Says Andy Harris, founder, proprietor, and scanner safety monitor at the Red Roaster Room Internet Café in, you guessed it, trendy San Francisco.

Yes, at the Red Roaster, like more pedestrian Internet cafés, one can down a mocha while opening one’s email—in fact, a mere $2 entitles klatschees to a seat in front of an AirPort-equipped iMac with unlimited Internet access.

But Harris has created more than an email expressway at the ol’ Red Roaster. Mac technology—and caffeine—fuel a veritable cauldron of creative activity. Which is exactly what Harris had in mind. In a typical day at the Cybercafé, “aspiring filmmakers open Final Cut Pro and walk out with their clips burned on a CD. Freelance web designers post their work on the web for their clients. Digital artists mix music and make multimedia.” Ah, smells like a good brew.

Photojournalists know how powerful their images can be. But what about movies? Can such a simple tool as iMovie help people breach the barrier of language?

Dr. Angel Jannasch-Pennell certainly thinks so. He’s the co-director of Arizona State University’s Conexiones Project, where he teaches the universal language of film to the children of migrant workers. The students, many of whom speak little or no English, use iMovie to make short films on iMac and iBook computers. The vital communication skills they learn help many of them not only graduate from high school but also attend college.

“Some of these kids don’t say a word to you the entire time,” says Jannasch-Pennell, but “with iMovie, they have their own voice.”

Have you noticed how many Sherlock plug-ins we have to choose from?

The answer is 54, and the latest plug-in is a real gentleman. It’s Jeeves (of Ask Jeeves fame). Ask Jeeves waits (in the Internet channel) to serve your every web searching need. Like his counterpart on the askjeeves.com site, you can use the Ask Jeeves plug-in to pose questions in plain English and receive quick and relevant responses. How quick? Ask Jeeves incorporates “popularity technology,” so your searches benefit from the millions of searches Jeeves has been asked to perform previously.

Got a good topic to research on the web? Start up Sherlock, click on the Internet channel, and ask Jeeves to give you a hand.

Like many Macintosh owners who surf the unpredictable waters of the Internet, you may be worried about accidentally downloading a virus or inadvertently allowing others to access the personal data on your computer.

Worry no longer. Symantec recently announced that Norton AntiVirus and Norton Personal Firewall are now built for Mac OS X. With Norton AntiVirus installed, you can regularly and easily check your Mac for infected files (including email attachments), and its LiveUpdate technology will keep you armed against the latest threats.

Norton Personal Firewall, meanwhile, maintains a constant vigil against unwanted intruders, whether you connect to the Internet constantly with broadband service or just occasionally with a dialup ISP.

Like many other Macintosh software products, Norton AntiVirus and Norton Personal Firewall are available from the Apple Store.

Since conservation has been on the minds of many of us in recent months, it wouldn’t surprise us if you’ve been relying on various energy-saving tips to keep energy usage down. You may even have decided to unplug your iMac when done using it.

However, you may not have realized that when you disconnect your iMac from AC power, it relies on its internal battery to retain some control panel settings as well as the date and time. To make sure that your computer saves that information longer, we’ve made a Power Management Update available in our AppleCare Knowledge Base.

Please note: the update affects only iMac computers released in February 2001 or later.