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Originally Posted by MrTAToad  I still believe that Apple should allow other manufacturers to make Mac's again - whilst Apple wouldn't make such a direct profit, it would allow more people to experience a Mac. |
There's two things wrong with that argument. Last things first: Why would 2 or 3 Mac makers allow more people to experience a Mac? If more people want to buy Macs, Apple produces more. More companies making Macs would not really expand that.
More importantly, however, Apple has certainly learned its lessons from licensing the OS to others the last time. The only _successful_ clone maker was PowerComputing. It was so successful that Apple had to kill them (by stopping the licensing agreement) and then buy them (when they were cheap).
It's _quite_ clear that any licensee would try to undercut Apple's prices, were Apple to try a second age of clones. Sure: Consumers would like that. Buy a cheap Mac desktop for 399 or 299. Great. But Apple would suffer.
Apple has to sell a _lot_ of iPods, iPhones etc. before they can give up the Mac hardware business (which it effectively would by licensing the OS out to competitors).
Theoretically, Apple _could_ think about this, though. -> If iPods etc. (i.e. all those products which are _not_ really Macs) become such great money makers that making Macs does not really matter anymore, they could simply start to sell Mac _software_ to PC buyers. But that's been discussed to death. Apple's not there yet - and may never _get_ there as long as Macs are so successful. (Don't underestimate their success.)
