Herbvic, A great many dealers deserted Apple over the years and many others offered Apples and Wintels. The monopoly on CPUs from IBM/Motorola differs from the more competitive mileue that occurs with Intel, Amd, Cyrix and IBM. The downward curve is far steeper than the duopoly of IBM/MOT who keep the prices profitable for themselves and lag compared to the Wintels. I expect thoug that Apple is trying to get them down so they can get a sales surge under way.
There will be ever more pressure on the dealers network as Win98-2000-NT blend finally arrive and the Dell model become the norm. Do not forget that as the visible attributes of the two OS's converge (and they are converging as each adds the new features the public wants they will converge to that average want) Even now you can get addon programs that will make each look just like the other visually.
More and more people are going to stores only for looking, they then go home and buy mail order/internet order from out of state to save the 4-8% sales taxes(freight is typically only 2% and the MO/Net dealersare also 5-15% cheaper as well. Soon only the suckers will buy from local mall stores closeby.
I suspect there will be a federal law to level this playfield soon. Possibly a mandatorystate notification notice to the local sales tax body so they can send you an invoice. From the dealer viewpoint it is a big problem on all manner of goods, not just computers. a $3000 sale has an average of $210 sales tax and can be shipped for $10-15(depending on weight).
Did APple not stop mail ordersellers a few years back?, I see they are back.
Of course the mail order people are knights in shining armor, ask them, helping us against grasping state goverments who abuse their taxing authority to support a bloated medioceracy. I like the California 1% tax proposition. Give them a people controlled budget and make them live within it. Let some excessive services fall by the wayside.
Especially exxcess wellfare.
If you feed the pigeons all they can eat every day for five years you will have a skydarkening horde of pigeons to feed every day. When you stop they will still come and they will starve, and some will learn to forage. The USA/Canada has crippled generations of people by giving them food and money. This has trained them, like pigeons, only in the ways of getting that money from the state.
Many areas have begun to retreat from this fools game and have stopped or limited welfare as one of the most harmful prgrams ever implemented in history. Look what it did to Rome in the old days. Rant, Rant, Rave etc.
Bill |
