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Apple have started an App Store fan page on Facebook. "Hello Hell, yes, I'd like to check if you guys have frozen over? You have? I thought so. Ballmer? Yeah, he's still alive - you can take him soon." Via the fan page, Apple will put up links to apps they recommend. It has over 28,000 fans already, so if you're a developer, this is a good thing.

Amazon are planning to release a Kindle iPad app. Hopefully Apple allow it on to the App Store - competition is a good thing. Plus then all that content I purchased for my Kindle won't be thrown down the toilet when I sell my Kindle once the iPad comes out.

Jean-Louis Gassée, former Apple executive, co-founder of of Be (who were supposed to be purchased by Apple, but Apple nabbed NeXT instead), is writing about how Palm stuffed it all up and should just go away and die as they're not even worth buying. ...

Welcome to another segment of Ask MacTalk. This is your chance to email me and ask a question regarding anything to do with Apple. You might have a technical issue you want solved, you might be seeking advice with a new computer, or just want to settle a bet with a friend. Either way, as long as it's Apple related, I will take a stab at answering one question, every Monday. If I pick your question to be answered, you win a $20 iTunes voucher!

If you have a question you'd like to ask, just email ask@mactalk.com.au - just note, not every email will be answered or published, so if it's something urgent, your best bet is to post on the forums.

The question this week comes from Judy Frazer. She wants some info about the iBook store and the iPad. ...

Jealous of your friends’ fancy media centres? You probably already have one!

I’m a total cheapskate. If there’s one thing I love, it’s getting stuff for free, and when it comes to my home media setup, I’m all about using what I have.

Although I’d love to buy an Apple TV with ATVFlash and run XBMC in my lounge room, the fact is that if you already have a current-gen HD console and you’re happy to work with their few constraints, you can kill two birds with one stone and can have a great, seamless media setup in multiple rooms without forking out any extra cash.

You may not get the face-meltingly pretty interface of some dedicated systems, but in the end it’s all about getting access to your digital content and playing it back with high fidelity, right? On this front, the Xbox 360 and PS3 have you covered. We’ll talk about using the Apple TV and Mac Mini as home media centres in future articles, which both do a stellar job of taking the home media interface to another level for those who have the time and money to invest. This guide goes out to those whose monthly spending invariably vanishes on video games and the machines that play them, and have not a penny to spare on dedicated hardware. ...

<img class="alignright size-full wp-image-5843" src="http://www.mactalk.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/HC-GG913_Jobs_20060311120024.gif" alt="HC-GG913_Jobs_20060311120024" width="136" height="231" />"<a href="http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/03/18/windows-phone-7-to-get-copy-paste-post-launch/">Windows Phone 7 Series will get copy and paste support post-launch</a>", says Boy Genius. According to well known blogger Long Zheng, copy and paste is an integral part of Windows Phone 7 Series, just not at the expense of a timely launch.

Parents with kids, prepare to surrender your iPhones to your children - <a href="http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/news/comments/fisher-price-releases-iphone-apps/">Fisher Price released some iPhone and iPod Touch apps</a> not too long ago. I'm no child (I voted and everything, okay?), but these apps look like standard Fisher Price fare - fun for kids, but you'll wish you never showed your three-year old exactly how much fun poking things on a screen can be!

"Developers must sequester the tablet computer in rooms with blacked-out windows", say BusinessWeek. They are, of course, referring to <a href="http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2010/tc20100318_833402.htm">those select iPad developers given special early access to the device</a> for testing purposes. Presumably they're also under NDA, but we'll just ignore that so you can read all the juicy details, okay?

<a href="http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/03/app-store-payola">Wired bust a move on some dodgy iPhone review sites</a> which are demanding iPhone developers pay them money for reviews on their websites. That's not to say that the sites have some serious Google-juice flowing, though - both unscrupulous websites appear in the top four search results for "iPhone app review".

...

This week saw the Google-Apple feud reach new heights with a four page report from The New York Times detailing the increasing rivalry between Steve Jobs and Eric Schmidt. An anonymous source inside Silicon Valley said in the article "It’s World War III. Amazing animosity is motivating two of the most powerful people in the industry ... This is the biggest ego battle in history. It’s incendiary." (Apple's Spat With Google Is Getting Personal - The New York Times). All of this while rumours were also brought up of a Google TV, directly competing with Apple's "hobby" device (Google and Partners Seek TV Foothold - The New York Times).

Despite the threat Android poses to the iPhone, many other smartphone users still want in on Apple's 170,000 app wonder. First we heard that 10% of all Microsoft employees are secret iPhone devotees (Forbidden Fruit: Microsoft Workers Hide Their iPhones - The Wall Street Journal) and now reports are also surfacing that 40% of Blackberry owners would happily swap in their little plastic keyboards for the big old touch screen that the iPhone boasts (40% of Blackberry users willing to trade in for an iPhone - Ars Technica).

"Mac OS X is like living in a farmhouse in the country with no locks, and Windows is living in a house with bars on the windows in the bad part of town", according to security expert Charlie Miller, who is just about to reveal a whole bunch of security holes found in our favourite OS (Mac OS X: "safer, but less secure" - The H Security). ...

<p style="text-align: center;"><img class="size-full wp-image-5825 aligncenter" title="ibooks_habits_20100225" src="http://www.mactalk.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/ibooks_habits_20100225.png" alt="ibooks_habits_20100225" width="575" height="432" /></p>

<em>This opinion piece was written by Nicholas Pyers, editor of the </em><a href="http://www.appleusers.org" target="_blank"><em>AppleUsers Spotlight</em></a><em> magazine.</em>

Despite the hype about how Apple's iPad is going to kill the traditional paper based book and other e-book readers like Amazon's Kindle, it is interesting to note that the much publicized iBooks application for the iPad is NOT actually installed on the iPad by default. Like the iTunes Remote App, it is a free, yet optional, download from the iTunes App Store. Users must make a conscious decision to hunt the iBook app down from amongst the myriad of 150,000+ other apps available from the Store and install it on their iPads - How many people will actually do this? I believe that had Apple included the iBook app as standard, everyone would try at least one book and then perhaps go on to purchase more? Hence, I must ask "Why haven't have Apple installed iBooks as a default application?" ...