I’ve read several blogs, and news sites discussing this utopian possibility, I think most make valid points in favor and against this move, but I think they still miss the big picture, and here I will detail what I believe that is.
The Windows argument
Some believe Apple should release OS X as an OS for non Apple hardware as away to destroy the Microsoft empire. This is in my view the most retrograde argument of them all.
The notion that a company would base an important decision as this one on this argument is ludicrous in this day and age, now the 80’s Steve Jobs might have given it some consideration, and maybe even tried to push it to the board, but not this Steve Jobs, no way.
But let’s play Devil’s advocate and assume that OS X is released with a licensed for use in Intel/AMD base systems, and sold at the price OS X is currently sold. Would that destroy Microsoft? The answer is simply and utterly “NO”. It wont because Microsoft makes money from a number of different sources not just the OS, and worst case scenario, they have more room to maneuver prices and what not to make it competitive.
Well at least they will be forced to make Windows better! That’s an interesting argument, but still, no. It doesn’t force them to go in that direction either, it just forces them to reinvent themselves, and if they manage to make it better, then great, but wouldn’t bet on it.
So, no Microsoft wont die, if Apple releases OS X to the masses for free or pay.
Apple would make even more money!
The sales would soar!
Those that believe this need to understand that’s it’s not that simple. Apple would need to come up with an approach to deal with support for all the different hardware in the market. This means new sale logistics, a broader scope of training, and more work all around for the support staff, technical or otherwise. This also means, having to change their QA procedure, and that’s not taking into account security, compatibility, etc..
It would be as bad or worst than Windows
Those that believe this, are wrong, very wrong. If Apple manages to plan accordingly, and partner intelligently with Hardware vendors, then the problems will be minimal.
One of the benefits Apple has is that it can learn from Microsoft’s failures. Creating a sane HCL, and supporting only those peripherals that are in the HCL will make Apple’s life easier, it will not be perfect but it will good. Apple doesn’t need to support all hardware vendors but partnering with a few, a handful if you will, will bring them a long way. If they go the route of letting the Vendors develop their own drivers, leaving Apple with just the need of certifying it, then things might look better.
This is a very complex situation, and while it would definitely benefit Apple, and bring more money to the share holders, and let’s face it Apple is a corporation and money talks. It’s still a utopian dream at best.
Apple is a hardware company!
This is true, and would continue to be one.
Their hardware sales would crumble
May be, may be not. It’s difficult to predict this. What can happen is that their hardware would expand, they might start actually give the consumer more options. Also it might help them expand their line, and will help them score better deals on the hardware and passing on the savings to the consumer, in the end they can become bigger than all the PC companies combined.
But alas this are all conjectures, and it may all fail.
The Hackintosh
Many people are applauding Apple’s public stance on the hackintosh issue, what’s their stance you ask? Silence, that’s the best stance they can make right now.
Why don’t they pursue this people?
Well how are they going to do that? Most of this guys (the one doing the hacking) have legally purchased copy of OS X, and while they may be braking the EULA it seems it’s not enough to prosecute or convict.; I’m not a lawyer, but you can find a lot of comments from lawyers in this regard, and the consensus is Apple would get nothing or very little, if they go out to get this people/Companies.
Why don’t they put some anti-theft/tampering/hacking counter measures?
They have, and failed. Look at the iPhone, and the iPod, all their smart security features have been broken. My guess (hope) is they have learn their lesson, but really it’s simple. Every time Apple puts out a firmware to render useless the hackintosh, their will be some one that breaks, it and the cycle continues, now given enough time someone will have to give, most would think it will be the hackers, but that’s not necessarily true, this guys (as weird as they may sound) are having a lot of fun doing this, and learning in the process, so go figure, in the other hand, for Apple it will get to a point, where all those counter measures might actually hurt the performance of their hardware.
Again this oversimplifying and this is quite complicated from all standpoints.
So what’s left then?
Honestly, I don’t know what will happen. I just hope is a positive move for all of us, and that includes Apple.
My guess is they might create a version of OS X for the Mass market, let’s face it all hardware is different, and while the hackintosh are quite stable, and work fine, the real deal have far better performance reliability, because of Apple being able optimize the OS for their hardware.
Conclusion
As I see it, it’s a gamble for Apple to go either way. That said the path of less resistance is to continue silent, and continue working on their products and their R&D and let this feed the Cult of the Mac.
Because in the long run, I think some of those Hackintosh owners might end being Mac owners. Others will either continue to work at it, or will just let it fade.
So this Hackintosh thing might prove worthwhile for Apple, and as they say “There is no such thing as bad publicity”. Apple has the attention of hobbyist once again, maybe this time they will capitalize a bit differently, and hopefully more equally and open.
