"trying for decades at this point to make a computer that's open, easy to use for everyone, never crashes, etc."<p>The last Mac I bought ran Tiger. Given reasonable maintenance, and good net hygiene, I had one software crash that I know of. It was the <i>hardware</i> that failed repeatedly ... screen, drive.<p>I've also been using Vista for a year. No significant events (I'm not pushing the envelope all that hard, do PM, net hygiene.)<p>I'm just saying that they've gotten pretty close to "never crashes" to be quitting now. But to give -many more- consumers the -stability- they need, and to protect them from the darkside of the net, there needs to be a degree of closedness.<p>There used to be a lot of wide-open platforms before mainstreaming boiled down options for most to PC/Mac. It was a chaotic period, and the narrowing down arguably made widespread adoption and economy of scale possible. If there were still 20 platforms ... well I don't even want to think about it. The complexity and cost, I suspect, would be an order of magnitude higher. So -we gained- from the mainstreaming.<p>I don't really grok the sense of anxiety here. The App store won't sell apps that aren't approved? But anyone who wants to can. <i>Most</i> people seem to want decisions made for them, because they're busy with the rest of their life. (See: US Congress.) Yes, you give up freedoms when other people are making choices for you. So long as I'm still free to choose for myself, what's the problem? I'm not going to roll my own OS ... so that decision's already in someone else's hands.