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Excerpt - On Thursday afternoon, several hours after I’d gotten my final “Steve’s health is a private matter” — and much to my amazement — Mr. Jobs called me. “This is Steve Jobs,” he began. “You think I’m an arrogant [expletive] who thinks he’s above the law, and I think you’re a slime bucket who gets most of his facts wrong.” After that rather arresting opening, he went on to say that he would give me some details about his recent health problems, but only if I would agree to keep them off the record. I tried to argue him...

Excerpt - ~ snip ~ The dearth of information has led investors to do their own digging over the years. In 2004, one hedge fund hired private investigators to tail Mr. Jobs to hospital appointments in the hopes figuring out how sick he was, said a portfolio manager at the fund. Eventually, he said, Mr. Jobs "seemed to catch on," and became harder to track. More recently, hedge-fund managers said Tuesday, fund managers have talked of asking doctors to closely analyze pictures of Mr. Jobs to monitor changes in his physical appearance, and have been talking about once again hiring...

Excerpt - The Justice Department has ended its criminal investigation of backdated stock options at Apple Inc., deciding not to bring charges against the company or several current and former executives it had been probing for two years, people familiar with the case said. ~ snip ~

Excerpt - Just got a nervous call from my lawyers who said they wanted to give me a "heads up" about a "situation" at Broadcom. See more about it here. Basically the feds are going after some Broadcom execs over some options backdating stuff. I'm like, So what? I don't work at Broadcom. They're like, Um, well, see, Broadcom did its own internal investigation and already cleared these guys, and the SEC isn't buying it apparently, and though the company itself has already settled the whole thing the SEC is still going after the executives as individuals. Now you do...

Bear Stearns analysts Andy Neff, Bill Hand and Ted Chung sent a note to clients this morning following Apple's (AAPL) announcement of a new developers' platform for the iPhone. Key excerpts: WHY NOW? EIGHT COMPELLING REASONS. Despite current anxiety, we view current weakness in AAPL shares as an opportunity to add to positions based on our assessment of several positive inflection points: 1. WIDgets. With iPhone SDK launch today (3/6), AAPL further extended its lead in the emerging WIDget (Wireless Internet Devices: GPS, email, TV/video, social) market. Making media content portable is a 200mm unit (annual) market; making phones portable...

Apple has lowered its projected shipments of iPhones from two million units to around 1-1.2 million units for the second fiscal quarter, which will end March 2008, the Chinese-language Economic Daily News (EDN) quoted sources at Apple's handset component suppliers in Taiwan as indicating. Sales of iPhones in Europe have been lower than expected, pushing Apple to slash its shipment projection for the second quarter, the EDN quoted the sources as saying. Apple shipped more than 2.3 million iPhones in the first fiscal quarter, bringing total shipments of iPhones to close to four million units since its launch, the paper...

Your Apple iPhone could be infected with potentially malicious Trojan software because of a fake upgrade download, computer security officials with US-CERT warned Wednesday. "This Trojan claims to be a tool used to prepare the device for an upgrade to firmware version 1.1.3," the US-CERT advisory says. "When a user installs the Trojan, other application components are altered. If the Trojan is uninstalled, the affected applications may also be removed." The Trojan appears to be timed to exploit rumors that began in early December 2007 about new features in an upcoming iPhone firmware upgrade. Various online news sites and blogs...

If you haven’t upgraded yet - don’t!I bought my first Apple computer in 1978 - the original Apple ][ - and the obvious quality of the products has kept me coming back for more. Good thing the Leopard upgrade wasn’t my first experience of Apple quality. 10.5.1 isn’t it, either.I had great hopes that the first dot release of 10.5 would fix most of the problems. Sadly, that is not the case. Most Leopard installs are trouble-free. But if you rely on your Mac to make a living, you have to ask yourself if it is worth the risk to...

I have been writing about Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) for the past ten months for AOL's BloggingStocks and have been a bull in every article. The shares have been a home run for investors in this difficult and challenging year. Apple is fast becoming the business school case study right before our very eyes as this company is executing flawlessly. Let's examine what's going on here in the calender fourth quarter -- Apple's fiscal first quarter of fiscal year 2008. The stock has ranged these past 12 months from a low of $76 to a high of $192. Currently Apple...

Apple (AAPL) is trading at 164$ per share, $28 off their yearly high, and I want every share I can get going into the holiday season. About three months ago I made a life changing decision, the decision to purchase an iMAC desktop computer. 15 minutes later I was asking myself, "what took me so long?". Ahh, the colors, the compatibility, the ease at which I maneuvered on my new computer. My initial impression was that the MAC offered the greatest operating system and computing unit I have ever experienced. Three months later, my MAC was my new prized possession,...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Apple Inc. reported that profits in its fiscal fourth quarter surged 67 percent due to strong sales of Mac computers and the iPhone. Results trounced Wall Street's expectations.

Excerpt - Apple today announced financial results for its fiscal 2007 third quarter ended June 30, 2007. Apple posted revenue of $5.41 billion and net quarterly profit of $818 million, or $.92 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $4.37 billion and net quarterly profit of $472 million, or $.54 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 36.9 percent, up from 30.3 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 40 percent of the quarter's revenue. Apple shipped 1,764,000 Macintosh computers, representing 33 percent growth over the year-ago quarter and exceeding the previous company...

Excerpt - Arguably two of America's best run companies are Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) and International Business Machines (NYSE: IBM). Both have achieved high levels of success and shareholders have been rewarded along the way. However, both are treading in different waters and Apple is emerging as the winner going forward. In fact, I'm sure Apple will overtake IBM in value over the next two years. Bottom line: Apple will be bigger than IBM. Apple will be a bigger company than IBM in terms of market capitalization. As of this writing Apple is just about to hit $100 billion in...

APPLE PUNDITS are predicting that the entertainment gear maker is set to take on Microsoft in an operating system war again. According to Architosh, an Apple insider has told it that Apple's Messiah Steve Jobs is planning to make an announcement about expanding the Macintosh market share soon.

"You are very sad. And fat LOL." -- Quote from reader email pertaining to this Apple article. You don't need an empty gaze and a shuffling gait to be a stock cultist. There are quite a few companies whose followers possess a cult-like quality -- especially Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL - News). And what better time to talk about that cultish devotion than when the company's shares are trading near new 52-week highs?I should start by admitting that I'm a lifelong Apple devotee. When I was in college in the late '80s, I churned out papers and short fiction on an...