Silicon Valley businessmen fancy themselves unflinching hard-core capitalists. Yet they hate to compete for workers — and the New York Times found an email to prove it.

Tech giants have long sought more work visas, saying they enrich immigrants. But a reported Justice Department investigation raises the possibility Google, Apple and Yahoo, among others, colluded to hold down wages.

Steve Wozniak told a Wall Street Journal reporter his Apple co-founder Steve Jobs sounds "healthy, energetic," signaling the CEO will return from medical leave at the end of June as planned. The market wasn't particularly interested.

"Jorge Colombo drew this week's cover using Brushes, an application for the iPhone, while standing for an hour outside Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum in Times Square." [New Yorker]

Blogger In Other News caught this somewhat unfortunate screengrab on the New York Times website tonight of Apple's ad stars, John Hodgman and Justin Long, gazing lazily at a soon to be executed Missouri man.

Did contractors pave imperfection into Apple's parking-lot paradise? A controversial photo showing a misspelled traffic warning sent one employee out on the asphalt to disprove yesterday's report of a chip in Steve Jobs's flawless facade.

What happens when Apple's famously perfectionist CEO takes a six-month medical leave? Everything at Apple goes to hell. Like the parking lots. Feel better soon, Steve!

Google's G1 is the biggest enemy of Apple's iPhone. And Apple is making a big push into the Web. So it's totally hunky-dory that Google and Apple share board members, right? Wrong, say antitrust cops.

Perhaps there's a reason Apple CEO Steve Jobs keeps a veil of mystery drawn over his private life: He's a spoiled, rich dude with a raging sense of entitlement, as his real-estate ventures reveal.

Hackers have broken into Salma Hayek's email, revealing the actress's iPhone-app obsession, designer-clothes habit, travel plans, and more. (Her billionaire husband, François-Henri Pinault, who's throwing a second wedding for her this weekend, pays the bill!)

Jim Goldman, the shameless Apple parrot and CNBC correspondent, did his best for the computer company in an on-air price comparison the other day. But he had to lift his argument wholesale.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs is the ultimate telecommuter, working from home on a new, lightweight "netbook" while he's ostensibly on medical leave from Apple. Investors are calming down. So what are employees worried about?

When Steve Jobs is away, his PR mice will play! A tipster sent us this photo of Apple flack Katie Cotton snuggling up to Bruce Springsteen — apparently at a recent concert in San Jose.

Sure, he once briefly flipped out about rigged online voting, but Steve Wozniak's Dancing with the Stars stint will be remembered for the Apple cofounder's overflowing good humor, maintained through his inevitable defeat.

Esquire: GM should hire Apple CEO Steve Jobs, assuming he doesn't die and stuff.

Lauren, the star of Microsoft's latest ad campaign, wants a laptop with a 17-inch screen for under $1,000. She goes to the Apple Store; no luck. "I'm not cool enough to be a Mac person," she sighs as she drives away. She heads to Best Buy and finds one for $699. (Oh, by the way, though Microsoft is telling people that the people like Lauren featured in its new ads were hired on Craigslist for a "market-research study," Lauren is an actress.)

Some 'What Will Become of Newspapers?' thinkers believe that the iTunes model is the future of the news business. Well, with one software upgrade, paid news is now an iPhone app! Will this matter?

Have you heard that Twitter is the future of news? If so, we're in for a world where Apple's introduction of a copy-and-paste feature for the iPhone is the most important news ever.

After Valleywag reported that Apple had laid off 50 salespeople last week, Apple spokesman Steve Dowling issued a blanket denial: "Not true." Turns out the layoffs happened, and Dowling lied, CNET News reports.

Something's going on at Apple. Normally a leak-proof ship, the S.S. Steve Jobs has been taking on rumors of layoffs. The latest: Cuts in Mac hardware and software units, says a tipster: