, no matter what Apple throws in there to appease the naysayers. Please Apple, for the love of all that is holy, rename Final Cut Express (or FCE) “iMovie Pro”, drop Final Cut Studio’s price, and BE DONE WITH IT! I hope they have listened to the streams of folks buying FCE even though they had iMovie already.

#2, Garageband ‘09 is great for recording podcasts, but is there any way we can get ourselves situated to record a podcast in Garageband WITHOUT using an Automator script to get our settings right the first time? Isn’t Apple’s whole philosophy “simple and elegant”? So why, then, do we have to turn off everything that makes us mental in Garageband every single time we create a new podcast (or audio recording of our voice)?! Heck, creating templates is fine, but I’d like it if Garageband knew my favourite settings with regards to my voice track automatically so I didn’t have to fix it every single time!

#3, iPhoto is great, but seriously, for those of us with rather large libraries, iPhoto is a bear to open every single time I wish to sync pics from my iPhone (which is why I love Image Capture and use it as my default). The organization features you keep adding are wonderful, Apple, PLEASE keep ‘em coming. But please, figure out a way to have iPhoto open within 5 seconds for those of us poor souls without SSDs… yet.

#4, I really feel like iDVD is totally missing something, especially if you don’t make very many DVDs (like yours truly). If you can figure out a way to give us users a way to host user-generated content on iTunes, then do it, PLEASE. Plus that rumoured iTunes LP & iTunes Extras integration that was so heavily rumoured a couple of months ago if you don’t mind, please.

#5, Another totally unused member of the iLife suite, at least for me, is iWeb. I don’t use it mainly because I don’t have MobileMe because it costs $100 a year to get a Me.com account! If Apple were to either a) fairly price MobileMe for new users, or b) offer 1 or 2 years for $0 with any new Mac purchases, that alone would make life significantly easier for all of us young Mac geeks!

All right, now that my complaining about the iLife suite is over, how about some interesting iWork suggestions, Apple?

#1, I use Pages. A LOT. I use it mainly for school work and working up documents on any spare time I have. But seriously, I would love to see some external functionality that was added to iWork 09 (namely the equation editor and the really awesome bibliography stuff) be put into the Pages app itself so we don’t have to go and purchase an additional plugin for upwards of $600 (excluding any academia discounts)! That would be truly awesome, and maybe, just maybe, could you even have a way to do especially strange mathematical symbols (like definite integrals) and other crazy mathematical stuff without having to resort to learning LaTEX (pronounced “la-tech”)? Pretty please with a Rainier cherry on top?

#2, I don’t use Numbers OR Keynote that much, but it is nice to have that functionality when I need it. One problem I’m having with Numbers when I do use it is that if I wanted to do, say, a complex mathematical formula (i.e. not “SUM” or “AVERAGE”) that I know from Excel, I would at least appreciate it deeply if that functionality was there. Could you do that, Apple? Please? And as for Keynote, I’d love to be able to create great presentations that work on Windows (whether thru iWork.com or some other solution) effortlessly and easily so that I do NOT have to create a separate PPT doc every single time I have to do a class presentation (which is becoming less & less often, but it still will have to come up from time to time). Could you do that, pretty please?

#3, I love iWork, but there are lots of things that probably SHOULD be included to make it a genuine competitor to MS Office (and justify the inevitable $79 price tag). First and foremost, how about a MS Access clone (ie database apps)? You guys just so happen to have a perfectly good one with your buddies at FileMaker, makers of Bento. Could you please integrate Bento into iWork ‘10/X please? Thanks! Secondly, there is no companion to the following MS Office apps in iWork thus far (excluding the aforementioned Access): OneNote, Project, and Visio, which is a diagramming application, specifically for the dreaded “org sheets” (Dilbert fans as well as seasoned cube dwellers know EXACTLY what I am talking about). If this were offered in iWork for Mac OS X, it would be a major coup, especially in order to get more offices onboard with the Macintosh platform.

So, after all of that, I think I’ve exhausted that particular subject.

LIKELIHOOD OF iLIFE/iWORK UPDATES: 99.9999%

Finally, the rumors have been swirling about iPhone OS 4.0. I have no idea what is going to be in it, although I would love to see a FM radio app, maybe even built into the iPod app specifically for iPhone 3G, 3GS, and 2G/3G iPod touch users (where the hardware supports such a thing). My guess is it’ll only be a sneak peek for now, with a release at WWDC 2010 in San Francisco.

