Abstract of INFO-MAC archived encoded Mac binary file 'art/zine/atpm-512-srd.hqx' Uploaded 01/07/2000 2574444 bytes From: Chris Turner Subject: ATPM 5.12 December 6, 1999, Etna, NH (http://www.atpm.com)--The holiday season is upon us, and as the staff of About This Particular Macintosh presents our December issue, we wish you the very best during this time of joy, and for the new year to come. Kicking things off in this month's Apple Cider, Tom Iovino awaits the upcoming year 2000, and looks back on 1999 with some Random Saved Thoughts regarding Apple, Microsoft, football and parade balloons. Publisher Michael Tsai examines the current state of Macintosh software from Microsoft, and as usual, doesn't pull any punches. David Ozab continues his Segments piece, this time with a look at "MIDI and the Mac" in this month's How To. Networking guru Matthew Glidden, of "Three Macs and a Printer", continues his 10-part series on networking your Macs with part 5, "Mixing Ethernet and LocalTalk Networks." For those of you with a mixture of older and newer Macs that need to communicate with one another, this column is for you. This month's Art Department is a bit different, as our graphics guru Jamal Ghandour takes on a different form of art--music. Jamal walks you through how to burn your own music compilation CDs, turning your personal music collection into your own work of art. In this month's About This Particular Web Site, David Spencer presents a cornucopia of sites for your holiday viewing pleasure, from staff favorites The Onion and mp3.com to The Register, Digital Blasphemy, and more. Be sure to contribute sites you think other readers might be interested in by emailing David. Our Shareware Editor Bill Lovett has an extensive roundup of software that aids the Mac user in one of the staples of computer usage--installation. Check out Clean-Install Assistant, Yank, Tome Viewer, and Installer Observer. All make excellent holiday gifts for the Mac user in your life--with the exception of Yank, they are all free, and even Yank is inexpensive for what it does. The staff reviews a wide range of items just in time for your last-minute holiday shopping, including Humongous Entertainment's Backyard Football; N2MP3 from Proteron; nik Color Efex!; Guy Kawasaki's latest tome, Rules for Revolutionaries; the Rio Player 500; and Handspring's Palm OS PDA, the Visor Deluxe. A great gift idea this year is an ATPM t-shirt, available now. Check our web site for more details. Or you could really impress the ATPM reader in your life by winning him or her a t-shirt in this month's Trivia