Apple Address Book and MobileMe Contacts

Apple’s Address Book application on Mac OS X Snow Leopard has the ability to print directly to address labels.  First create a new group called “Holiday Cards 2010″ in Apple’s Address Book.  Add the contacts you wish to send a card to this season to this new group.  Once this task is complete, simply select the group and perform the following steps:

1. Select File>Print from the Address Book Menu
2. Click the icon next to your Printer choice that looks like an upside-down triangle
3. From the Style drop down menu, choose Mailing Labels
4. Under the Layout tab, set the Page to Avery Standard and 8160 (or whatever type of mailing label you have)

Now you’re all set to print.  I would also recommend saving the results as a PDF file, and printing from there.  That way you’ll always have a record of whom you already mailed cards to this holiday season. If you want to change the font or add an image to the address labels, from that same print dialog box where you choose which type of label you’re using, simply toggle over from Layout to the Label tab and make any changes you want.

Avery Designer Pro and Google Contacts

Just as with the Apple Address Book solution above, the first thing to do when you’re dealing with your Google-stored addresses is to create a new group called “Holiday Cards 2010″ in Google’s Contacts.  Add your chosen contacts to the group. Now we’ll export the group to a local file on your Mac, and use Avery’s Designer Pro for Mac application to actually print the labels. Once you’ve installed Avery’s software, perform the following steps:

1. Export the contact group in Google Contacts as a “Google CSV” file (google.csv)
2. Launch Avery Designer Pro and choose 8160 – Easy Peel Mailing Labels (or whatever type of mailing label you have) from the list of all Avery Products
3. Click on the Use Blank button in the bottom right hand corner of Avery Designer Pro
4. From the toolbar located on the top left, click on the Text Box button to add a text box to the label
5. Now click on the Mail Merge button located just below the toolbar, this will prompt you to load the exported CSV file (google.csv)
6. Select the exported CSV file from the file system, and insert the columns you want to show up on the label

Now you can print from Avery Designer Pro’s File menu.  I would again recommend saving the results as a PDF file, and printing from there.

This technique is a little more flexible considering you have the option to choose one of Avery’s design styles. It’s also a little more powerful since you are actually designing the address labels in a designer that even supports layers, and of course a little more complex, as you need to export data and install and use a third-party application.

You can also mix and match the above two solutions, as you could certainly export your Google Contacts as a vCard and import them into Apple’s Address Book. The Avery Designer Pro application can also import Apple Address Book Contacts.  Either way, hopefully you find printing mailing labels on a Mac one of the easier one of the easier things to cross of your list this holiday.

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The format the new hardware takes will actually be only the superficial impact of tomorrow’s announcement, though. What will really amaze, and what will matter far more for the future of Apple and the personal electronics industry, will be the content deals that are announced alongside the launch of the new device. If the deals go anywhere near as predicted, Steve Jobs could be crowned the new king of all media.

Alright, so maybe I’m overstating things a bit, but not by much. The story of how Apple’s iTunes affected the music industry, and gave the company an amazing degree of control in setting policy and pricing splits for digital music distribution is well known. It is widely accepted that record companies begrudgingly acquiesce to Apple’s demands, although occasionally they demand a concession, like the iTunes price policy change that accompanied the move to DRM-free music files.

Even now, Apple is reportedly trying to use the same strong-arm tactics on providers of television video content who hawk their wares in the iTunes store. MacRumors reports that the Mac-maker is urging TV networks to lower the per-episode price of content from $1.99 to $1, as part of its selling strategy for the tablet.

If the tablet proves to be even half the multimedia wunderkind it is being hailed as, other media providers can expect the same kind of pressure brought to bear. The book, magazine and newspaper industry in particular stands the least chance of resisting Apple’s power grab, since at this point it’s already looking for a life raft to save it from a daunting future steeped in decline. Some rumors are now circulating that the tablet will ship with a built-in Barnes & Noble bookstore, but whatever the outcome, you can bet Apple will have significant support from magazine and newspaper providers looking for a lucrative alternative to print.

Where Apple has the advantage, even if it is seen as an unsavory source of salvation by those wary of what its done for the music industry, is that it isn’t the Internet. People almost invariably like things that are free, and the Internet makes free easy. The only thing people like more than free is easy, and Apple’s distribution method makes things very easy, especially if the iTunes store is married to an extremely light and thin portable device with a decent size screen and a range of connectivity options.

Selling through Apple also takes a lot of the backshop issues out of the hands of providers. They no longer have to worry about setting up advertising, controlling access, preventing piracy and security exploits, etc. And the revenue picture becomes much more clear, with a per unit price that stockholders and stakeholders alike can easily understand. Taking the long view, siding with Apple makes sense, even if the upfront price is quite steep in terms of power dynamics.

So will Steve Jobs inherit a kingdom tomorrow? Not quite yet, I think. More like he’ll take control of quite a few lucrative fiefdoms, but it’ll take a little longer to unite the entire media nation and declare himself monarch. Make no mistake, though, this is what the tablet will accomplish in the long run. It’s the inherited legacy of the iPod and iPhone, in fact, and this is simply the next building block. Fancy gadgets are lovely, but what draws customers to those shiny screens is the content that they’re displaying; control the content, and you control consumer spending.

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This update for iPhoto also includes three new travel-related photo book themes: Old World Travel, Tropical Travel and Asian Travel. Each is based on the existing travel theme, but includes several unique backgrounds. Apple has also provided additional greeting card themes.

This free update is 161MB and can be downloaded automatically via Software Update or through Apple’s Support Downloads website.

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In OS X printing to a PDF is a as simple as:

1. File > Print
2. PDF > Save as PDF

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