[alphasubzero949]

http://www.rixstep.com/2/20050614,00.html

Steve has another chance to take Bill Gates' advice.

Bottom line: Should OS X be licensed for PCs? We all love our Mac hardware (some to death in here), but wouldn't it be nice to have a huge marketshare and see computers running OS X all over the place?

Yes, driver support is a major issue, but even if Apple got several vendors to build boxes according to what Apple wants for OS X...and for cheap? I'd be all over it.

[Mastrap]

Apple is a hardware company. Part of the reason that OS X is as good as it is, is because Apple has complete control over the hardware it runs on.

If MS wouldn't have to worry about all of the PCs builds out there Longhorn would have been in the shops month ago.

[BasketofPuppies]

Bill's suggestion essentially amounted to, do what I say and you can be as big as I am.

At the time, Apple was, I believe, sixteen times the size of Microsoft. And not only that, Bill wanted a piece of the action.

The deal, as Bill wanted it to happen, would have been a bad business decision for Apple.

That said, I'm convinced Apple could have made it as a direct Microsoft competitor if John Sculley, Michael Spindler, or Gil Amelio had been serious about cloning.

At least, for the time being, Apple could live off of software and iPod sales, some of which are quite high-margin, as it attempts to shift its business model from computer sales to OS licensing.