Its been rumoured for a long time that Apple is going to celebrate its 30th anniversary on April 1st by announcing some cool new products. Maybe it will be the new Intel iBook or, as most people are salivating for, the true video iPod. Guess we will have to wait and see but I hope I have enough pennies in my pocket to buy one or, if not, maybe the current iPod will get a price reduction and I can replace the one that was stolen.

We don’t record many programs on our TiVo but I hadn’t realised just how much I’ve come to take for granted the ability to pause or rewind live TV. I’m staying in the San Diego apartment and I keep going to pause the TV to get a drink or use the toilet only to find that I can’t.

So today we have snot-nose students protesting the latest plans for immigration reform. Now, students will protest anything of course - I remember being part of a sit-in at UEA when some ‘facist’ speaker came to visit - but I become increasingly fed up with the “illegals are not criminals” mantra.

Of course the very term illegal immigrant is now supposedly racist but, by definition, if you do something illegal then you are a criminal. If I burgle your house I am not an undocumented visitor, even if I am desperate and only trying to better myself and my family.

At work today one of my new colleagues has been waiting 3 years to make progress on his Green Card application; $000s have been spent on his behalf to prove his value to the country. Why then should someone who has no interest in paying taxes or contributing to our society get a free pass? Make the process easier for all (note I said all, not just Mexicans) so that those who genuinely wish to belong can come; punish those who wish not to go through the process to the maximum.

Something that always amuses me - we all know that when people talk about illegal imigrants they really only mean Mexicans (and maybe Europeans). If the government was to propose real reform, say invite 75,000 Iranians and Syrians (I bet many of them are as desperate to live here as the Mexicans) I bet today’s protestors would be out again saying how the country is letting too many people in. Finally, let all the illegals who want to stay, stay, but they have to live in the same neighbourhoods as the protestors, paying no taxes but using all social services, refusing to speak English in schools…. Whats that I hear? Oh yeah, silence.

The Game Developer Conference in San Jose this week saw an important keynote speech from Sony Coumpter Entertainment President Phil Harrison unveiling more of the forthcoming PlayStation 3. You can read a good summary of it at Gamespot.

The real big news was the announcement of the PlayStation Network Platform A rival to XBox Live, this service will allow users to download games, content, extras directly to their harddrive. It will also allow VoIP for free as well as, of course, multi-player online gaming.

You might be asking why I care. Well, it seems to me that this must be the project that I am going to work on at Sony, that no one was allowed to tell me about until it was announced. Sounds very cool to me.

Everything is set for me to start at Sony on Monday so today is my last (week)day of freedom, no more getting up at 9.30 and waching Judge Joe Brown over lunch. But I’m also glad that it means no more sending out resumes every morning and waiting for the phone to ring.

I’d like to say I’m spending my last day in style but this morning I have some PC setup to do and this afternoon I need to complete my Lord of The Rings marathon, and at 12 hrs for the whole lot, marathon is the word.

And, finally, I want to thank the good state of California for keeping me somewhat financially afloat these past few weeks.