http://arstechnica.com/articles/culture/total-share.ars/5 – I find it interesting that the Mac never had more than 12% market share. When the Mac was introduced it was competing with IBM which had almost 30% market share. Funny how folks just do not get it. They say Apple “lost” the race by not selling cheaper hardware and licensing their OS. But IBM was already a standard.
Yes, they could have made a deal with Bill and attempted to make the Mac a second standard. I would enjoy seeing how that world would have turned out. One thing is certain, there was no guarantee of success had they done it. In other words, the game was not Apple’s to “lose” but theirs to “win” if they could figure out how. They did not figure out how.
What they have done, is figure out how to stay alive, and in the process, often to lead development on many fronts. [I was a BeOS developer for two years and still think of that period as the highlight of my programming years. Cutting edge to a fault, the BeOS was…] I applaud Apple, and Steve in particular, for their vision. And I wish them well in the future.