<i>I wouldn't be surprised if OS X is moving towards becoming single most popular OS among the remaining open source developers.</i><p>This assumes a shrinking pool. Open Source development is happening at a higher rate than ever before, and the number of Open Source developers and users is higher than ever before.<p>Yes, Apple has seen a dramatic increase in market share, but before that Windows laptops were abundant at Open Source conferences; before a few years ago, running Linux on a laptop was a harrowing and challenging experience, and most people (even developers) simply could not make it all work. I'm only on my second "fully functional under Linux" laptop, and I've <i>always</i> bought laptops with Linux compatibility in mind.<p>Apple happens to make the nicest laptop hardware, and Mac OS X happens to run best on it. And, for many tasks, particularly tasks common to laptop usage, Mac OS X is an acceptable substitute for Linux in ways that Windows never was.