The Apple story is interesting. I switched from Windows to Mac in 2000 to get on the OS X Public Beta, and it really was all about the BSD underpinnings for me.
But at that point Apple was already on an upward trajectory thanks to the iMac and iBook, with the iPod to come the following year. Granted OS 9 was a dog that has long since seen its day, and the technology in OS X was necessary to create a modern operating system that would enable the kind of UX that Jobs sought. But I question how much of it can really be credited to open source or the geek early adopters per se; certainly it helped, but was it pivotal?
Yeah, I guess it does sound like I'm crediting Open Source and the geeks with singlehandedly saving Apple.
I don't think it was open source itself that saved Apple, but the decision -- as revolutionary as it was at the time -- proved to be an excellent business decision. They added value to their product (hardware sales) by integrating Open Source. And as a bonus, they appealed to a specific audience without having to invest significant resources in selling to that audience.
It was a brilliant business decision because it not only opened a new channel of potential customers, it opened up a whole new set of possibilities for integrating Open Source software; they could leverage the movement. And that's really the significance of the decision in this context.
Apple, Nokia and SGI all focused on their core business -- making hardware -- but only Apple saw the value of leveraging a movement to add value to their hardware/brand. All three were in desperate positions, but only Apple saw the merit of leveraging the Open Source movement for the good of the business.
Where Nokia could have built on the goodwill of their brand by adopting an open and vibrant platform -- one where they could have as much control as they desired -- they have chosen to chain their fortune to a third party that has relatively little vested in their success.
The biggest irony here (other than Apple's role in Nokia's demise) is that choosing Android comes with very little risk compared to the risk that Apple took: there's ongoing development underwritten by a single organization; there's no licensing or quality stigma about the platform; there's a worldwide consortium of companies already using the platform; and there's already a significant and growing market share.
They have missed the opportunity to leverage the movement.
But at that point Apple was already on an upward trajectory thanks to the iMac and iBook, with the iPod to come the following year. Granted OS 9 was a dog that has long since seen its day, and the technology in OS X was necessary to create a modern operating system that would enable the kind of UX that Jobs sought. But I question how much of it can really be credited to open source or the geek early adopters per se; certainly it helped, but was it pivotal?