Another "all-new" iMovie. ’06 was feature-rich and complicated. ’08 was simple, but lost some features. Now ’09 is simple and has lots of whiz-bang features. The timeline has not returned, but the new iWorks is impressive. This version of iMovie makes very complex operations quite simple, but also makes simple operations very complex. Warning: it may not run well on any Mac that is not practically new (and has plenty of RAM).

iPhoto is more complex. Faces and Places join Events (from ’08) to make iPhoto a powerful tool for organizing and for dazzling others with spiffy slide shows, and more. For those who never liked or understood Events, you may get dizzy with iPhoto ’09. Remember, you can always ignore everything "newfangled" and just use the Albums like always. But for most of you, some training in iPhoto will make Events lovable and Faces (face recognition) irresistible. Places (organizing your pix by where they were taken) won't have a lot of mass appeal, but for some will be very important. Warning: this program may not handle big photo libraries well on anything but the newest Apple computers with lots of RAM.

All the iLife and iWorks applications have more features, as the applications continue to mature.

iTunes without DRM (copy-protected) music will mean the music you buy can move to any computer or device you own. This is a good thing, as life gets complicated when you can't play your own music.