Good points and Apple's attitude towards their faithful ones, is probably one of the main griefs many have had with Apple throughout the years:)
The thing is that Apple doesn't seem to cater as much to us professionals as to their idea of "the rest of us", who are the ones who just want a device which just works out of the box and who will never care much for geeky specs or the possiblity to tweek and fiddle with your devices.
That is why the company seems to ignore the input from more professional users, although we may not be downright geeks. And they definitely have been ignoring the geeky ones or the "hobbyists" as I call them. I suspect that this is the reason for lot of the animosity towards Apple from that lot. And still, when using their products, even the geeks have to admit that they are good.
But nothing is perfect and we are confronted with such things as this iCloud-service - which is very promising, but as long as it leaves Macs and PCs in the cold, it is still lacking. Maybe they are gearing for a future when all devices will be mobile and iOS-like? I guess so.
Your point about re-translating is worth considering and also how their reasoning is based on a different reality than what people encounters out in the big world outside Silicon Valley. High data coast might be one part of it, but having lived and worked in Portugal for many years, and having family in Brazil today, I have often noticed how the reality people live in there, is totally ignored. Many of my friends dream of Macs, iPods and iPads but it can only be a dream. They are not poor but the pricing is way outside anything they can afford. Here in Norway where I live now, these products are expensive but not more than most people can afford them if they really want.
So only the really rich and well-off can realise their dreams about owning an "Apple" in most countries around the world. How does that fit in with the philosophy of making products for the rest of us?
Apple cannot cater to the poor, one might object. No, but I still think that their stance regarding lower priced products (and therefore lower quality) is influenced by the reality the people behind the products live in. To them, the products may be expensive but still affordable.
Well, just a few musings around how the fact that these products are created in one certain corner of the world, affects the products.
To me, the main problems lie in the fact that the only viable alternative is dominated by one company, no matter how much choice you have in the hardware. You are still stuck with Windows. With Apple, you are stuck with both hardware and the OS-software. I still chooses it before having to fiddle with Windows. But I wish there were more choices in this area!
(Yes, we have Linux and we have Solaris and what not, but well...)