LIKELIHOOD OF iPHONE OS 4.0: 100%

And now for my own predictions (good grief this is getting lengthy):

1) An iTunes update is almost inevitable at this point, maybe even iTunes 10 (or iTunes X, since Apple tends to love the ‘X’ for ‘10′ naming scheme). While I don’t know what will be in this mythical iTunes update, I do have a wishlist. First of all, a truly unified iTunes Store interface, bringing the audiobook pages and any other pages that might still be on the old interface up to speed. Secondly, I would love to see Apple totally redoing the iTunes code from the ground up in Objective-C, a lot like what they did with Snow Leopard, allowing iTunes to be 3x faster at performing certain tasks and not being such a darn resource hog, even on Mac OS X. Any other iTunes upgrades (possibly even plugins, allowing the easy creation of new plugins by iTunes users to extend the functionality of iTunes) will be icing on the cake.

2) There has been absolutely nothing made of the invitation of certain high profile gaming blogs to the 3-ring media circus that will inevitably happen tomorrow. Plus, GOG.com (a site I have evangelized heavily in the past) is touting a big, huge announcement “unlike any in the history of GOG” with a giant countdown clock that ends at 12:00 pm Warsaw, Poland time on Thursday, January 27th. Using only this incredibly circumstantial connection (and the fact that Apple rarely invites super specialized media that isn’t the Apple press without throwing them and their constituency a pretty large bone), I have come to this conclusion: GOG.com (nee CD Projekt), along with their big huge announcement on Thursday, will announce some kind of site upgrade the day before, at Apple’s big huge media event, proclaiming GOG.com games will run natively on Mac OS X without the user running Windows XP, Windows Vista, or Windows 7 OR having to use some cross-platform porting technology like, say, Cider or some such! This, in all honesty, would be HUGE to the Mac gaming community, mainly because the Mac has almost always been put down as “the Mac isn’t a good games platform” (even in the face of the Marathon trilogy, Pathways Into Darkness, Dark Castle, and many other Mac games that were largely exclusive to the Mac platform). Yes, we have gotten some pretty awful optimized ports of games as well (see GH3 & GH Aerosmith), but I feel that the Mac is an underutilized platform for playing games on, and if GOG.com (and possibly Steam) were enabled to create Mac OS X-native versions of the games that they sell WITHOUT using Cider or Wine or any number of other cross-platform porting technologies and techniques, then that would be a huge boon for Mac OS X development and spur concurrent Mac development of upcoming big-name PC titles that are truly optimized for Macs natively (as well as bring lots of other interesting items to the Mac platform, such as the astrological program Solar Fire *wink wink nudge nudge*).

3) My final predictions are ones that people will probably see coming, and that is Macintosh hardware updates. The MacBook just got a plastic unibody enclosure, so that plastic monstrosity will be staying awhile, and the Mac Mini recently got hardware upgrades, but the Apple TV has basically sat stagnant since the final MacWorld Expo Apple attended (and probably before). More folks are buying Mac Minis instead of Apple TVs, and that is mainly for the home theatre PC (or HTPC) functionality Apple rarely advertises, wherein one can do far more things on a Mac Mini than one can do on an Apple TV, hacked or no.

So, my prediction is that the AppleTV will be discontinued as of Wednesday, January 27th, 2010 and the Mac Mini will be price-dropped to be in line with what the AppleTV was priced at, like starting at $200 or something like that (and plussed with HTPC essentials like HDMI, component, and a certain “bag of hurt” that should have been on the Mini all along). This way, all the desktop Mac products can be reasonably “plussed” and price-dropped to be in line with this new strategy. On the laptop side, Apple’s been raked over the coals by these little tiny devices called “netbooks”, which have cut significant corners hardware-wise in order to be as dirt cheap as they are. Apple really should price drop its Mac notebooks to be in line with a) the MacBook Air (which is basically Apple’s “netbook” already) being priced at $499 or $599 (or both, ya never know), as well as the plastic MacBook dropping to $799 or so, with the MacBook Pro starting now at $999 (not a “pro” price at all), possibly with the 9400M AND the 9600M GT, which should have been on the lower end MB, MBA, and MBP models in the first place in my opinion.

