Sure, but what laptop are you going to put it in? If what you want is a Macbook Air, you pay or you go home.

Of course, it’s annoying, but the Apple Silicon experience is so good I don’t mind paying the higher markup.

Their walled garden is so bad that I couldn't imagine paying that kind of markup.

It’s pretty opt-in. My computing life is on a bunch of NixOS machines with Linux 5-series kernels.

I connect to the real computers via Apple Silicon appliances because they’re cool, quiet, tender fonts properly, play sound properly, etc.

I know a lot of people are into the Desktop Linux thing. “Mine is great ever since I upgraded to PulseAudio blah, everything is awesome as song as you never close the lid…”

Have fucking fun with that.

All of Apple's software is free so you pay via hardware and services. I prefer the Mac ecosystem to the Windows one so there really is no choice. I'd be open to another ecosystem (Linux?) if it worked better than the Apple one or if Apple made consistently started making some decisions that went over the line (like their CSAM stuff which is on the edge).

Until then a few hundred dollars a year to be in a better ecosystem is not even worth second guessing.

Not all. You have to pay extra for things like Logic.

Apple doesn't make any serious profit from Logic Pro, it is straight up sold at a cost or less. Look at the major competitors.

Ableton releases new major versions of their DAW once every couple years. Standard edition is $450. Full edition is $750. Upgrading to the next major version is $240 or so (provided you already own a previous one).

Logic Pro? You pay $199, and you are done. Logic Pro had a massive major update a year or so ago, fully free. Not only it is cheaper, there are no different editions or costs for upgrades. For a one-time cost (that is already cheaper than major competitors), you get perpetual massive updates with no bs or extra costs. In terms of major commercial DAWs that are actually used in the industry, Logic Pro hands down is a great bang for the buck.