That's the question Mac commentators and fans will be asking today, with the announcement that Apple's CEO will take yet another medical leave. I want to ask the question of you. What future does Apple have without Steve Jobs? Please answer in comments or send e-mail to joewilcox at gmail dot com.

Jobs took his last medical leave two years ago this month. But there was a difference. Jobs planned for a six-month hiatus and returned during that time period, even after undergoing a liver transplant in April 2009. But today's announcement gives no time period at all, raising more seriously a question asked many times two years ago: Will Jobs return? It's one thing for Wall Street to see a finite medical leave, but something else when there is no end date in sight. Earlier fears ebbed as Jobs' return date approached. This time there is no end date.

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While the company has not yet directly come out and said that its planned event in San Francisco is tablet-related, it sure looks like it will be. In an interview with Maria Bartiromo of CNBC, HP personal systems chief Tom Bradley seemed to suggest WebOS would be the topic.

Bartiromo asked Bradley, "where's your tablet?" His initial response was that the company would have a "set of announcements" on February 9 around the topic of Web OS, although when asked later about how HP would catch up to the bevy of tablets released at CES (where the interview was taped), he responded "you and I will talk about that on the 9th."

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Since the Xbox 360 Kinect controller was hacked to work with an open source PC driver last November, creative minds have been running wild. Indie interface developers and their unique uses of Kinect have helped turn it into one of Microsoft's most exciting products.

A video circulating on the Web today shows what is possible when pairing the Xbox 360 Kinect sensor with a projector. In this hack, Elliot Woods of Kimchi and Chips demonstrates some rudimentary projection mapping.

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Two years ago this month, Apple CEO Steve Jobs left Apple for a six-month medical leave. Today, the company revealed that Jobs is going again, but for indeterminate time. The open-ended time period may unsettle some investors -- in a stock that has been high-flying for the better part of 18 months. Apple made the announcement during a US holiday, official observance of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday, and a day before announcing holiday quarter earnings.

Jobs had survived a rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable; he revealed his cancer fight in mid-2004. But by summer 2008, Jobs' gaunt appearance caused a rash of rumors about his heath -- that and how little time he spent on stage during Apple events. Jobs caused another stir in December 2008 by announcing he wouldn't give the Macworld 2009 keynote. About a month later, when he announced the medical leave, health emerged as one, if not the major, reason.

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One of the biggest traumas of buying a new computer is making sure all your files, emails, programs and settings are transferred across to your shiny new computer. Migrating from PC to PC is relatively straightforward these days, with Windows 7 providing an Easy Transfer Wizard for files and settings, and Laplink offering PCmover for those who want to transfer lock, stock and barrel. But what if you've bought a Mac and want to transfer everything across from your tired old PC to Apple's glitzy new computer?

Sadly there's not yet a one-stop solution to this problem -- programs and settings aren't cross platform, so an element of research is required when it comes to sourcing Apple alternatives to your software arsenal. However, when it comes to files and email, the situation is more promising: Laplink has released a tool that aims to simplify the transfer of both from your PC to your Mac in the form of Laplink Switch & Sync. The question is, how effective is it, and does it cover all the bases?

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Keeping your hard drive in order is a complex business, and one that normally requires an entire library of utilities and applications. There is a simpler alternative: you could just install Paragon Hard Disk Manager 2011 Suite. The program can create, format, delete or undelete, resize or merge your chosen partitions, for instance. A straightforward set of backup tools allow you to do everything from back up your emails or chosen files, to copy individual partitions or clone an entire hard drive.

Other modules help with migrating to a new hard drive; installing and managing multiple operating systems on one system; securely wiping a drive to remove confidential information; or defragmenting your files to maximise performance.

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Mozilla's Firefox 4 reached its ninth beta version on Friday, which promises a quicker startup time, quicker bookmarking, support for multiple JavaScript heaps also known as "compartments," support for the Indexed Database API, and minor superficial changes, like the option to have tabs placed in the titlebar position when the browser window is maximized and a minor redesign of the add-on bar.

