David Primo writes "Techeblog has a great article on the strangest iPod cases ever. Pictures included. From the article: 'This might be the first iPod case that costs more than the player itself. The Louis Vuitton Classic iPod Cover by Takashi Murakami features peach natural calf leather lining, golden brass pieces, and a multicolor canvas.'" The military-grade case actually makes sense for people like me who keep letting their mp3 player fall on the floor, but able to withstand a mortar shell explosion might be overkill.

PygmySurfer writes "Apple Computer on Monday revealed it had renewed contracts with the four largest record companies to sell songs through its iTunes digital store at 99 cents each. The agreements came after months of bargaining, and were a defeat for music companies that had been pushing for a variable pricing model."

WebHostingGuy wrote to mention an MSNBC article discussing a move by several Linux distributors to standardize on a set of components for desktop versions of the operating system. From the article: "The standard created by the Free Standards Group should make it easier for developers to write applications that will work on Linux versions from different distributors. Linux has a firm foothold as an operating system for servers -- it's popular for hosting Web sites, for instance -- but has only a few percent of the desktop market."