How Apple makes more profit on their systems...

Jon 'maddog' Hall maddog at li.org
Mon Oct 5 10:47:29 EDT 2009


Hi,

I have been watching this conversation for the past couple of days, and
I would just like to throw in a small observation.

People like Apple because of their design, because things plug together
seamlessly, because everything works well.

One simple reason for this is that Apple controls, to a large extent,
both the hardware and software from top to bottom.

Yes, there are "notebook hard drives", but we all know that even when
they follow a spec like IDE, there is slop in the spec, and there are
other factors such as power consumption, heat generated, rotational
speed, MTBF, etc. etc.  Those of us old enough remember the early days
of SCSI, when the spec was....scuzzy.  This caused lots of differences
in drivers. Over the years the spec tightened, and there fewer
differences.

Also, by controlling the hardware and software, Apple can lay out
roadmaps of functionality.  They can offer, within reason, features
outside a standard spec.  Their volumes, although lower than the volumes
of Microsoft systems, allow them to compete reasonably in doing this.

They also get to test a much smaller test matrix of hardware and
software with every release of their OS.

Not having to deal with all the different vendors is a great cost
savings and a path to stability that Microsoft would have trouble
achieving.

Witness the rock-solid systems like VMS, MVS and other proprietary
systems developed on in-house manufactured hardware.

Secondly, I remember when Apple released their guide to developing apps
for the MacIntosh, and how people complained about it.  But they
remained firm, and now they have a system that is "consistent" even to
third party applications.

But it comes at a price, both monetarily (prices to the consumer), with
interoperability, and with "Freedom".

Sure, Apple makes "more profit on their systems".  But it is because
people buy them....and people buy them despite the closed nature of the
development system because they are stable, well designed and do what
some people want.  It is a lot easier to do that when you have control
of the entire system from beginning of design through manufacture. QED.

I have watched Linux systems improve for the past 15 years.  Free
Software is amazing, and it is getting better. Certainly the GAP has
closed between FOSS and Microsoft. The gap may or may not close between
Apple and FOSS.

I am sure that this will generate some discussion and possibly even
flames.  I will probably not answer them because I am really busy at the
moment.

Warmest regards,

maddog





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