Re:Apple's Dumbing Down of Computers a.k.a The End of Super-...
by hugh3 on Thursday October 21, 2010 @05:59PM
(#1817629)
Not to mention the technical difficulties. How would they stop me from running an application which I'd copied off a CD, or compiled myself, when I already have control over my filesystem? I suppose they could figure out a way, but it'd involve a lot of voodoo.
Besides, imagine the marketing pitch for that version of OSX. "Upgrade to our latest version! Most of your old software will stop working, and you'll have to buy it again!" I don't think so.
They're going to make a lot of money with their app store -- they don't need to destroy the rest of their platform to do it, though.
Re:Apple's Dumbing Down of Computers a.k.a The End of Super-...
by fuzzythinker on Thursday October 21, 2010 @06:01PM
(#1817637)
That's if MacOS remains < 33% market share. Once it hits a demanding 50%+ market share, they have the power to do pretty much what they want, unless laws prevent them from doing so. Not saying they would, but your argument is weaker once they gain the market share.
They were up on stage yesterday talking up the new AutoCAD port. The new AutoCAD port which is utterly incompatible with the posted App Store rules. The AutoCAD port that would in no way benefit from the exposure the App Store would give it, and which doesn't need and would never accept the 30% sales overhead for payment processing.
Locking the platform to the App Store would be a great way to kill Office, MatLab, Photoshop, Lightroom, AutoCAD, Steam, and a bunch of other software the platform needs if they want to keep anyone using it. To assume that it is inevitable that Apple will do it is to assume that Apple has a death-wish for the Mac platform.
But if we're going to assume that, why not just assume they'd kill the platform in the most straight-forward way possible: by discontinuing it.