Commentary--Mac OS X 10.1 Free Upgrade or Not

As we noted on Monday, Apple's Mac OS X 10.1 web page no longer indicates the cost, if any, of obtaining the upgrade by registered Mac OS X 10.0.x owners. Initially the page had stated that the upgrade would be available as a $19.95 CD via the Mac Up-to-Date program. And Steve Jobs' commented during the keynote that the upgrade would be free to current Mc OS X 10.0.x owners. Nothing has been said or written by Apple about the availability of 10.1 as a download. The two issues, cost and downloadability, have raged on beyond belief on all of the list groups that we belong to.

Our view is that $20 is not an unreasonable fee for a bootable software upgrade CD whether there is a totally free download or not. Charging an upgrade fee for a CD is common practice--many software houses charge that or more when they issue an upgrade. We doubt that Apple would make money by charging a modest upgrade fee. The $20 charge would probably just cover Apple's cost from its contractor (we believe) handling Apple's Mac Up-to-Date fulfillment program.

But should Apple charge $20 for the upgrade even if it does just cover Apple's cost? If one buys a Mac, any Mac, after May 21st and it does not include a Mac OS X 10.0.x CD, Apple will send one a Mac OS X 10.0.3 CD for free--totally free--via the Mac OS Up-to-Date program. Apparently, the program even extends to Apple factory refurbs since we used the program to get a totally free Mac OS X 10.0.3 CD for our refurbed G4 Cube obtained earlier this month. We gather, therefore, that Apple really wants people to use Mac OS X and is willing to take a $20 hit on a computer sale, even a refurb, to ensure that possibility. One might think, then, that Apple would want to continue this effort by providing a Mac OS X 10.1 CD totally free as well. Of course, it is one thing to take a $20 hit on a computer sale and quite another to take it on very $129 Mac OS X sale plus on every computer shipping with Mac OS X or sold since May 21st. That's a more expensive proposition but one that we think Apple should consider carefully as an element in making Mac OS X a success.

Some have argued that Apple should supply totally free 10.1 CDs because 10.0, in their view, was a $129 beta release masquerading as a final release, i.e. a true final release is owed them. We don't buy this argument. Steve Jobs made it clear that the March 24th release was incomplete and released primarily for early adopters. Apple never misrepresented what was in Mac OS X 10.0 and has worked diligently and successfully to improve 10.0 by providing four free upgrades over the past several months. We have used 10.0 as our primary OS since it came out and now have 10.0.4 running on all of our computers that are supported and two that aren't. We like OS X much better than Mac OS 9.1 and only boot back to 9.1 when a piece of critical software requires us to. The only reason we see why Apple should waive the cost of providing a 10.1 CD is if Apple figures that it will gain in the long term by significantly facillitating a broader, happier installed base. We will be happy either way unless we have to pay $20 for each computer with Mac OS X rather than a $20 fee for all of them.

What about 10.1 as a download? Apple has yet to speak on this issue but we think Apple should provide for it. Even if 10.1 is a 500+ MB file, Apple should provide the option for Mac users to download it. Two weeks ago Microsoft released Windows XP RC1, its first public beta. XP is not only a 569 MB download that costs $10 but it is also an .iso file that requires one to burn a CD to install it even as an upgrade. Big deal. Are Mac users any less accomplished than Wintel users? We think not. We did it after having for the first time to install and use PC burner software and burn a bootable system CD. Apple is brilliantly promoting its computers as hubs of a digital life style. Is there any better way to underscore this vision than to encourage Mac users to download and burn a Mac OS X 10.1 updater CD?