The time is almost at hand!  Apple announced this week the release date for the next major upgrade to its operating system - Mac OS 10.3, nicknamed “Panther”.  Panther was uncaged for a brief viewing back at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June.  Since then developers and beta testers have been fed a steady diet of beta releases.  Although we already know a little about Panther’s promise, there will surely be some surprises to come.  Apple stated this week that there are over 150 new features in Panther.  I covered some of the new features in a past article (Apple Lets “Cat Out Of The Bag” With Panther Preview, July 11, 2003), which is available on my web site at: http://macmaineiac.com/articles/07_11_03.html.  We’ll cover it in more detail when it’s released.

And when will that be?  Friday, October 24^th.  All the Apple Retail Stores, and many other authorized resellers, will be hosting “The Night of the Panther” from 8:00 PM to 12:00 PM.  These events are always fun.  At the 10.2 “Jaguar” event there were T-shirts, mouse pads, and in-store discounts.  If you’ve never been to an Apple Retail store, The Night of the Panther would be a great time to check one out.  The Rockingham Mall store in N.H. is probably the easiest to get to, and there’s the added benefit of no sales tax.

Also, expected to be announced at an October 16^th event is the opening of the iTunes Music Store for Windows, accompanied by the release of iTunes for Windows (the Music Store is accessed from within the iTunes application, hence the need for a Windows version).  After the unqualified success of the Mac-users-only iTunes Music Store, several pretenders have emerged - the schlocky rip-off BuyMusic.com; Dell, in their usual wanna-be style, announced not only a Music Store but a shameless iPod clone; just this week, Napster was reborn; and, of course, Microsoft has announced their intention to sell music on-line, although who knows when that will happen, given their penchant for vaporware.

iTunes for Windows is a big deal for Apple, because it’s a major skirmish in the war for media format use.  Apple’s music is distributed in AAC (Advanced Audio Codec) format, based on the MPEG-4 industry standard.  Other online stores distribute in Windows Media Audio format, and getting AAC onto Windows boxes would be a major foot in the door for Apple.

© 2003 Peter F. Zimowski