Who would you trust more: a sincere pirate or a dishonest thief?

Parlay?

A. Aye, let me at the loot!
B. Can you explain this a tad better?
C. Let me walk off the plank

Courtesy of the MacHeist skunk works community.

A bunch of people groupthinking up some crazy theories, or are they on to something? For those who enjoy teasers, sneak peaks, and early invites, check out the ongoing discussion on the Heist forums.

Something different, fresh, and highly flammable. More details to come.

Guess what? Things are stirring again. Actually, they've been stirring for a while, but I've had to keep quiet about most of them. I'm planning some huge updates to the site though in the upcoming week or two.

For any MDA fans out there, if you missed it, we're running a developer competition now to select the right developers for Season 2. And if you're a developer, you'll definitely want to check it out.

MacThemes 2... is out! Huge props to Ricky, Johnny and Dave for pulling it off, and kudos to David Lanham and Renn of Atacama Design for the great design refresh. The front page is now active again with a reallly excited news staff, so while I'm taking things pretty hands off, I'll be looking forward to reading all the new content.

MacHeist? Well... it's over, I guess. But it's a long break between now and the next one. Maybe we'll think of something to fill that hiatus up.

There's other stuff coming up, and I'll be making efforts soon to get some more discussion going between me and you guys. But for now, the blog is definitely continuing in hibernation. (I have over 10,000 comments in moderation, mostly spam. I don't even know where to begin.) Stick with the twitter feed for updates.

As MacHeist is underway, I thought I'd share with you guys a little peek into its design process.

As John Casasanta, Scott Meinzer and I began to finalize details on Heist a couple months ago, we realized that what we were going for (spy themed, campy stories, etc.) would require an extremely capable web designer with a distinctive style. This had to look different from all the forums and blogs out there. It had to look amazing. And it had to be designed fast.

So my first pick for the project was Adam Betts, who I had worked with previously on the original design for MacThemes. What he had created for MacThemes, in my opinion, was fresh nearly three years ago, and is still fresh today. And the amazing thing was, he had come up with the general visual idea and details in a matter of days. So, after a few days of chatting with him, I convinced him to join the project, and he got to work.

Below are a few snapshots from the process over roughly two weeks (click for full size):

Notice something? Adam had the fundamental pieces of the design nailed from the beginning. And from there, it was a matter of relatively minor changes. (Combo code entry, site background, etc.)

Of course the design job isn't over quite yet... but I think it's safe to say that people are loving what Adam came up with. Major props to him.

Voila, the final product

What we've been calling "Act 2" after My Dream App has just begun, and it's called MacHeist. Thousands of you signed up with interest in the event, and over the next few days, you'll be receiving spiffy invite tickets by mail. (It's a closed event for now.)

And for the rest of you... well, if you'd like a taste of what Heist will be about, I encourage you to check out this post on TUAW. We call it a wild monkey chase. See, unlike most wild goose chases, this one involves a monkey, and actually ends somewhere cool. (Plus I think you'll agree. It's pretty hilarious seeing people's reactions to over a dozen monkeys mysteriously popping up all over the Mac web.)

Enjoy, and hopefully I'll be seeing some of you soon inside MacHeist! And Digg this!