Learned over the weekend that the latest version of Apple’s Mac OS is being called “Lion.” Wallpaper will be needed. This lion if one of two resident males at Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle. Click the image for a 1920 x 1200 wallpaper freely available for personal, non-commercial use.

You can check out my entire portfolio at Salmon Bay Photography.

I finally got a decent shot of one of the two snow leopard cubs at Woodland Park Zoo. Mac fanboys can rejoice! These cubs are a tough shoot. They are very quick and curious and seem to know how to not be photographed. Enjoy the wallpaper. I will keep photographing them.

These snow leopard photos and the wallpapers on my portfolio site, Salmon Bay Photography, are freely available for personal, non-commercial use. See my terms for the fine print.

1600 x 690 Snow Leopard

1280 x 552 Snow Leopard

Check out the snow leopards at Woodland Park Zoo.

Recently my trusty Creative MuVo mp3 player has been having a tough time with AAA battery life. I use this player for working out and long runs because I know that I will inevitably crush one of my iPods — and that just can’t happen. It is simple and holds an hour plus long playlist. The now constant battery changing is cumbersome. In service since at least 2002, if not earlier, it has had a good solid run.

About a week ago, I found myself in Staples with a large-ish reward coupon. Recycling ink cartridges there really does add up. So I took a chance on the Eclipse MP3 CL2, a 4 GB “old” iPod Shuffle knock-off. I have to say that I am pretty impressed with my impulse purchase. It is a nice little player for workouts. USB connection and a rechargeable battery. 4 GB memory put the old iPod Shuffle to shame. Worth checking out.

Lots of chatter about iPad as the Kindle killer. The chatter is bunk. Kindle has a specific target audience, a niche. That niche loves the Kindle. Niche is the new critical mass.

Look at some of the advantages Kindle has:

1. Battery Life. Kindle can last up to 7 days without a charge. Seriously.
2. Content delivery. Kindle has it included. No extra charges or higher price tag.
3. Readability. Do you want to read a backlit screen all day?
4. Opening an App Store that people will care about.

The iPad is a very slick device, but it will not be the only one to change the tablet game. Apple App Store developers will start to run into some of the issues that cross-platform mobile developers are dealing with. Namely screen size and incompatible devices. Apple has been very smart with their device hardware and software release cycles. This will become more difficult as different devices begin to proliferate. The iPad will face way more competition than the iPod. Repeating success is, in fact, harder than initial success. Other players and other platforms (HP, Asus, Dell, Everyone on Microsoft or Android) are ready this time. My take is that the biggest losers will be the publishers. Their pricing models will now be more fully exposed to the buying public. That new knowledge will suppress their margins.

On of the better reads on the “Kindle killer” iPad at TechFlash: 5 reasons why the iPad is not a Kindle killer

Disclosure: The wife is employed by Amazon, does not work on Kindle, and does not read my blog.

With all the talk of an Apple tablet, it is worth taking the time to understand that this is far from a new idea. Jerry Kaplan’s

Startup

is not only a great read on the Silicon Valley start up life but on the origins and game of tablet computing. Notable characters in this tale include Jobs and Gates. Worth picking up a copy – to read on your Kindle!