So, we will see in roughly 24 hours if I nailed it or not. Hopefully I can do a wrapup post shortly thereafter after I’ve had a chance to disseminate and process all the information from tomorrow’s big, huge event.

An Update & A Bit More Crowdsourcing

Okay, first an update on the iTunes problem I ran into. I did a clean install of OS X (actually, I reinstalled OS X 10.5 and THEN reinstalled 10.6, but we’re getting overly technical and geeky here), and the problem has indeed gone away!! So a clean install will fix the problem for those of you who still have this problem.

Now, I am in need of your help again. I’m not an expert whatsoever on hosted WordPress blogs rather than DIY WordPress installations, so I don’t know if this could happen or not.

My goal is to install a few plugins on this blog to make certain improvements to the blog (up to and including giving you notifications on new comments as they arrive/get approved). Hopefully someone who is far more knowledgeable than I will be able to help me.

Also, speaking of approvals, I’m writing up this new post on the WordPress 2 iPhone app, so I can now moderate comments that much faster, even from the road!

Thanks for your patience on this issue, and I hope to put up a few more posts AFTER the holidays!

So, happy holidays to you and yours, no matter what you celebrate (be it Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Christmas, or some other holiday)!

My iTunes Account Access Problem

Like the aforementioned cookie problem, I have had a problem accessing my iTunes account ever since I updated to Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard and iTunes 9.0!

The solution someone posed is: Get a new iTunes account! Why, I never! I want to be able to access all the TV shows I purchased AS WELL AS access my account! Why can’t I do that?!

I first will click on either the Account button or my iTunes Apple ID at the top…

…And then I enter my user data…

(Censored out, of course)

…And then THIS comes up! No error messages, nothing!

So, what am I doing wrong?

My iTunes Cookie Problem

This is so I don’t have to explain my iTunes problem to very many other people in words, because words fail me. This is what happens when I try to redeem an iTunes gift card, and it’s been giving me the same sorts of problems with regard to accessing my account.

I enter a gift card code…

…And I get this error message. I click More Info…

…And I get this screen!!!

Are my cookies THAT borked so as not to recognize which OS I’m on? Truly strange.

Mac 20 Questions

Okay guys, you know that project I couldn’t speak about during my last post?  Well, now I can speak about it, because I was interviewed on the Mac 20 Questions podcast, which asks 20 questions of different people about how they use their Macs.  The episode in question should be up as you read this post.

It was a lot of fun to record that interview, Skype dropouts and all.  Thank you David Allen, and thank you in advance to everyone who listens!

Update from Me

Okay, folks.  I know I haven’t been blogging in awhile, but there’s so much to talk about related to the blog.  First, you may notice that the site has been upgraded just a mite with a few widgets, including a Twitter widget!

Also, I have made a decision that I’ve been meaning to do for a nice long while: I have chosen to delete all my blogs except for this one.  This blog is now my main blog and will remain so for the foreseeable future.  I just didn’t have enough time in the day to update all my blogs!  So, this problem snowballed to the point where NONE of them got updated.  I really didn’t want to not blog, so I decided to eliminate some blogs, and this one was one I really wanted to keep up to date as much as possible.

The third and final thing today is that I have uploaded my first ScreenSteps tutorial to the site!

Of course, there is “one more thing”… but it’s not set in stone yet, so I have to tease this one.  I’ll be sure to plug it once I have more details.

Apple’s Future

I’m sure everybody and their sister has heard about Apple CEO Steve Jobs taking a 6-month or so medical leave from the company.

Also, I’m supremely sure everybody has heard the same old boring, tired argument that “Apple can’t replace Steve Jobs.”  And I’m hoping everyone read MacWorld’s piece on the “triumvirate” of Tim Cook, Jony Ive, and Phil Schiller.

One thing that Steve is known for is the “cool factor” he brings to Apple’s product line.  Another is the product development, vision, and marketing that Steve has introduced with the iPod, the iPhone, and, yes, the MacBooks.

Allow me to submit my own name, BJ Wanlund, for consideration to be the new CEO of Apple Inc.

