[alexvoda]

I agree with your analysis and it matches my thoughts.

But then, wouldn't a naive conclusion be that in order to maintain the freedom of the market, the appearance of status symbol brands/products must be prevented?

That's a tall order. Humans really like status symbols, not only as proof of status but as reminders of status.

[Eddy_Viscosity2]

> Humans really like status symbols

I think this is HUGE understatement. Humans are all about status (speaking in general terms, of course there will be individual exceptions). Status means access to scarce resources, status means choice of mates, status is everything. People will optimize for status ahead of nearly everything else and in a way this is rational because with status can come anything else they may want or need.

[alexvoda]

With the tiny nitpick that there is a distinction between signalling status and having status itself. And the relationship between the two is not always straight forward.

Status symbols are more related to the former.

[alexvoda]

A further observation here is that selling status symbols is what Apple does. They have transitioned from being a computer manufacturer for the DTP and creative industry to being a luxury brand. But that itself is not enough. In the pre-iPhone days, Vertu was the luxury cellphone brand. Similarly, there are plenty of car brands that are more exclusivist than Tesla. Yet they do not have the same outsized influence on the market.

Therefore the issue probably is a status symbol that scales to the mass market.