A couple of days ago, without much fanfare a great new Mac application, Pixelmator was released. Despite the relatively lack of interest of the mainstream Mac press, this is major news.

Despite what graphic pros may say, Pixelmator is a direct competitor to Photoshop. Granted, it does not offer yet advanced capabilities such as 16 bit per channel images or even RAW support (although it seems that this particular feature will be included later this year in a future update), but for most of us, Pixelmator, with its great user interface, small memory footprint and perfect integration with Core Image, is a perfect replacement for the much more expensive Adobe product.

Personally I see this announcement, as the culmination of Apple’s strategy to reduce their dependency on Adobe without having to create a Photoshop competitor themselves. It is probably a surprise to many that it took so much time for developers to use Core Image to create a photo editor. After all, Core Image is available since Mac OS 10.4 which was released two and a half years ago. Apple had done most of the hard work by providing a powerful API to easily composite layers and support non-destructive filters. Why did it then take so much time to create such a product? Well, it seems that everyone believed that Apple would use Core Image to create their own Photoshop competitor. Competing against Adobe is difficult enough but if you have to take on both Adobe and Apple that is a really scary thought. That is why I am not really surprised that Pixelmator was created by two young brothers who probably have not much to lose, even if this project does not become an instant hit. However, I sincerely hope that their app becomes extremely popular. They deserve it and the Mac community needs more innovative developers like them who are willing to take risks. I have already paid my US$59 license. Will you?

It seems that my boss thinks that I have too much spare time to do cool stuff like developing for the Mac and he has decided to do something about it. So, starting yesterday, in addition to running the SWG tech sales organization in Mexico, I have now the additional responsibility of being in charge of the Lab Services consulting team. While I am certainly flattered that he believes that I can successfully run a team of about 60 highly-skilled professionals, I am concerned that this will eventually impact my personal life. We’ll see.

I have just updated my .Mac site using iWeb’08. You will find pictures of my recent trip to London, Brugge and Utrecht. I have also added pictures from previous trips.

After spending ten days in Europe I am back in Mexico. Even though I enjoyed my visit to the UK, Belgium and Holland I must say that in many ways I feel more comfortable in the Americas. It doesn’t matter if you talk about Brazil, the U.S. or Mexico, there is something over here that makes you feel alive. In Europe I feel that life is much more comfortable but I need the extra adrenaline shot that you get in a continent with few safety nets and more opportunities.

Today I spent the day in Utrecht visiting with my family the place where my father and I grew up. I hadn’t returned to The Netherlands in over a decade and my memories where starting to get blurry. It was certainly very emotional, although I think that neither my father nor I would ever consider returning to live to Utrecht.

Don’t get me wrong, I like the town, it is a medium-sized city with romantic canals that is very enjoyable during the summer and even though the rain can be depressing during the rest of the year I am convinced that it is possible to have a complete, happy life there. However, I cannot picture myself living there, as life seems to move much slower than in larger metropolitan areas.

One could argue that with the Internet (and I was able to get excellent download speeds in Utrecht) it is no longer necessary to live close to large cities in order to get many of the benefits that people normally associate with places like New York, Paris or London. I am not convinced. There is much more to live in a large city than being able to easily buy the latest and greatest. Small cities tend to favor status quo while largest cities spur competition and innovation. This doesn’t mean that innovation is less likely to appear in smaller cities or rural areas, it is just less likely because it is less necessary and there are less opportunities to share ideas with other interested parties. That is why I feel that I would feel quite lonely if I had to return to my home town. I could be wrong, though as Utrecht is only about twenty miles away from Amsterdam. Could it be that this old city combines the benefits of a small town and a large metro-pole? Possible, but it didn’t seem that way to me.

I think that small towns located to major population centers have a bright future. Knowledge workers usually no longer need to go to the office every day and that could mean a major change in the way people choose where to live. After decades of observing people move to large urban areas, we could be close to witness a major behavioral shift. Last year, after attending WWDC I went to Carmel and Monterey with my wife. I think that I (as well as many others) could easily picture myself living there, enjoying the benefits of a small town and the relative proximity to San Jose and San Francisco. What is the difference with Utrecht? Well, for a technologist Amsterdam doesn’t compare to the Bay Area and the weather is much better in Carmel than in Utrecht.