If there's zero protection for "intellectual property", it becomes a lot harder for the majority of the software industry to even function.
Apple, as an enterprise, has been very successful by building a profitable operating system platform and channeling those profits back in to both hardware and software engineering. That kind of enterprise would not exist if Apple's software could be used by anyone for anything.
Any hardware vendor of any consequence could use that as they see fit, resulting in a stew of mis-matched standards and rampant confusion, not unlike the Android tablet market. While there are good products in this space, they are often difficult to differentiate from superficially similar yet technically inferior alternatives. This is not helping people on the whole.
Personally I like the choice between a premium product which is commercialized and free, open-source alternatives that are, for many applications, good enough. I would not want a market that's locked in to one model at the expense of the other.
Apple, as an enterprise, has been very successful by building a profitable operating system platform and channeling those profits back in to both hardware and software engineering. That kind of enterprise would not exist if Apple's software could be used by anyone for anything.
Any hardware vendor of any consequence could use that as they see fit, resulting in a stew of mis-matched standards and rampant confusion, not unlike the Android tablet market. While there are good products in this space, they are often difficult to differentiate from superficially similar yet technically inferior alternatives. This is not helping people on the whole.
Personally I like the choice between a premium product which is commercialized and free, open-source alternatives that are, for many applications, good enough. I would not want a market that's locked in to one model at the expense of the other.