Form factor? If they copied the iMac G3, I missed it. And the iMac G4. Or even the iMac G5. I don’t follow Windows stuff so I’ll have to assume that they’ve all got Intel iMac-like all-in-one’s now.
The only thing I look to Apple for is their OS. The new iMacs are beautiful. (Have one.) And the MacBook unibodies? Superb. The iPod was a clear win. But all have been evolving into these great designs. And some of the stuff that preceded them (I take them apart) was horrible, brainless, insane. Would that they had cracked a case on some Windows boxes.
When you have only 4 products and you’ve been reworking them for 10 or 15 years, you had better be learning something from your mistakes.
With every successive wave of new product from Apple, the industry as a whole has been altered, ever since the first, “gumdrop” iMac. We still see jewel toned translucent plastics, over a decade later, across all manner of consumer products. Titanium PowerBook? Same. Aluminum tower? Same, but plastic. iPod? Same. iPhone? Same.