I came across a cool – but simple – demo on how Google works.

Since Apple unveiled an overhaul of its iPod line-up about a month ago, Apple shares have climbed more than 20% – hitting a new record high of $171.11 yesterday. With Google flying through $600 (now $617) and Research in Motion touching a 52-week high of $118.80 last year, it looks like investors have caught tech fever and/or they are gravitating to high-profile, consumer-focused tech companies. Update: The Wall St. Journal has a story that suggests the tech landscape is looking a lot more like 1999.

When you (Microsoft) announce the acquisition of a Web site (Jellyfish.com), it’s probably not a good idea for it to be down for “scheduled system maintenance”. Saying “We Are Down But Not Out” doesn’t cut it or encourage people to come back for another look.

So Techmeme is launching a list of the top-100 blogs – a move that will make all those stats-lovin’, feed countin’ bloggers extremely happy. Maybe this decision will prompt Techmeme’s Gabe Rivera to reveal the secret sauce that drives the site – and how blogs and blog post manage to find their way on to it. As far I can tell, it’s based on links with some manual tweaking but that’s just a guess. Update: mesh’s Mathew Ingram is ranked 39th on the list. Nice.
More: Couple of quick thoughts on the Techmeme 100: To get on the list, you must blog a lot. As a result, it’s difficult for the lone-ranger blogger to get on it. This explains why it’s dominated by large media players and multi-author blogs such as GigaOm and TechCrunch.

I’ve got a small blog side project happening. One issue I’ve been unable to resolve is changing the permalink structure. Right now, it’s http://thisisablog.com/?p=155 but I want it to be http://thisisablog.com/2007/09/28/wordpress-help-please. I’ve fiddled around the permalink option within WordPress and some re-direct plug-ins but it appears I need to do something with htaccess so I can keep the old permalinks links “alive” while implementing new permalinks for all posts. Any help would be much appreciated.

The power supply on my MacBook crapped out, which seems to be a common issue judging by some of the forums I visited. When I went looking for a replacement, one thing that struck me is how Apple has tight control over the peripheral market. The only power supply available was a $99 unit from Apple. Isn’t there some large factory in China pumping out knockoffs for $20. At that price, I’d buy a power supply for home and one for work.