Apple CEO Steve Jobs has been interviewed on CNBC following the September 12 media event in San Francisco concerning the company's latest announcements. Jobs told CNBC that Apple is very happy with its iPod sales and has good expectations for the forthcoming quarters. As far as overall sales are concerned, the Apple CEO said Â?WeÂ?ve never sold this many of anything before, and so weÂ?re learning as we go, but so far weÂ?re pretty happy.Â?

Jobs also commented on the stock-options irregularities on AppleÂ?s finances, and he admitted that Apple did discover some discrepancies but is not facing an SEC probe. Apple are conducting an internal investigation into the finance books, but Jobs added that the internal investigation will be completed within Â? a not terribly distant futureÂ?. Watch the video to see the interview!

Apple's shares have hit $73.36 today, almost 5% higher than they were yesterday. Reports all over the internet suggest that this hike in the price of Apple shares is due to interest in Apple's special event titled 'Showtime' that will run less than a week from now on September 12. The question is, will the shares stay at this level, rise, or fall after news from the September 12 event has circulated? That all depends on what Apple are planning to reveal of course. Analysts today predicted that Apple could "multiply" revenue with new products, including a new iPods and a new iMac - both of which are expected to be revealed at the event.

"Next Tuesday we believe Apple will unveil a major move into the digital home with the potential to multiply its revenue streams," UBS analyst Benjamin A. Reitzeswrote in a note to clients. "In addition to potential new nanos and movie and video services, we are excited about potential products through 2007."

Whatever the September 12 event brings, you can be sure to see all the latest here at QJ.net's Apple blog. What are you expecting? A WiFi enabled iPod, a new design, more features. Tell us through your comments!

A Greenpeace report naming Apple as one of the worst companies for pollution in the world has been debunked by Daniel Eran of Roughly Drafted. Greenpeace claimed that Apple had used many toxic chemicals in manufacturing, without asking where these toxic chemicals or by-products would end up, and Apple's position of 2.7 out of 10 (10 being the highest) was based upon this.

The article suppresses Greenpeace as being a valid organization for factual results, suggesting that their report was skewed in their favour, with previous Greenpeace works being 'sloppy' and using 'loose facts'. The Greenpeace report has been accused of using press releases by companies or public statements to determine their position rather than raw facts.

Greenpeace's report seems particularly flawed when you weigh up the differences between HP and Apple. HP received a much-higher ranking of 5.7 compared to Apple's 2.7 points, but HP have said on their website: In 2005, we found that some [Resistance of Hazardous Substances] RoHS compliant components were not yet available. Although we did not meet our goal for 2005, significant progress was made in transitioning HPÂ?s product lines to RoHS compliance.

Even will Apple's low score, here is what Apple had on their website: Apple products are compliant with the European Directive on the Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment, also known as the RoHS directive. Examples of materials restricted by RoHS include lead, mercury, cadmium, hexavalent chromium, and PBB and PBDE flame retardants. As a result of our precautionary approach to substances, Apple was able to meet many of the RoHS restrictions long before the July 2006 deadline.

Despite this, Apple got a bad rating whilst HP were ranked particularly good. Next time you see a Greenpeace report, take it with a pinch of salt.

Details are still sketchy, but Apple is planning on holding a special press event on September 12 according to an official email sent to Your Mac Life-- an online radio show. This junket is set to take place on the opening of day of the highly-touted Apple Expo 2006 in Paris.

Since there isn't much info about what's going to happen on the said Apple event, it seems that everybody is ready to speculate. Some are saying that the event will most likely discuss hardware introductions. BusinessWeek recently reported that according to their sources, an Apple movie download service will launch in mid-September, so most likely that will eat up a bulk of the press event. Well, we will give you more updates as they come our way, for now, feel free to speculate.

The legal battle between Hongfujin Precision Industry Co., the contracted manufacturer of Apple's iPod media jukebox, and two Chinese journalists over alleged defamation has taken a new turn today.

It appears that after the worldwide media coverage that ensued after the conflict over claims that Hongfujin were mistreating workers in their factory has made a difference with a statement being made by Hongfuin. The said company today stated that they would reduce their demands from 30 million yuan ($3.8 million) "to avoid blurring the issue because of the great public attention on the target of the injunction."

Out of good will, Hongfujin have also said that any compensation it receives would be donated to charity, ruling out the possibility of this being a money-related venture and silencing critics. Despite the 'cooling down' of the case, Hongfujin are continuing to prosecute the two journalists, named as Weng Bao and Wang You, whose bank accounts have been frozen by the Shenzhen Intermediate Court.

Wang and Weng have set up a blog recounting their ordeal and reflecting on the risks associated with doing their job. Maybe they'll be a little more careful next time not to start a multi-million dollar lawsuit.

Hongfujin Precision Industry Co., the contracted manufacturer of Apple's iPod media jukebox have filed lawsuits against two Chinese journalists who wrote articles about working conditions at factories where iPods are made. According to Chinese press, Hongfujin, which is a subsidiary of TaiwanÂ?s Hon Hai Precision Industry Ltd.Â?s Foxconn Technology Group, is seeking 30 million renminbi (US$3.77 million) in damages from the two journalists.

