Clip & save this to your Apple scrapbook, next to articles reporting Michael Dell's 1997 "shut it down and give the money to shareholders" assessment. Author M

Clip & save this to your Apple scrapbook, next to articles reporting Michael Dell's 1997 "shut it down and give the money to shareholders" assessment. Author Mims casually overlooks how crucial Mac/OSX is to the iOS development ecosystem, and how important "screens that have more pixels than any PC ever" are to the leading-edge creators for every other tech and cultural platform. It's a reminder why tech columnists aren't asked to manage/turn-around tech companies. There is one true insight here, though, about where the future mass-market volume and profits will come from. But let me suggest a diametrically opposite strategic direction, suggested by the same insight: It may again be time for Apple to welcome OSX on third-party hardware. OSX is now a complement to the real cash cows – iOS devices, media stores, and cloud service – via the OSX development stack and other tight integrations. Apple could give OSX away for running on any clone PC (or virtual host), and reap benefits in the markets where it has stronger profit margins. Apple would still produce showpiece Macs – the creation/development/knowledge-work hardware you get when you can afford them – but most OSX users would simply be throwing OSX onto their econoclones, because it's what works best with the iOS devices they spend most of their time on. If you squint, you could see "free OSX anywhere" as a followup step in the progression that's included ITunes everywhere and free XCode.