most of you probably have seen this, but it made my day, so it thought id pass it on
according to a new york times article, michael dell, founder of dell computers, had this suggestion for steve jobs after he returned to apple in 1997:
"What would I do?" Dell said to an audience of several thousand information technology managers. "I'd shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders."
on friday, when the stock market closed, apple's worth was at $72.13 billion, passing Dell's value of $71.97 billion.
I remember when that was said. Its funny to think about now. Im not going to get too excited though. You never know what tomorrow brings. Today though, it makes the sun shine a little brighter.B) -maestro
With the now official release of 10.4.4 on x86 architecture, the future looks both brighter and dimmer. The architecture itself has some ineherent vulnerabilities that most Mac users will be unfamiliar to, and the release of x86 Tiger provides a security risk in and of itself. No doubt Wintel drones who at least admire if not covet OS X, but hate Apple, are overjoyed. Although it is very secure, and most certainly has many protections against installment on non-Apple systems, someone will figure out how. And when Steve finally retires or kicks the bucket, whichever comes first, the new CEO may be very pressured to liscense the contemporary OS. By that time, of course, Apple and perhaps even the rest of the consumer computing market might have switched to a newer architecture, but it is still a reasonable prediction. With any luck, a bylaw will be passed before Steve leaves to prevent such an occurence, but if there is no one to object when the time comes, what difference will it make?
That's my two bits. Now, about that haircut...
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Cheers! :-) - JediJoker
Current: - "ProBook:" 15.4" MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo 2.33 GHz - Mac Classic II - Old PowerBook
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Registered: 06/07/04
Posts: 1266
Loc: Stoughton, WI USA
Licensing the OS out would be a scary two-edged sword only coveted by those who are not willing to get a Mac, though want it's power. I'd hate to see a new CEO allow that to happen(again) in my lifetime.
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i dont think steve and all the different thinkers that are in place now, that see the vision and the goal and how well steve has implemented it in the past 10 years would let it happen. they are all probably on the same page now. he reinvented the company, and the people there are more than likely dedicated enough to the ideals set forth to never change their stance on the availability of the os