Published articles written by the two journalists accused Apple and Hongfujin Precision Industry Co. of exploiting workers at their factory in southern China. The Shenzhen Intermediate Court, which accepted the case, froze the assets of the two reporters, Weng Bao and Wang You. The journalist rights group Reporters Without Borders have requested that the iPod contractor drop the lawsuit, but as of yet no news on Hongfujin Precision Industry Co.'s reply has surfaced.

Looks like Google CEO, Dr.Eric Schmidt, has joined the bushel-wagon over at Apple's Board of Directors in a meeting held this August 29. According to Schmidt, "Apple is one of the companies in the world that I most admire...I'm really looking forward to working with Steve and AppleÂ?s board to help with all of the amazing things Apple is doing.Â?

However, Schmidt clarified that his decision to join Apple's Board of Directors is not an exclusive thing, as he also currently holds a chair in Princeton University's board of trustees and in Google's board of directors. Steve Jobs is pleased and looking forward to Schmidt's future contributions to the company with the latter's experience as an internet technologist, entrepreneur, and strategist.

Apparently, Schmidt is hot stuff in the internet entrepreneurship arena as he was also the head
technology officer at Sun Microsystems, Inc. where he defined the company's internet software strategy. He was also elected to the National Academy of Engineering where his work was recognized for developing strategies for "the world's most successful internet search engine company."

What does this mean for us? Hmmm..We'll have to wait and see, and we'll definitely keep you posted on this.

At least five employees of Apple have been removed from their jobs after they were found guilty of downloading the Mac OS Leopard illegally over the internet. Apparently, these employees were able to acquire copies of the Operating system which were distributed to developers at the Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference two weeks ago. It is rumored that dozens more are to face the same charges and are also bound to be terminated from the company. It is currently still unclear as to whether they have shared copies of the unreleased OS or if they separately acquired the software.

Though some people may think that Apple may be getting a bit too heavy-handed, the measures which they have taken could be understandable, considering all of the effort that they have taken in order to keep the Leopard under wraps until its official release in Spring of 2007. On top of that, Apple has also had to deal with a deluge of fake Leopard screenshots which circulated throughout the internet several months ago.

The company is infamous for having tracked down three people whom they claim have originally uploaded copies of the developer's version of the Mac OS Tiger back in 2004.

Apple's aggressive tactics may seem to be taking effect however, since popular torrent sites have already started to systematically delete torrents that are somehow related to the OS in question.

Nosy little spies within the walls of Apple have been at their wits' end in trying to figure out what exactly this company has been up to, particularly if the said company will be releasing a new line of products this fall.

Apple is said to be preparing massive air-freight shipments with unconfirmed contents from the Far East this week, and these shipments are expected to reach US shores by maybe the 5th of September. Could it just be a coincidence that the timeframe of these shipments fits nicely with the date when Apple is believed to be ready to start rolling out its first Core 2 Duo-based Macbook Pro notebooks?

Then there's also the fact that the end-of-life notice of the entire iPod Nano line is on September 16th, which is also the same day that Apple's "Free iPod nano" back-to-school promotion is set to expire. This timeframe also coincides with previous rumors regarding the availability of Apple's next-gen iPod Nano. More coincidence?

These are all general speculations at the moment, and until we either get direct word from Apple officials, or we get to find out what's in those boxes they just shipped, there's still no telling as to what kind of strange fruit will really fall from this tree and hit us on the head.

This week, the Apple legal team has caused a bit of a stir by trying to claim the word "pod". Even if your product is nothing like the iPod in the way it looks, feels or even smells, it appears that you can still face a lawsuit from Apple if your trademark contains the word Pod in it. This is exactly what happened to a small family business when they invented a digital device to aid in their business of making arcade game machines.

The Ellison family, owners of Mach 5 products, came up with a digital version of the mechanical readout of prizes on arcade machines The readout transmits the accounting information via infrared technology to a notebook or a PDA in a way that the data can be loaded directly into a spreadsheet. They named this device the 'Profit Pod'. As soon as computer giant Apple caught wind of the Profit Pod, the Ellisons received a letter. The letter goes:

Apple recently learned that Mach 5 Products filed an ITU trademark application for PROFIT POD (Serial No. 76/589,480), on April 30, 2004, for "infrared data transmission and collection system, namely an infrared data transmission and collection system for amusement games comprised of a meter for counting input signals from switches, a processor for processing the signals so that they may be transmitted by an infrared signal, an infrared signal generator and software for programming hand held computers that can detect and process infrared signals"

...We believe there is confusing similarity between Apple's IPOD mark and the PROFIT POD mark. PROFIT POD is a POD-formative mark and incorporates a substantial portion of Apple's IPOD mark. The products are likewise related. Accordingly, we must ask that Mach 5 Products immediately abandon the pending application for PROFIT POD, agree to cease all use of the PROFIT POD mark and not to use or file any other applications for similar marks in the U.S. or elsewhere.

The profit pod is in no way similar to an iPod except for having 'Pod' in the name, so why Apple decided to send this letter, I do not know. My message to the Ellison family: Carry on calling your invention the Profit Pod, because I am pretty sure that no court of law would allow Apple to win this one in a million years. But then again, that's just my opinion. How about you, what's your take on this subject? Let us know via the comments.