Today's Wall Street Journal features a great article questioning whether Apple Computer has lost its punch. While iPod has been immensely successful, sales of its core desktop and laptop systems have been flat or slightly negative.

Besides the price difference, I think another factor weighs into people's decisions not to switch to the Mac platform: a perception of widely unavailable software. Want to play Yahoo! games? Sorry, it doesn't work on Macs. Does The Weather Channel's "Desktop Weather" tool look cool? That won't work on a Mac either. And forget about any games--the selection of games for the Mac OS is like counting Red Sox fans at Yankee Stadium.

The worst gap of all: Blackberry. Research in Motion, which makes Blackberry, doesn't offer Mac-compatible sync software. In fact, the Web site for Microsoft's Virtual PC software for Mac mentions syncing your Blackberry as a reason to buy this Windows emulator. This is awful PR for Apple. Every time someone visits the Blackberry Web site, this perception of software unavailability is reinforced.

Instead of focusing on its own ease of use--which I think everyone already concedes--Apple should launch a high-profile campaign to help software companies create Mac-compatible applications. If that means sending Apple's own engineers and programmers over to another company like a consulting firm would, do it. And tell us about it when it's done. Fix the Yahoo! games situation, and then launch a campaign highlighting Yahoo! games and Mac. If getting RIM to offer Blackberry sync software for the Mac OS means Apple has to absorb some or even most of that cost, it's a gamble worth taking. There's something in it for these other companies, too, and it would help repair what I think is Apple's longest-standing (and largely most accurate) image problem.

Disclaimer: unlike some harder-core Phish junkies, I don't own every live album and bootleg out there. This is from my own selective, but comprehensive, collection. (It does include every studio album except the newest one.)

5) Free. Yes, it's pop, and yes, it was a radio hit back in 1996. But it's as good as pop radio material gets, with tight construction that cleverly makes room for a bridge that hints just enough at what Phish can do in concert.

4) First Tube. I'm not sure if it's a coincidence, but the theme sounds pleasantly a little like parts of Beethoven's Fifth.

3) Limb by Limb. Great melody, great lyrics, but the real genius here is Fishman--just how many simultaneous time signatures appear to be handled by one person? Incredible.

2) Slave to the Traffic Light. (Specifically, the version on A Live One.) "See the city; see the zoo; traffic light won't let you through." It's the song perfectly constructed for a Phish concert--minimal and somewhat odd lyrics, an eerie calm in the middle and then a buildup of just the right speed and magnitude and exactly the right way of ending.

1) Stash. This song is a phenomenon, and it's impossible to itemize every attribute of it. Showing off every instrument both in a spotlight and together, this one is as close to a perfect Phish song as you can get.

I want to start a restaurant chain called Carb Delight. The menu will be muffins, cakes, pasta, breads and croissants. I mean, why not just tell it like it is?

Crema Lita (those purveyors of "fat free ice cream") is now offering "low carb" ice cream. But before you jump at it, read the fine print: a serving has 8 grams of fat. That's still pretty slim for ice cream, but relatively high for the purported message.

And then there's Cosi, with its new lobster salad sandwich. This "summer sandwich" weighs in at 43 grams of fat. For that much, I'd rather head to my local pizzeria and at least have crisp crust, real cheese and tomato sauce.

A few observations that deserve more attention in the debate over the West Side stadium:

1) Make no mistake about it, the Jets are one of the most undistinguished franchises in sports and deliver almost no value to the city's energy. They bring little or no civic pride to East Rutherford, New York, the metropolitan area, or anywhere else. The city doesn't rally around them like it does for the Yankees. When was the last time anyone heard excited office chatter even if the Jets won? If anything, the Jets prevent New Yorkers from watching real football by taking up one of the Sunday afternoon time slots on television. Notwithstanding the debate about whether public funds should be used for stadiums, this team deserves nothing.

2) In an NFL season, each team plays 8 home games. Eight. Even if the Jets go to the Super Bowl, that would only yield a maximum of 3 more games and leave, oh, some 355 days with a vacant facility.

3) Do stadiums and arenas bring about vibrant economic life in their neighborhoods? Let's see. Walk around Madison Square Garden on a weekend night after a Knicks or Rangers game has ended. In fact, MSG seems to have a repellant effect, creating a nowhere-land between Chelsea and Hell's Kitchen (unless you consider Wendy's and the generic Riese restaurant du jour to be appealing economic activity).

It's worth a visit from anywhere in the City to Lenny's Cafe, on Columbus Avenue at 75th Street, to see one of the fastest talkers around. It's the guy who takes your order at the counter. This guy is incredible.

"Turkeyonclubavacadopepperslettucetomatohoneymustard."

If you thought those disclaimer voice-overs on radio ads were fast, this guy puts them to shame. It's not just that each order articulated with lightning speed and precise crispness, but also that he recites, at an equally blistering pace in rapid succession, the most recent five orders every several minutes.

"Poppybageltoastedvegetablecreamcheese, chickencutletrolllettucetomato, specialnumberfive, spinachsaladbreadonsidenobutter..."

There's no admission for this one-man show--it's included with the order. Or you could just go and watch. But kudos to Lenny's for making the food just as impressive as this magician of speech.

5) Free fish screen saver!

4) 5,000 free smileys!

3) FREE McDonald's burgers when you sign up for our giftcard program!

2) Anything from Verizon.

1) What else? The X10 security camera.

Good news: Jordans cereal, made in the U.K., will be back on U.S. shelves later this fall, and redistribution has already begun in Quebec.

Jordans (and that is correct; it is named after the founding family of the same name, Jordans with an s) is fantastic cereal. The Morning Crisp contains just enough strawberry to be flavorful without being too sweet. The muesli features an impressive variety of nuts and fruit--wholesome but not too busy.

