And keep in mind, my laptop batteries have generally lasted over three years, and I might be able to postpone this battery replacement for another year. As a lone indie dev, I don't make a huge amount of money, and it would be ridiculous to have a clone of a $3000 computer in a closet for a once-in-three-year occurence. That specific time vs. money tradeoff doesn't make much financial sense.
Rest assured, though, I'm not "one dropped cup of coffee away from not being in business anymore", as one silly reply suggested.
I always have an extra machine around the house in the event either my machine or my wife's machine fails. I've setup an account for her on my machine as backup for her to work with my machine if hers fails, etc.
After years of being remote/hybrid, we now have spare keyboards and mice around as well for when one inevitably breaks as well.
It's usually the same people who will pay $2500 a year for routine service on their car without saying something but bitch about $500 repair on the principal income generator they have (their macbook).
Maybe, just maybe, they consider it wasteful to throw away a working machine. The hardware is not exactly green to make, so sure, lets everyone buy a new laptop every year.
But my time has value too, and upgrading from Intel to the new M series did cut compilation times in half for a particular project I was working on. I'm not willing to sacrifice that much time to just keep on using an old machine. Then there's the problem of reliability. Even if I have a spare MacBook lying around there's a non zero chance my work machine will die at a very inconvenient time (like on site at a customer or when working against a short deadline). After 5 years the bathtub curve starts going up and I don't want to depend on old hardware, even when it's working.
There's a wide gulf between "singularly dependent on a 5 year old PC" and "just throw it out every year".
If the business is so important getting a second one and setting it up would probably take less time than coming up with that article.
Apple had bizarre policies sometimes sure, but I think this is 10% Apple’s fault and 90% the person posting this not being responsible enough for his business tools.
Completely untrue: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40534047
Some commenters (see also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40533735) seem to want to assume that I'm an idiot, but no, I'm not. I'm trying to avoid a hassle, but I'm not facing any kind of existential crisis to my business.
I did stop using Macs a few years ago. When my iPhone 11 dies I’ll probably switch to an older Pixel and install GrapheneOS on it.
But regardless of what kind of laptop you have, if you use it constantly and your time at it is worth a lot, having a backup in your closet makes sense. When you think of what tools cost in many professions, a backup laptop isn’t the wildest idea.