[antitrust]

I wish they'd taken a middle path.

Having BASIC (or another language) built into the machine was a big plus and encouraged people to see continuity between the OS, the hardware and the code.

If that BASIC had to use built-in functions and data-types instead of simply POKE-ing and PEEKING-ing as a de facto interface with the underlying machine code, that would still have been hacker-friendly without being inflexible.

It was such a weird relationship between desktop machines and UNIXes back then. It's like the desktop designers had to re-learn the lessons of UNIX in the small. So much was forgotten.

[analog31]

I agree. In my view, the "walled garden" of iOS is just the next step in what Apple had already intended to establish for the original Mac. To be charitable, I can imagine it being based on the idea of protecting the user from Bad Software.

But lots of us wanted to write Bad Software such as little programs for our own use, or for limited, specialized use by other people. I found the Mac programming docs (Inside Mac) to be impenetrable, and the overhead for writing Hello World enormous.

Then I fell in love with HyperCard. But we all know what happened to that.

[antitrust]

> In my view, the "walled garden" of iOS is just the next step in what Apple had already intended to establish for the original Mac.

I imagine this is a quandary that shows up not in computing, but anywhere that users interact with a single source of definitive rules.

For example, it might be easier for government to erect certain walled gardens... or for companies to do this with their employees, parents with their kids, etc.

It's not that I don't understand their position or view it as probably the best way to herd cats (I mean, "consumers").

But hacker-friendliness is what gets you the top echelon of users drifting toward your hardware and software. As a result, it's a huge (but invisible) business draw.