File Email with a Key in Apple Mail
In Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger or later, you can use the simple and fun MsgFiler Mail plug-in to file Mail messages using keyboard shortcuts.
New in Apple Mail 4 (the 10.6 Snow Leopard version), to assign a keyboard shortcut to any mailbox on the Move To or Copy To submenu, you can also open the Keyboard pane of System Preferences, click Keyboard Shortcuts, and select Application Shortcuts in the list on the left. Click the + button, choose Mail from the Application pop-up menu, type the name of the mailbox in the Menu Title field, click in the Keyboard Shortcut field, and press the keystroke combination you want to use. Then click Add.
Written by
Tonya Engst
Recent TidBITS Talk Discussions
- Alternatives to MobileMe for syncing calendars between iPad/Mac (1 message)
- Free anti-virus for the Mac (20 messages)
- iTunes 10 syncing iPod Touch 4.1 (2 messages)
- Thoughts about Ping (16 messages)
Published in TidBITS 1018.
Subscribe to our weekly email edition.
- Verizon to Woo iPad Buyers with MiFi
- DealBITS Drawing: Win a Copy of ProfitTrain
- EagleFiler Turns a Finder Folder Into a Snippet Keeper
- Can T-Mobile's 3G Speed Overcome Its Frequency Limitations?
- The Fall and Rise of Bundle-Based Businesses
- TidBITS Watchlist: Notable Software Updates for 15 March 2010
- ExtraBITS for 15 March 2010
Tim Cook Gets $22 Million for Filling Steve Jobs's Shoes
Those of us who have had regular jobs know the joy of the bonus, a reward for working hard and producing results. Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook found a little something extra in his pay envelope on 10 March 2010: $5 million plus 75,000 restricted shares of stock worth $17 million at today's prices.
Cook was rewarded for "outstanding performance in assuming the day-to-day operations of the Company for the period in fiscal 2009 during which Mr. Jobs was on medical leave of absence," according to an SEC filing by Apple. The stock grants are in two even pieces that can't be sold for one and two years as long as Cook is still employed on those dates.
Many executives at companies large and small are compensated far beyond the value to investors. I'm a great fan of Nell Minow, who has for the last 11 years documented at Corporate Library excessive and secret corporate payouts to underperforming leaders.
But Cook seems to deserve this one (I'm not a shareholder, and so the disbursement doesn't affect me directly). Cook was in charge of Apple for the first half of 2009, and the company didn't appear to suffer at all, despite handwringing by pundits who thought Jobs had the golden product-laying goose in his carry-on luggage.
The stock was around $100 per share near the end of 2008 and into 2009; it closed at $224.84 on the day Cook's shares were awarded. Company revenue and earnings were remarkable in the fiscal quarter ending in January 2010 (which included the holiday season). Apple increased revenue 32 percent over the year-ago quarter, and profit was up 50 percent. Apple has $40 billion in cash and short-term investments.
The company's market capitalization - stock price multiplied by shares outstanding - is over $200 billion, which means shareholders' stake in the firm has grown by about $115 billion in the last 14 months. Cook's bonus is two-hundredths of one percent of that increase.
The restricted stock is also a tiny set of handcuffs to keep Cook at the company, and could be worth much more than the $17 million the shares would sell for today. Two years ago, Cook exercised 300,000 options and sold them for around $140 per share, reaping about $40 million. Records show he retained just 14,000 shares in the company before this new, restricted grant.
![](/file/11593/db.tidbits.com.tar/db.tidbits.com/images/badges/SmileLogo2010-50x50.gif)
editing PDFs; TextExpander for saving time and keystrokes while you
type; DiscLabel for designing CD/DVD labels and inserts. Free demos,
fast and friendly customer support. <http://www.smilesoftware.com/>
I'm glad Cook did a fine gig for standing in for Steve Jobs. It's better than many CEOs who seem to earn multi-million dollar bonuses for being fired. But, that is still quite a wad of bills.
I sometimes wonder what companies could save if we farmed out some of these jobs to India.
I think stock options would be a more appropriate gift than reserved stock, in that options (while they represent an expense to stockholders) reward only further improvements instead of being an outright grant.
I'd argue that only a tiny portion of both salaried and hourly labor, including executives and professionals, know the joy of a bonus. I'm not talking a nominal three figure Christmas gift, and you're not either. I'm talking a bonus that exceeds a significant percentage of base salary.
I'd argue only the top 1% or less of American workers knows the joy of a real bonus. Often it's just the C-level managers. And often, like here, it can be the result of short-term pumping of the stock price by accounting gimmicks and layoffs.
I'd agree with David Weintraub that we'd all be better off and more productive if the labors of all workers were reflected in their bonuses and pay rather than being skimmed off for the top of the pyramid.
The only joy most workers share in Mr. Cooks success is not being laid off and having their jobs offshored to China.
Overall, I support salary equity, with a relatively small spread between people earning a living wage with pension, health care, and sick leave at the bottom; and people earning a decent return based on their value to shareholders on the top.
Rewards are one thing but that's a pretty obscene amount of money.
I am a dyed-in-the-wool Apple fan and I realise Tim Cook wouldn't be doing it for nothing, and he needs to be rewarded for performance.
I think Obama's initiative to rein-in these excessive rewards is correct and needs to be supported.