You may not write a lot of C functions in your code, but you'd using plenty of functions (and function like macros), which are part of Apple's frameworks. So you'll have to understand C functions if you write Objective-C code.

Not to mention that it often takes (me) more than one reading in order to retain the information in said book.

Well, to be fair, Apple's packaging has been covering all those points since the original iPod. And back then that kind of attention to packaging was fairly innovative for a consumer electronics product — as demonstrated by that infamous Microsoft internal training video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUXnJraKM3k

There seems to be ongoing confusion between innovation and invention. What you describe as Apple's innovation is what innovation is in general -- you start with an existing thing and improve it some way. Coming up with something completely new is invention and I don't think either Apple or Google do a lot of that.

Yeah, yeah DarkDust means the Location Services database "-gate", which you are right is not even remotely similar. In fact the two issues are as dissimilar as they can be. And here lies the most depressing thing — this will garner very little attention, especially outside of geek circles. I'd be surprised if this revelation, as egregious violation of privacy as it describes, will cause mainstream media excitement and force a congressional hearing and grilling like the Location Services thing did.

Sure they can do that, but will it really matter? By then they'll have lost a lot of money, a lot of market share, a lot of mind share and brand value. And switching to Android will not prevent the rest of the Android OEMs from gutting them. In fact it probably will be a much more brutal gutting, because while with WinPho7 Nokia are at least getting in the game early on in the life of the platform with Android they will be 5-ish years behind most of their competitors.

This has been the case throughout the whole of the last ten years and we've been eagerly awaiting said pioneer for at least 4-5 of them. Still nothing. I'm starting to suspect that there is actually no gold and that the only ones who haven't figured it out yet are some of the folks on Slashdot.

In what way GNUstep + GCC (+ presumably Linux) facilitate "systems [lock]down and ... prevent after-market modifications" more than "Android-esque / Java"?

Some of the biggest NeXT clients were precisely from the military, intelligence, banking, financial services and science communities. And they chose NeXT precisely because of Objective-C and NeXTStep.

Apple don't have to do squat to prevent iPad apps form being "recycled" on a Sony gadget - there are more than enough differences that cannot easily be compensated between this Sony platform and iOS for this to even be a possibility. For example Sony will be using Cairo instead of Apple's Quartz, so any drawing code in an app will have to be rewritten. Also GNUstep does not implement UIKit at all. It doesn't even mimic AppKit all that well. And reverse engineering and achieving parity with either framework is a gargantuan task. So any UI code in an app will also need to be rewritten, or at least significantly modified, at which point you might as well rewrite the whole application in an entirely different language/framework.

Each share of Apple stock is worth one N-th (where N is the total number of shares, which for Apple is about 900 million) of the company's book value. If Apple were to shut down tomorrow you'll get some sum of money without having to pass your shares to anybody.

Contrary to the obviously less than clued in article says, it's all Linux, be it Android, Chrome or WebOS.

But is it? When you have three completely distinct ways of writing applications, would you still count them as one OS simply because they have the same kernel? Would you be running a glorified browser, like ChromeOS, on a SuperDome Supercomputer?

If the PR team is planning to "manage the rumors", I'm hesitant to believe that the rumor is accurate. After all, if HP was really killing the Slate, why wouldn't they want word out as soon as possible, or why would they care about managing what's said?

Actually, I'm reading this exactly the opposite way - if HP were not killing the Slate a simple response would be sufficient, something like - "Of course no. That rumor is ludicrous. We are still shipping the Slate in the already announced timeframe."

On the other hand, if they are "killing" the Slate and, say, replacing it with the same hardware but running WebOS, they probably need time to assess how much time will that take, or whatever, so they can come out and say - "We are killing the current Slate device if favor of releasing so-and-so in six months."

I may, too, be reading it wrongly, though. Probably it's best if we don't assume either way until HP comment on the matter or release the device.

*takes a deep breath* FOR THE UMPTEENTH TIME, NOBODY IS ARGUING APPLE DIDN'T KNOW HIS IDENTITY! *and exhale* The point Doches is making, and completely agree with, is that we should not splatter his name and face all over teh intertubes and laugh at his expense. The guy has it quite hard as is and he can do without out visceral gloating.

Or any individual one of their employees, who have access to said servers. And when it comes to financial information, my position is no on both counts. I sure hope most people share my position.