I came across Jordans while in Montreal last summer. I couldn't find it in New York City, but learned that it was available at Price Chopper in the Berkshires. I tried to arrange with my local grocery store to carry the brand, but that was right when Belgo/Bellas, the Montreal-based North American distributor, decided to be pathetic. Several faxes and phone calls went unreturned until Jordans told me they were finding new Canadian and American distributors.

Best of all, Jordans packaging doesn't overwhelm you with exotic grains you can't spell or pronounce; it's just good, hearty cereal. I'm looking forward to its return.

Marvelous Marv Albert, the voice of the Knicks, has ditched Cablevision. Well, good for him. But shame on Dolan & Company for apparently trying to control his commentary. Supposedly, things got too touchy when Marv continued to be candid even in the "new and improved" Lenny Wilkens era. (This is the era in which Dolan's Duds were trounced by the Nets in a playoff series they never should have seen.)

Of course, this is nothing new: Bob Page was a superb host of MSG SportsDesk until one too many unflattering observations about Rangers management.

Marv's departure is of primary interest to any New York sports fan. But in the New York Times sports section, it's buried inside to make room for a front-page article about Curt Schilling's wonderful relationship with fans of the Red Sox -- partly owned by the Times.

My primary laptop is somewhere in California being repaired by Apple, so I've been using my previous machine, a Powerbook G3 I bought in 1999. It's running Mac OS 8.6, one of the greatest operating systems of all time.

Yes, there was the initial behavioral adjustment of learning not to look for the Mac OS X Dock at the bottom of the screen to switch applications. That's past now, and I remember why I stuck with 8.6 for years while simply watching everyone else upgrade to later systems and get into trouble.

OS 8.6 was the one that finally got the original Mac foundation right before Apple switched to a UNIX base for OS X. True, UNIX is "industrial strength," as Apple says, but it results in some user-unfriendly anomalies: you have to deal with read/write permissions and root directories. For an individual user, even with sugary UI coatings, this is counterintuitive (although it is the way many operating systems are set up today).

Speed is an issue. The colossal IE 5.1 muddles through Flash and other animation, impeded by a relatively slow processor trying to absorb incoming data at high speed. But that's basically it-- OS 8.6 is rock solid and fun to use. Even when my G4 returns, I'll be keeping this laptop plugged in and on call for some time to come.

Feeling guilty after a few cheap hot dogs? Now you can wash it down with incredible fat free ice cream at a great price. The Crema Lita on West 72nd Street has an intriguing promotion: bring in your recept from Gray's Papaya next door, and you get 10% off your fat-free frozen delicacy.

If only Whole Foods were so creative. You could score 20% off organic tofu with proof of purchase of 5 Big Macs.

Back in 1996, I worked for Pipeline, one of the largest ISPs at the time, and our billing system accidentally double-billed 20,000 accounts. The VP of Customer Support called me. "Can you think of a spin for this?" she asked.

With that in mind, I was entertained by my experience with--who else--AT&T Wireless yesterday. I received a warranty exchange Motorola T721 phone (which turned out not to solve my static problems, but that's beside the point). Upon receiving the phone, as instructed (as it turned out, wrongly), I called to update my IMEI number.

"I need to update my IMEI number on a warranty exchange phone," I said. It was Friday at 3pm.

"We can't do that right now," I was told. "We can't access any customer informaton. Our systems are updating."

Updating? "You mean, broken?" I asked.

Five hours later, I was able to call back and--although the system was now fixed--learn that this IMEI number change was unnecessary. How many bars do you have?

You have to love the geek vibe of a Web site called HowardForums.com, an online community of hyper-enthused cell phone experts. It has the features of a classic online community, with frequent contributors and seasoned readers scolding newbies for not reading the FAQ or searching for their answer before posting. In recent posts, two AT&T Wireless users are arguing with each other about the physics of wireless signal building penetration. Supposedly, when Verizon Wireless released the Motorola 700, HowardForums users organized a camp-out near the store's Union Square branch to get first dibs on the new phone.

It reminds me of a newsgroup called ne.weather I used to read a lot in the early 1990s. It's nice to see that even with the commercialization of the Internet since then, these pockets of geeky online community still exist.

For 5 hours of Routes 7, 22A, and 22 and then the Taconic Parkway from Burlington to the city, the iPod cassette adapter by Sony gets the MVP award. The Phish album A Live One sounded fantastic, taking full advantage of the car stereo system with no hiss or distortion. (What could be more appropriate for a drive through the Green Mountain State?)

Aren't all cassette adapters the same? No. A year ago I got the Xtreme Mac adapter, and the sound in the same car was awful. I highly recommend the Sony along with the Belkin charger.

The signs are good for the Yankees. Sure, it's nice to win 8-0 when Moose gives up only 2 hits. But last night's victory was as ugly as they come, and they still won.

Jose "Au" Contreras, this year's version of Jeff Nelson, gave up 5 runs in 2/3 inning. But the Yankees came back and scored 6 runs with 3 hits, enough to compensate for 2 errors. Derek Jeter's home run cutting the defecit to 5-4 was the last achievement with any elegance; the Yanks tied the game and took the lead on outs.

It's great to win when things are going well. When you can win the ugly ones, that's the best sign of all.

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The next post will be early next week.

What a week last week. Phish announced this summer's tour was its last, and Channel 2 dumped sportscaster Warner Wolf.

You have to give Phish credit for going out at the right time. Nothing is worse than a band that's been around too long. Three years ago, I saw the Allman Brothers at Red Rocks in Colorado and their age was obvious--the show felt more depressing than engaging.

As for Wolf, the Channel 2 news director belongs in Arnold Diaz's Hall of Shame.

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The blog begins a summer posting schedule today. New posts will not necessarily appear every business day.