I am nothing more than an idea guy.  But I have numerous wonderful and fantastic ideas for Apple, if this were to come to fruition.  Most of them rely on one thing: Apple’s knack for creating a) fantastic consumer electronics hardware, b) amazing services that use iTunes, the world’s most stable sales platform, as a jumping-off point, and c) the most amazing, simple, and easy-to-use software products anywhere.

Even if Apple decided to put me in as Senior Vice President of Blue Sky Development, I’d be more than happy to fulfill that sort of role.  You see, I’ve always wanted to be an Imagineer, but my strengths lie solely in ideas, and also writing, and maybe a bit of nomenclature as well.  I also have some extremely eclectic taste in music, and that’s something Steve is also known for.  Also, I am wild about movies (although I am picky about which ones I see in the theaters, much to my detriment sometimes) and very wild about TV shows.  (Oh, and Apple, would you PLEASE get on putting Star Trek: The Next Generation on iTunes???  It’s been long enough!!)

Let’s hope everyone can see some great products coming out of Apple for a long time to come.

Oh, and one more thing…

Let’s talk about Macworld real quick here.  iWork 09 and iLife 09 are both either out right now or coming out shortly.  iWork 09 sounds like a product I’d be really happy to get my dirty paws on, and iLife also sounds good.  Being a daily Pages user, the Pages changes are pretty darn awesome!  They also put out the 17″ unibody MacBook Pro with an embedded extended-life battery… for the EXACT SAME PRICE they have it at now.  And they also announced: DRM-free iTunes!!!  YAY!!  Although paying upwards of $250-300 for the privilege is a bit high and mighty…

Software Piracy and What I See As a Fix

Okay, here’s the deal: Thanks to the Shane R. Monroe show “Car Talk” (found at cartalk.monroeworld.com for now), which will certainly be renamed in the future, an issue came up that I feel I need to tackle on this blog: Software piracy.

Now, I don’t condone software piracy, but the anti-piracy measures some companies take on absolutely boils my blood.  All these software companies decide to blame piracy for “poor sales” when they’ve only got themselves to blame for a very large chunk of it.

Some examples of this are: “Oh, we have this fully-functional trial version, but we deliberately screwed with this one feature you really want, so if you want it fully-featured, you gotta pay up!” or (and this is rich) “Oh, we see you’re downloading our demo.  Oh, and we almost forgot to tell you that you only have a few hours or days to try our program before it breaks and you must pay up to continue using it!! (insert evil maniacal laugh here)”

This is absolute insanity, and the rest of this post will be a plea for a modicum of sanity.  However, I must say that I am no longer using any of Rogue Amoeba’s “fully-functional trials with one feature deliberately screwed with” that I mentioned above, thanks to Benjamin Fryxell over at macmaniapodcast.com!  He gave me a free license to WireTap Studio, and I now can say with absolute certainty that I’ll be using this application IN PLACE OF Audio Hijack Pro for a nice long time to come.  Thanks again Ben!

Now, back to the topic at hand.  There is but one bright spot in this unstable environment, and I want to fully disclose before I go on that I recently got an iPhone 3G, so the following discussion of the App Store is probably going to be a bit biased.

Now, that being said, the App Store is the lone sane idea in operation.  The idea is that Apple approves apps for the App Store, and you have to develop apps to Apple’s specifications, which I admit are vague and spotty in places, but for the most part, Apple has a remarkable track record in the App Store’s day-to-day operations.

Also, the DRM is included in every app, and all apps go to all iPhone and iPod Touch owners.  This (to me) makes far more sense than playing with SecuROM or any number of other protection schemes designed to fight software piracy (and losing at it).  The App Store is beautifully executed for the most part, and this is THE solution for software piracy going forward.

So, what do I want to see as a fix?  Since iTunes is on both Windows AND Macintosh (in essence, it covers 99.9% of the computer market), I want to see Apple expanding the App Store to both Windows AND Mac computer software.  This will help the fight against software piracy, and it will have a farther reach than Steam or any other solution for this kind of thing ever will (and I’ll bet Apple will get Valve and company on board and have Steam integrated within iTunes on both platforms, which would probably save Mac gamers a considerable amount of grief concerning certain games).  Also, each application or game has a demo, just like with Xbox Live Arcade.  This wouldn’t be just for games, though.  It would also be for applications like iLife, iWork, and many other pieces of software.  In fact, Apple could even reduce packaging for the bundled software to nothing with this solution, and come up with many more optical drive-free computers a la the MacBook Air.