11 Comments
I think the title of your post is rather inaccurate. It’s not as if Apple is not already offering OS X to the masses, if you want to consider computer consumers “masses”. The title of your post implies that Apple is not even selling OS X to the “masses” but we the Apple consumers ARE PART OF the “masses.” You make OS X sound as if it were for only the exclusive few who only can get it by hemming and hawing at Steve Jobs’s feet–well, I exaggerate but perhaps you get my point.
And also note “offer” is also potentially misleading. Are you asking Apple to give away OS X? Clearly you’re not. The better word to use is “sell”.
A more accurate title would be: “Should Apple Sell OS X to non-Mac users?”
I hope you make this correction because the implications of “masses” is highly misleading.
While the Mac is selling much more, it hasn’t displaced Microsoft from the top, hence the Masses are the Windows users.
To the point of availability it’s true you can buy OS X anywhere, but it only runs on a Mac (unless you want to modify, violate the EULA,etc..) so OS X is not option for non-mac users.
As to whether Apple should open source OS X, I wouldn’t mind if they do, in fact I would be very happy. But that’s a stretch.
I will amend the title, because I mean no harm at all to Apple, and let’s be honest, there are some people that wouldn’t mind hemming at Steve Jobs’s feet as you put it, and I think you know this.
Their “Unit Sales” might soar, but will they make more money? Let’s play with some numbers and find out…
Apple’s last fiscal quarter (1FQ2008), Apple sold 2,319,000 computers–Mac minis, MacBooks, iMacs, Mac Pros, and Xserves. They made $3,552,000. Apple’s Gross Margin was 34.7%.
So the “average” Mac sold for about $1532. We’ll apply the gross margin–this is not fair since it includes all products Apple sold, but it’s the best we’ve got–and say Apple makes $531 of profit from each Mac.
There. Now we have some numbers to play with.
The most obvious thing we see is that Apple makes more money selling a Mac than they do selling Leopard. Software typically has very high margins (All you’re selling is a box, a DVD, and some paper) so we’ll ignore it and pretend that Apple makes the whole $129 off of a sale of Leopard. In that case, Apple makes a tad over 4x the money selling a Mac than they make selling a retail box of Leopard.
Or, to put it another way, for Apple to make the same money it made selling a Mac, they have to sell four copies of Leopard at MSRP. So, for Apple to make the same money they made in 1FQ2008, they’d've had to sell 9,276,000 copies of Leopard.
Now let’s say Apple partnered with HP, Dell, Lenovo, and Acer–the top selling computer makers worldwide. In 4Q2007 (Which is Apple’s 1FQ2008), these companies sold 39,229,000 computers. So Mac OS X would have to have been 23% of all computers sold for Apple to make the same money. Remember–that’s the same money. Not more.
Would it work? Do you think Apple would be able to get to 23% World-Wide market share from their current 2% or so? Personally, I don’t think so.
Peter,
You made some good points, but why would the Hardware sale decrease? I know there are plausible scenarios where the sales might be affected, but let’s face facts, their OS will always run better on Apple hardware, and if they can make money from the OS and keep increasing their hardware sales, well then by your logic, they’ll be making a nice profit, not necessarily huge, but as Steve Jobs said once “it’s not just about the money”.
I’m not in any advocating Apple should become just a Software Company, as I said in the post, they have the opportunity of learning from the mistakes of Microsoft, and they have done this, they have diversified in a way that adds a lot to their sales and revenues. The iPod, iPhone, etc.. are some the results of this diversification, but I ask is releasing OS X for pc-clones really hurtful to their business? Also another point that interest me what would the impact be for the other OS’s?
As I see it, Apple has committed major blunders in the past, some even made company tremble, but it survived. Would this have the same effect? Don’t think so.
If people chose their partners the way PC advocates want us to choose our computers, the ideal partner would be cheap, promiscuous, and covered with bling. We spend lots of time with these machines. Perhaps some of us are looking for something better than a trashy date…
Ha! Amusing. That’s like saying all your dates have the same sort of genitals, all in the same places, all with the same basic functionality, so they must all be equal. If the specs match, pick the cheap one. And hey, if they’re not the same, let’s just go to the store and get an upgrade. (Plastics surgery, anyone?). What about character, personality, temperament, balance, and all the intangible differences we rely on feel truly attached to someone? The hardware does not make the person. The PC crowd seems to promulgate a world devoid of valuing the qualities of things, be they people or objects.
Well, all I can say is if you own an Intel based mac, then welcome to the PC crowd, because any way you like to rationalize it, it’s a PC.
