The future of Music on your computer?

iTunes competitors come, and iTunes competitors go. The number of startups that promised to overturn Apples enormous advantage in on line music is almost as large as the number of Nigerians that promise to make me a millionaire. The one thing they have all had in common until recently is their singular lack of success.

Generally, the reason for this is held to be Apple unique one, two punch combo of the iTunes store and the iPod. Any service that offers music that is not playable on the mighty iPod is effectively doomed.

Which is why the Amazon store works. The easy to use downloader throws mpeg files (that will happily play on your iPod) dirctly into iTunes. The quality is better that iTunes, the DRM is absent and the choice is huge.

Now, there is another pretender to the iTunes crown. Spotify offers the lure of free music on your computer. OK, there are restrictions. It's streaming not downloading but for home or office based computers the ability to access effectively limitless music for free is a real boon and great for experimenting with new musical discoveries.

I've been listening to spotify for a few days and I must say it works great. Apart from the Beatles, pretty much everything you need is there and the streaming is flawless so far. I can easily se Spotify becoming the default day to day music browsing platform. The service is ad supported, currenly ads are few and unobtrusive but Spotify plan to up the ad content. Hopefully not to a point where it becomes annoying.

On the move on my iPhone (or Touch) last fm offers streaming music too. Again this works well and allows for experimentation. Last fm also gives gig and artist data, which is nice.

Balancing this triple Amazon, lastfm, spotify combo against the iTunes store it's beginning to look like the era of iTunes dominance may be beginning to end.

Mac Collecting

Given that people will collect anything (ceramic frogs, beermats, fingernails) it's not surprising that older Macs should attract they eye of the collector.

But just how collectable are these older Macs and if they are which ones should you be holding on to?

They answer to the first part is, at the moment, not very. With the exception of the Lisa (which wasn't really a Mac), the chances of getting any real cash for your Mac is pretty remote. But, jut say, you're cleaning out the back cupboard and you DO come across a hoard of old Macs, which ones are worth the time and effort to put on ebay?

As with most things collectable, the early examples are worth the most. In this case you'll be looking for an original Mac, the 128K from 1984. This mac came in the original iconic case which failed to house any kind of hard drive (floppy drive only). It's meagre spec doesn't stop it from being the most collectible Mac. Other Macs may share the same case, but it's the 128K that fetches the big bucks. Expect to get around a hundred pounds for yours.

After the original Mac everything else vintage is small beans, you can pick up Mac pluses for around £50  and classics for a bit less. All the other models are pocket change.

The original iMac exploded onto the scene in 1998 making it over ten years old now. It was an immediate hit and its design inspired a thousand copies and turned blue plastic into an industry. A bondi blue iMac makes a great piece of decoration, and since it can run OS X 10.3.9 you could even use it from time to time. You could get around £50 for yours on ebay.

There is one Mac however that had collectable written all over it from the day it came out, the 20th Anniversary Mac, or TAM. Created to celebrate er, 20 years of Mac . With only 12,000 units built, along with looks that echo the current iMac, the TAM can fetch as much as £800 on ebay. 

So, you won't get rich collecting Macs but the flip side is that for little money you can build a collection of interesting personal computer milestones.

If I had the room my Mac collection would certainly contain the following:

original Mac 128K

Mac portable

iMac 233 Bondi Blue

G3 tower

20th Anniversary Mac