This is the last Mac posting at Hydrapinion for the year. I'm not proposing a full-blown wrap-up or look forward, just one observation from each category.

The Psystar case is pretty much over, with the cloner being banned from (among other things) selling derivative works of Mac OS X, aiding others to infringe on Apple's copyrights with regard to Mac OS X, or having any involvement in products intended to overcome the technological protection measures in Mac OS X.

That seems to rule out Psystar's Rebel EFI product too, although the judge did not specifically include it in his ruling.

The decision will probably dissuade other would-be cloners in the US, but Apple may need to repeat the process in other jurisdictions - assuming local laws are as favourable as those in the company's homeland.

Looking ahead, the iTunes Store seems likely to become increasingly important to Apple. It's still the market leader in the US, accounting for around two-thirds of paid music downloads and a quarter of music unit sales overall.

Those figures don't include subscription services, but the recent acquisition of Lala suggests Apple may be moving in that direction after all.

And whether or not the oft-predicted Apple tablet actually arrives in 2010, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see an Apple e-book reader app for the iPhone and iPod touch (and possibly for Macs and PCs as well, but that would, I'd suggest, be more likely to take the form of a new iTunes feature) with standalone books for sale at the iTunes Store/App Store.

There's clearly a lot of interest in this area among readers and publishers. Readers like the idea of cheap books with almost instant delivery, and it seems that publishers are looking for a bigger slice of the pie than Amazon (with its Kindle) is prepared to concede - and there are indications that Apple will oblige.

Anyway, enjoy whatever summer break is coming your way, and Hydrapinion Mac will be back in mid January.