I’m flying out to San Francisco for WWDC 2007 (and some extra travelling) in a few hours. This will mean that I’ll be slower to answer emails over the next couple of weeks, but hopefully not that anyone will notice. Like the world would end, anyway! 😉

This is the first WWDC I’ve attended since 2003, when Apple showed us Panther, launched the original iSights (we all got a free one) and the PowerMac G5s, which would get faster and faster and, er, yes. So, this time it will be Leopard and who knows what else. Probably lots of talk about some phone, too.

Since about half the cost of the trip is actually getting to the US, I’ll be spending another week or so there travelling around, visiting friends and generally making a nuisance of myself. I’m really looking forward to it.

So, if you’re going, see you there and if not, I’m sure there’ll be plenty WWDC stuff on the internets to keep you occupied.

KIT is available as today’s MacUpdate Promo for $14.95 – that’s 40% off the usual $24.95 price.

Also, there is a chance to win one of two free copies for people who post comments on the MacUpdate Promo site.

The offer only runs for 24 hours, so if you’re interested go to the MacUpdate Promo site to buy.

Update: The offer is now closed.

A couple of weeks ago, the dollar-pound exchange rate breached the psychological $2 barrier and I had to revisit my thinking on whether to continue pricing my products in the US dollar or to move to another currency, namely the euro.

Meanwhile, some people did move – Martin Pilkington of M Cubed Software announced their move to the euro straight away, closely followed by Rory Prior of Think Mac and a debate ignited on the MacSB mailing list that I’m not sure reached any definite conclusions and left me none the wiser.

I stayed out of that debate but was later asked my opinion on the #macsb IRC channel. I gave a few reasons why I remained undecided, but here is the now fully-developed version of my answer that omits the one that went “it means I actually have to do something, which is never a good start”.

The aim of moving to the euro would be to achieve price stability for myself and not to be tied to a currency that will continue to nosedive in value. The trouble, from my perspective, is that the move is difficult to sell, if not to my customers then to myself.

Consider the following:

• Most people in the US prefer to pay in dollars. They know exactly what it’s worth without doing any mental arithmetic, or to be told down the line that €25 is actually $34 (the price today) and probably worse given PayPal’s conversation rates.
• Most people outside the US know the dollar is at a real low point, so they’re getting a bargain. Even I get disappointed when I see something priced in euros because I know I might actually cost me money.
• Most people outside of Europe don’t know the rough value of the euro at any given time, so while they may be more accustomed to currency conversion, it’s not something they’re likely to do on the spot. It has the potential to confuse and infuriate.
• Moving to the euro would effectively create a price increase for US customers (and others) if the value of the dollar continues to plummet while the euro remains strong.
• Competing products are most often priced in dollars, although whether price is a consideration in that way is another matter.

So, already it’s not looking too great for the euro, but the situation is certainly better than using Sterling which would confuse almost everyone and there doesn’t seem to have been any fuss over the change for Martin or Rory.

My other concern with the euro is the way it works. In case you don’t know, the European Central Bank sets a single interest rate for all Eurozone countries. That’s one interest rate, but numerous different economies all ticking over independently. This has created, for example, a crazy house price boom in the Republic of Ireland because the interest rate is considered too low, while Germany struggled to get its economy moving with rates that are too high.

Maybe this will all work out, but it makes me wonder whether I’m jumping from one sinking ship to another that’s permanently negotiating icebergs.

Other than that, I think the euro is great. As travel money, it’s so handy to be able to use the same currency in three different countries in one day (as often happens when you’re travelling around Europe) all with the same exchange rate – hence the appeal.

So: what to do? With the amount I’m earning decreasing and my cost of living increasing, the situation is clearly unsustainable.

Another option is simply to raise prices. It wasn’t my intention to do that either, although a change in currency could bring that about for many people if the value of the dollar continues to decline (i.e. the whole point of this exercise).

However, I have been working on future plans lately and realised something blindingly obvious. I had already intended to raise prices on the next versions of my products because, without that rise, they would be considerably lower priced than many of their competitors, yet equal if not better on features, etc.

So, prices for the current versions of my products will remain unchanged and I will continue to price in US Dollars, but future versions of my products will be priced to match their improved capabilities, while remaining competitive. The plan may yet change, but for now I think that is the answer to my personal conundrum and one that I think is fair for everybody.

I appear as a guest discussing Search Kit, the framework for indexing and searching files and text on episode 14 of the Late Night Cocoa podcast, out now.

For anyone who doesn’t know, Late Night Cocoa looks at a different topic every week with a guest developer and is suitable for both novice and experienced Cocoa developers. It stands out because its host, Steve Scott, aka Scotty, does an excellent job producing a podcast that is not only useful and informative but also sounds good too. A lot of work goes in behind the scenes to make that happen.

And, as always with a podcast, you can listen to what you want when it suits you, so if one topic doesn’t interest you, there are bound to be plenty more that do. So if Cocoa development interests you, check it out.

Podcast production application, Übercaster, hits version 1.0 today. This follows a significant period of private and public beta testing, during which time the application has already built a reputation as a powerful yet intuitive application for recording and producing podcasts.

Übercaster brings everything podcasters need into one application and does this very well, as it has been designed for podcasting from the beginning.

Its comprehensive feature set includes live audio recording, multi-track editing and integration with Skype, iChat or Gizmo for recording interviews – with the neat trick that all participants can hear the audio you play in addition to the regular conversation.

Übercaster can also add tags and artwork, create enhanced podcasts, encode and upload the finished recordings to FTP servers, weblogs, .Mac and specialized podcasting hosting services such as Podshow+.

So is there anything Übercaster doesn’t do? Believe it or not, yes! Übercaster doesn’t create RSS feeds. Enter Feeder!

As of today you can purchase Übercaster and Feeder together as part of a special bundle. Übercaster is normally $79.95 and Feeder $29.95, but these two great applications can be purchased together for only $95, saving around 15%.

The bundle is available from the Übercaster store and links are available on Feeder’s product pages too.

Even if you are a podcaster and don’t need the bundle, you really should check out Übercaster for yourself. It is a very impressive application and deserves every success.

Congratulations to Eberhard and Sebastian of Pleasant Software for the People on this much-anticipated 1.0 release.