Better title for this article: Apple Will Become the Most Valuable Company in America
The "how" in this article boils down to "by being worth more than the other companies in America."
It wouldn't surprise me....I'm not really a fan of apple, and I have bought 2 iphones, 2 ipod touches (lost the 1st one), and an iPad in the last year. As soon as the ipad with facetime comes out, I'm buying two.
"I'm not really a fan of apple", what will you buy when you ARE an Apple fan? Becoming an Apple fan happens slowly but surely - 2 years ago I'd never have thought I'd be typing on a MacBook.
Id like to know how many developers buying macs is actually due to it being a must for iPhone development? i must be very uncool or may be i just dont "get it" if I prefer to save good 500-1000 bucks buying a dell (with ubuntu) that is a good 20% more powerful than the latest MBP...
Uh, So you're saying that the draw to develop for the platform is driving Mac sales? Are you aware how marginal developers really are? There aren't many, but you probably know a lot of them, and encounter many on this site. I suppose you imagine everyone in the world who thinks differently than you must have been forced or are stupid.
There's no need for that tone. You misunderstood the question - flashgorden was just asking why macs were so popular among developers.
Umm actually I didnt think anybody was stupid. I was questioning my own intelligence (and/or coolness) in fact since I could not fathom paying that extra price for reduced power (last I checked the MBPs werent even the real quad cores!).
I was just curious as to what proportion of developers were being attracted to macs for their coolness vs the ability to get into the apple market. I had a feeling it was the coolness (given unix + nice UI) but wasnt sure if it was more compelling than an Ubuntu (atleast the latest incarnation of it).
3-4 years ago MacBooks were already very popular among developers in the Valley, before the iPhone was a factor. Part of it is being fashionable, I'm sure, but part of it is the whole Unix thing without the headache of Linux, and part of it is that they're simply solid laptops.
Several years ago you already saw large number of MacBooks (well, PowerBooks at the time) at tech conferences. IMHO it really was the Unix + nice UI that attracted many developers. It certainly got me.
I dunno. I tried for a good year (with a borrowed mac) to like it but never could get into the mac mentality. Perhaps a year isnt enough? The shininess I did like very much. Just not enough to pay the apple tax :D
Over last 5 years, Apple's net income increased 7x, growing from $2 billion to $14 billion. Over this same period, Microsoft grew its net income only 1.5x, from $13 billion to $19 billion. While it is amazing that Apple is almost worth $300 billion, it is truly staggering that Microsoft is still worth $240 billion.