Mac the Knife

Mac the Knife is the pen name (inspired by the homophonous well-known song "Mack the Knife") of an anonymous gossip columnist for the (now defunct) Apple Macintosh-focused trade publication MacWEEK. Mac the Knife was always written by a single writer, but the identity of that writer changed more than once over the long publishing history of MacWEEK.

Tipsters who provided juicy gossip were provided with coffee mugs emblazoned with the Knife's logo.

MacWEEK ' s party at Macworld Conference & Expo was named for this fictional character. The party was often more secretive than Apple's own parties, to protect the identity of the Knife.

During the latter part of the Knife's career, his or her columns appeared on a Web site called The Electric Knife, which was published by Mac Publishing at mactheknife.com, but after the Knife's retirement, the domain expired; it is no longer associated with the Knife.

Today, none of the former Mac the Knife columnists write using this name. The columnist himself moved to MacEdition, penning a column called The Naked Mole Rat Report (an allusion to a phrase used in one of the Knife's last columns). Some speculate that the late Robert Hess, former editor Matthew Rothenberg (of the online publication eWEEK), or Nick DePlume of the online publication Think Secret might have been the columnist at one time.