"We continue to improve and polish Firefox 4 Beta to ensure we deliver an awesome experience to our 400 million users around the world. We couldn't do this without the help of our beta testers and their feedback," the Mozilla team wrote in its blog on Friday. "We want to hear how we can improve the features of Firefox 4 Beta and performance on specific sites."

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According to estimates from market research organization NPD Group, U.S. consumers spent between $15.4 and $15.6 billion on video games of all types, including boxed software, used games, rentals, subscriptions, downloads, apps, and ad monetized freeware, and in-game microtransactions.

Overall, consumer spending on video games was flat between 2009 and 2010, but the industry underwent a slight shift in where the money was being channeled, and that looks to have actually prevented the industry from posting an overall decline for 2010.

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Many people consider the Mac OS X desktop superior to Windows, which perhaps explains why there are so many utilities for Windows users that try to mimic elements like the Mac OS X Dock in Windows. But Windows 7 introduced some nifty new features of its own that suddenly become notable by their absence on the Mac.

One of the these features is the Live Thumbnail previews of open windows that appear when you roll the mouse over a Taskbar icon, allowing you to quickly view, select and even close individual windows or documents. Mac developers have been quick to plug the gap with the release of shareware programs like HyperDock and DockView, although you'll need the latest Mac OS X (v10.6, or Snow Leopard) release to take advantage of either program.

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Some people say command line tools are obsolete, out of date, no longer necessary when you can "point and click," instead. But the reality is very different. Every version of Windows sees the command line given new powers and abilities, and if you don't explore these then you really are missing out.

Take the WMIC command, for instance. It has astonishing scope and a huge set of features: the program can return useful information about your system, control running programs and generally manage just about every aspect of your PC -- all from the command line or a convenient shortcut.

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In what could be viewed as a shot across the bow of Microsoft, Google on Friday announced that it had modified its Google Apps service agreements to promise users 99.9 percent uptime. In addition, it removed wording that accounted for planned or scheduled downtime as part of the service reliability promise.

"Unlike most providers, we don't plan for our users to be down, even when we're upgrading our services or maintaining our systems," Enterprise Product Management Director Matthew Glotzbach said. He said Google would be the first company to eliminate maintenance window clauses from its service contracts.

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A Russian Windows TechNet Blog Thursday evening announced "Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 Released", and the presumption was that Microsoft had begun shipping SP1 (v. 601.17514.win7sp1_rtm.101119-1850.) to OEM partners.

The update has been slated for a first quarter 2011 release, and in October, RC1 of this incremental service update was pushed out. So the final RTM is expected to be very soon.

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Rob Wray, from mp3Car, takes a look at the first electric-cooled three-wheeled motorcycle. With 170HP, 0-60 in 5 seconds, 150MPH top speed and weighing in at only 1,800 pounds, it's a surprisingly performance-oriented vehicle. It goes roughly 200 miles on a single charge at slower speeds or about 100 miles at 60 miles per hour. The motorcycle can be charged to about 80 percent in about 20 minutes at a charging station.

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In Research in Motion's iconic family of BlackBerry smartphones, there has only ever been one line of products to have no keyboard, the more than two-year old Storm line. Now, leaks obtained by Boy Genius Report purportedly show RIM is trying again with the all-touch BlackBerry in 2011.

The device, which has been referred to as Monaco internally, has a 3.7" (800 x 480) capacitive touchscreen, a 1.2GHz processor, a 5 Megapixel camera with 720p video capture, running BlackBerry OS 6.1.

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In less than 24 hours, three different analyst firms released mobile market findings or projections, just days after Verizon announced it would begin selling iPhone 4 in early February. ChangeWave joins Canalys and ComScore.

I want to thank Betanews reader Ilan Lev for pointing out the ChangeWave study, which I hadn't seen. However, as is typical of ChangeWave data, the blog post presenting it puts the emphasis in the wrong place. In a survey conducted before the Verizon iPhone announcement, 16 percent of US respondents said they would switch from AT&T to Verizon. However, that number isn't nearly as big as it seems. ChangeWave also generally asked the 4,500 respondents their switching intentions from all the major carriers. Fifteen percent of respondents said they plan to switch from AT&T within 90 days. From that perspective, the immediate benefit to Verizon is marginal at best.

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