Now, I do believe the software has value, and that’s the reason of this post. Given that the OS has value, and the user space applications have value, why not capitalize by releasing OS X for non-apple branded hardware?
Right now if I understand correctly the measures Apple has taken to avoid that you install your Leopard DVD’s directly to a Dell, are the bios, and a few kernel extensions that Apple has in place. Of course it’s not news that all this have been defeated, and there are people running off the shelf Leopard on their Dell’s machines without issues.
So the difference in this case, you are putting value on the case and not what’s inside? Because of which you don’t realize that oops your partner is a cheap, promiscuous, with a taste for the minimalist bling.
Apple licensed their OS previously and it darn near killed the company.
Nice try, but it misses the point. It not the case versus what’s inside, it’s the balance of everything — the insides, the software, the case, the ecosystem, the overall experience. By the specs, one can easily build a hot-rod that has more horsepower, bigger wheels, better brake pads, etc. That doesn’t make that the better car, nor the better car-ownership experience. Apple does a better job at maintaining a standard of quality that the PC world has a hard time matching (and I work with the highest end machines on both platforms, so I know what I’m talking about). Unless Microsoft decides to start building its own computers and taking end-to-end responsibility for everything, I don’t see how the PC world can compete here. It’s not antagonism to say so, it’s just structurally impossible as far as I can tell.
NO! If Apple was running on generic hardware, then the lauded safety and security of the OS X / Apple platform would go out the window. The only time the security of a Mac was broken (root access to a machine with standard settings) was the 3rd party wireless card installed.
The complexity of the interaction of zillions of different hardware combinations, poor quality drivers, or the access to poorly written 4th party drivers to 3rd party hardware, and the radically increased complexity driven by this extreme diversity, would make the Mac as problematic as a Windows box.
Me, I will continue to buy Apple Macs, with superior hardware, for prices that are, 100% of the time, cheaper than any name brand comparably equipped PC (many hundreds cheaper, when you get to the higher configurations).
Allowing poor quality hardware and drivers to exist in the OS X world, would degrade the experience to that of a PC.
BTW: in managing IT environments with as many as 262,000 desktop computers, I can empirically state that Macs cost a fraction (10-25%) of a PC over the typical 3 year life of a corporate machine. Acquisition cost is such a minor factor in the life cycle price of the machine, that, even IF a Mac cost more, it would be a sound financial decision.
Opening up the hardware platform would remove that tremendous advantage that a Mac currently has.
So let me get this straight, the reasons I hear the commenters make for keeping OS X on the MAC and not opening up to the PC crowd are:
1. In would make it unsafe.
2. It would destroy the company
3. Apple Makes more money from selling computers =$3,552,000 a profit of 4 x the amount of what they’d make from software alone.
Now here’s my problem with these statements.
1. If the only thing making OS X safer is it’s small numbers then it’s not very safe to being with. Add in the sales of Ipod’s and Iphones with OS X and you have a lot of new hacking abilities coming out in the future. Also this kind of makes me appreciate Linux even more.
2. Microsoft has it’s fingers in many pies but very few of them are profitable, they make the lions share of their money on software. With Apple making great consumer products and achieving such high market penetration into the PC crowd it’s not difficult to see people adding OS X to their PC’s especially if they could get all the apple connectivity with their household electronics without having to make the huge leap to a Mac. I myself almost went with a Mac this winter but held back because I wanted a quad core computer with at least 4 gb of ram and a terabyte hard drive for my work. Now for a Mac that would have cost me $2700+, I spent $1400 including a new LCD screen. Hardly a comparison for the cost, and quite a difference from the notion of “Apple Macs, with superior hardware, for prices that are, 100% of the time, cheaper than any name brand comparably equipped PC (many hundreds cheaper, when you get to the higher configurations).” As stated in the above post. Would I like a Mac yes, but not at those prices. Now I know they would sell a lot more software than described before simply because your looking at new hardware sales vrs. existing units that might have it installed. If Apple were to make it easy to install onto existing PC’s you’d see a large portion of sales move in this direction, then in a few years many of those people would move over to MAC’s since they are already familiar with the system. Now let’s look at the math a bit again. If Apple could make 1/4 the profit it makes in hardware from software why not? You have to factor in the amount of money tied up in computers until it sell’s where as software is less expensive to produce. With software you can ship 50x more copies than you can 1 computer. So while a store may carry 100 computers in stock they could carry several hundred OS’s in only a few boxes and therefore sell more. Even if the computer doesn’t have OS X on it I as a consumer may opt to buy it and install it right from the start knowing that as my needs change I could add a smaller MAC to my network and have no problems down the road further increasing Apples bottom line.
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