This is the most stunning, blatant, and outright "amazing he's getting away with it" case of artistic theft I've ever witnessed.

Les Otten, Republican candidate for Governor of Main, has the nerve to claim that his Web site is completely original, and not a copy of President Obama's site, because "some local guys designed it."

A picture is worth a thousand words:

President Obama's Web Site:

Les Otten's Web Site:

Need more proof it's a blatant ripoff?

Looking at them side by side and you can clearly see that Otten copied Obama's design. But a simple trip to Photoshop (and probably the site code itself) reveals that Otten not only copied the design, but the site is virtually identical in every way.

The lighter areas of the image below are President Obama's site, the darker areas are Otten's site.

Notice that the sizes of bars, etc. are exactly the same. The color schemes are identical not only in tones, but placement.

What's even more incredible is that Otten has actually had the nerve to post this tidbit: "It is unfortunate that the Maine Democratic Party is focusing on the design of www.lesotten.com rather than its content."

Now let me say that I've never been one to jump on someone who copies an idea. I've used other people's designs as inspiration for my own work plenty of times. I don't find it unbelievable that two people can have the same idea at all, and there are certain techniques and layouts that are simply unavoidable as far as layout goes. But to completely rip-off a design in this manner and to this extent is just inexcusable.

MyFonts is offering a free download of Zag Regular and Zag Bold, part of Fontfabric's Zag font family in OpenType format.

You will need to set-up an account with MyFonts to download the fonts, but it's a beautiful font and worth the effort!

If you've ever needed to batch convert a folder full of Illustrator or .eps files to a bitmap format such as PNG or JPG, you know the frustration of doing it manually (one at a time) with Illustrator's export function. You could set up a batch action in Photoshop, but that's almost more trouble than it's worth.

Pongo is a tiny application that does only one thing, convert vector-based Illustrator files to either PNG, JPG or SVG format, with a single click of a button. You simply drag your file(s) onto the Pongo Icon, and choose which format you want to save the files as.

Pongo actually uses Adobe Illustrator to do the work, so you will have to have Illustrator installed, but it does its job in the background.

Pongo requires Mac OS X 10.4 or higher, and is completely free - though donations are accepted.

Apple Announces Netbook! That’s the headline you wanted to see, right? That’s the headline that industry analysts and so-called experts believe Apple must have in order to remain relevant in today’s economic climate. That’s also the headline you’re not likely to come across unless it happens to be April 1st.

The truth is, Apple already has a netbook on the market, which they’ve been selling for quite a while now. It’s called the MacBook Air.

In MacBook Air is the Apple Netbook, I discuss why I believe Apple isn't offering a netbook, and why we're not likely to see one any time soon.

Having spent the last 15+ years as a Mac-fanatic, one of the original editors at MacCentral, and more recently an editor at Macworld, Jim Dalrymple is no stranger to the Mac Web.

The Loop is Jim's latest Web venture. The site offers commentary on the latest news about Apple, product reviews and more. I've known Jim (in an online sense) for many years. He's a great writer, and I'm sure the site will quickly become one of my favorite daily visits. The site is just getting off the ground, and I wish him the best of luck!

When you have some time, give The Loop a quick visit.

Chris Foresman over at ArsTechnica comments on the upcoming font changes to OS X Snow Leopard.

Among the many under-the-hood changes to OS X are the removal of Strong and Light anti-alias font Display settings. Medium will be the only option.

And much to the delight of many designers, Apple is apparently getting rid of their proprietary dfont format. Taking its place will be a number of fonts in the TrueType Collection (.ttc) format. How font management applications like Suitcase Fusion will support this remains to be seen - however the .ttc format has been supported by the Mac OS since 8.5, according to Ars.

Digital photography fans can download the latest issue of PhotographyBB e-magazine in PDF format.

PhotographyBB is a free online magazine composed by a hardworking team of volunteer contributing authors whose goal is to teach beginners all about digital photography and image processing.

The June 2009 edition features articles on photography techniques and issues facing today’s digital photographer. Readers will learn tips on composition and how keeping things simple can lead to great photography. The issue also examines how to overcome “photographer’s block” when lack of inspiration occurs. Included is also a Photoshop® tutorial on creating an urban “grunge” type effect for dramatic impact.

I recently received an email from a fellow Mac user asking how you go about changing the orientation of an Adobe Illustrator document once you've already created it. Previously, you could do it in the Document Setup dialog box, but with CS4 that has changed - probably due to multiple artboard support being added to Illustrator CS4.

Below I've outlined how you change the various aspects of your document, including orientation, size, etc.

Jumsoft has expanded their Goodies bundle, a collection of applications and designs available from company's Web site free of charge.

The company added ten Keynote motion backgrounds to the vastly popular collection. The animated backgrounds are extremely easy to use, as users can simply drag and drop them onto their presentations as any other movie or picture.

You can download the latest Keynote Motion Backgrounds collection (88MB), as well as a number of other free goodies for other iWork apps.

The 2009 AIGA|Aquent Salary Survey draws from the largest pool to date of designers and others allied with the profession nationwide, and includes responses from more than 9,000 design professionals.

The AIGA|Aquent survey is widely recognized as the most comprehensive annual survey of compensation data for the communication design profession in the United States.