So, a solution that not only helps software piracy, but appeases the idiots at Greenpeace at the same time.  It’s a win-win for Apple.  Beats me why they haven’t used this solution yet.

Wow, it’s been THAT long?!

Hi guys!

Here are a few Mac things I need to get out of the way:

First, I got a new iPod Nano, and I was having a few problems with it (mainly album artwork issues, funny as that may sound).  For a quickie review: ABSOLUTELY try it at your local Apple Store or Best Buy.  I would not buy it again, let’s just get that out there.  It’s a great iPod, but I’m really being left cold by the experience so far.  It’s all right, but it’s just not my cup of Mocha Frappucino.  

It’s a bit small, and a bit thin.  Also, the Cover Flow with accelerometer is the most easily-activated feature on this device!  I had to turn it off, using the latest firmware update, because it was just too easy to activate Cover Flow, especially how I use the iPod (i.e. I have it inside a jacket pocket with my hand on the clickwheel).  If I had been given a choice, I’d have chosen something else.  Whoever made the decision to put an accelerometer into the iPod nano 4G needs to be drawn, quartered, and shot, because in real life, it really hinders the usefulness of the iPod UNLESS you turn those features off!

Also, the iPod earbuds are just as fragile as ever.  They’re already in the trash, and I’ve only used them for maybe a month before they gave out.  Let’s hope the delay for those new earbuds are because they need to make these FAR sturdier!

Now, I want to talk a little bit about the new Macbooks.  Okay, the design is great, and thank God they went away from Intel’s horrid integrated graphics.  And it’s great the new Macbooks are aluminum!  But, here’s my big complaint about them: NO BLU-RAY!  Since they have HDCP built into the new Macs, SURELY they could’ve put a Blu-Ray drive in these things, no matter whether from a licensing perspective, it was a “bag of hurt” or not.  That really burns.

Okay, hopefully I’ll be less of an interval till my next post.

What’s on YOUR iPod?

Hey guys, long time no post.  I’m planning on putting up my iTunes columns sometime this week or next, so be on the lookout for those.

I just got a new iPod, a review is forthcoming.  Again, be on the lookout for that.

And on that note, I got an idea while listening to my new iPod: What’s on the regular Joe’s iPod?  We have all these great playlists from celebrities like Michael Cera on iTunes, but what about the guys like you or me (since Apple ain’t looking toward the blogosphere for celebrities to make their playlists anytime soon…)?

So here’s the criteria: 25 songs and 10 albums that you couldn’t live without on your iPod.  So, to kick things off, here’s my list:

Albums:

1. Heart – Heart (1985).  Greatest album ever.  Nuff said.
2. Anne Murray – A Little Good News (1983).  One of the best singers period, Canadian or otherwise.
3. Holly Near and Ronnie Gilbert – Lifeline Extended (2006).  One of the best live albums to ever grace CD, cassette or iPod.
4. Genesis – We Can’t Dance (1991).  I absolutely LOVE this album by Genesis.
5. Linda Ronstadt feat. Aaron Neville – Cry Like A Rainstorm, Howl Like The Wind (1989).  Linda Ronstadt’s pop return, and ome of my absolute favourite albums period.
6. Phil Collins – No Jacket Required.  I had a tape of this that I wore out (literally).  My favorites are Don’t Lose My Number, Sussudio and Inside Out.
7. Peter, Paul, and Mary – No Easy Walk to Freedom.  Songs of conscience, along with PP&M’s comeback!  What could be any better?
8. Bonnie Raitt – Luck of the Draw.  Bonnie Raitt’s very best, by far.
9. Heart – Alive in Seattle (2003).  Another fantastic live album from the best live band around.

