Apple beats Street in holiday quarter; shares soar

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090121/ap_on_hi_te/earns_apple
Apple Inc. said Wednesday its profit in the holiday quarter edged up 2 percent and beat Wall Street’s expectations, buoyed in part by growing iPod sales outside the U.S. The iPod and iPhone maker’s predictions for the current quarter came in lower than analysts were predicting, but investors seemed happy to focus on the results rather than the forecast. In extended trading after the report was released, Apple’s shares jumped $9.83, or 12 percent, to $92.66. The first question for executives in a conference call regarded the health of Chief Executive Steve Jobs, who announced a week ago that he would take a six-month medical leave. Apple gave no new details, but Tim Cook, the chief operating officer who is handling day-to-day operations in Jobs’ absence, attempted to assure analysts that Apple will continue to do well no matter who’s in charge. “The values of our company are extremely well entrenched,” Cook said. “We believe that we’re on the face of the Earth to make great products, and that’s not changing.”
…Pirates of Silicon Valley exposes Bill Gates as the pathetic and scurrilous little intellectual property thief that was allowed a monopoly with Microsoft because his daddy was high up in the secret government.

Steve Jobs to Take Leave from Apple to Fight Illness

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/CEOProfiles/story?id=6649035&page=1
Apple Inc. founder and chief executive Steve Jobs said he will take a medical leave of absence from the company until the end of June, according to an e-mail from the CEO to Apple employees. “Unfortunately, the curiosity over my personal health continues to be a distraction not only for me and my family, but everyone else at Apple as well,” Jobs wrote in the e-mail. “In addition, during the past week I have learned that my health-related issues are more complex than I originally thought.” Tim Cook, Apple’s chief operating officer, will take on the chief executive responsibilities until Jobs’ return. Apple’s shares fell 6.54 percent in after-hours trading on the news of Jobs’ medical leave.
…my personal thoughts on Jobs’ illness is it is likely a neuroendocrine tumor (a tumor that produces hormones) of the pancreas. Specifically, I believe the illness to be a glucagonoma tumor of the pancreas. Glucagon, in contrast to insulin, is the primary hormone involved in catabolic processes. Catabolism, in contrast anabolism which insulin promotes, actively breaks down fats proteins and sugars. Glucagon is produced in the alpha-2 cells of the pancreas and glucagonomas routinely produce more than 1000x fold higher blood concentrations of  the hormone (thus, explaining Jobs’ dramatic recent muscle wasting). Glucagonomas are an exceedingly rare neuorendocrine tumor, only about 250 are described in medical literature, thus any hard statistics for glucagonoma are not definitive. However, if Jobs’ tumor has been confined to the pancreas and well walled off from access to blood vessels by fibroblasts (these are th cells that lay the foundation of much connective tissue), survival of greater than 20+ years without relapse with good health are reported for surgical resection and hormone therapy. Best of hope and wishes to Jobs for a good prognosis.
http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/118899-overview
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glucagonoma
Jobs’ dramatic weight loss, which is a common clinical presentation of the uncommon glucagonoma…

Apple’s Internet presence grows

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-10130137-37.html?tag=newsEditorsPicksArea.0
The Mac operating system in December made a stronger showing among users accessing the Web, according to preliminary figures from Net Applications. For the month of December, the Mac OS accounted for 9.63 percent of what Net Applications calls market share of Internet usage, a second-place showing. The iPhone, broken out separately, logged 0.44 percent, good enough for fourth place, just ahead of the Sony’s PlayStation. That puts the overall Apple share at just over 10 percent. The percentage for Mac OS X is a record, up slightly from November but also up 32 percent from December 2007, according to Fortune’s report on Net Applications’ findings, which are based on browser data. The iPhone’s toehold also is a record, more than tripling its December 2007 figure of 0.12 percent.