Songs:

1. Linda Ronstadt: When I Grow Too Old To Dream – Off her Living In The U.S.A. album, she performed this ditty when she guest-starred on The Muppet Show alongside Kermit, who’d been locked in with Gonzo’s mold collection almost the entire show.  Still puts a chill up my spine every time I listen.
2. Bette Midler: From A Distance – Off her Some People’s Lives album, Bette Midler is truly and utterly in her element here, and from a distance, all seems calm, even today.
3. John Fogerty: Gunslinger – Off his Revival album, John Fogerty calls for someone to upset the balance of power.  Boy, did he get what he wished for (and we all benefited).
4. Joni Mitchell: Woman of Heart and Mind – Off her For The Roses album, this just so happens to be one of my all-time favorites.
5. Bonnie Raitt: Not The Only One – Off her Luck of the Draw album, Bonnie Raitt knows that she isn’t the only lonely one.
6. Bruce Springsteen: Magic – Off his recent album of the same name, Bruce warns us of what will be when we believe the words of a press “magician”.
7. Jimmy Buffett: They Don’t Dance Like Carmen No More – Off A White Sportcoat and a Pink Crustacean, Jimmy Buffett wistfully recalls Carmen Miranda’s reign on the movie screen…
8. Linda Ronstadt: Different Drum – from Linda Ronstadt’s stint with her short-lived backup band, The Stone Poneys, this song evokes rebelliousness.
9. Los Lobos: La Bamba – from Just Another Band from East LA, this is one of those Spanish-language standards that gets an updated twist.
10. Martina McBride: Anyway – a recent single, Martina McBride (whom I first heard singing the end theme from A Muppet Christmas Carol) kicks it up several notches in the country music realm.
11. Mary Chapin Carpenter: Passionate Kisses – From Come On Come On, this was originally a Lucinda Williams song (!), and Mary Chapin Carpenter (despite what she says) gives it a country twist.
12. Olivia Newton-John: Physical – From, well, Physical, Olivia Newton-John sings about physical contact with the opposite sex with a very upbeat tempo.  Unfortunately, several people got things mixed up because Olivia (being the sexy woman she was back then) dressed up in a fashionable exercise outfit…
13. Pat Benatar: Helter Skelter – From Precious Time, Pat Benatar does her rockin’ Beatles cover.
14. Paula Abdul: Dance Like There’s No Tomorrow – A rather recent Paula single, she brings the pop again due to her exposure-grabbing stint as a judge on American Idol.
15. Peter, Paul & Mary: Light One Candle – From No Easy Walk to Freedom, this song of conscience, disguised as a song about the Hanukkah story, rings true even today.
16. Phil Collins: Inside Out – From No Jacket Required, this is easily one of my favorites.
17. REO Speedwagon: Ridin’ The Storm Out – From Ridin’ The Storm Out, this seems to be a fixture at Brevard College women’s basketball games.
18. Poison: Talk Dirty to Me – This song was featured on Guitar Hero 3, which is how I managed to get into this song.
19. Ray Parker Junior: Ghostbusters – Who DOESN’T love this song??
20. Pretenders: I’ll Stand By You – From Last of the Independents, this song should be the anthem of all faithful men and women.
21. Reba McEntire: The Night The Lights Went Out In Georgia – Originated by Vicki Lawrence, Reba took this song to a whole other level, and with the music video, explained the song’s complicated imagery quite well (a rarity for music videos of the time).
22. Sal: Devil May Care – The theme song for the Devil May Care audiobook in the UK, it’s one heck of a good song (and I do believe you can still download the song from MySpace, but if not, go to the band’s offical website, http://www.saltheband.co.uk/).
23. Steve Goodman: Go Cubs Go – The Chicago Cubs theme song these days (always is played upon every Cubs victory), what a great song!
24. Van Halen: When It’s Love – How do you NOT mention one of the greatest rock and roll bands ever?
25. The Who: Baba O’Riley – Contrary to popular belief, it’s NOT called “Teenage Wasteland”.  From Who’s Next, one of The Who’s most popular songs ever, and just got put up on the Rock Band store for download this summer.

So, I hear you wondering, “How do I send MY list in?  This guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about!”  Well, here’s how you do it:

1. Send me an email, supermacgeek@gmail.com with the subject line “What’s On My iPod” (without the quotes preferrably)
2. Give me a list of 10 albums and 25 songs you absolutely cannot live without on your iPod with a brief description along with your name so I can credit you (both in the title and in the actual post).

I’ll post them when I can (and when I get usable lists)!