[Swordmaker]

name 3 companies that sell Macs for less than Apple? If you don’t have at least 3 companies trying to under cut your prices then you don’t have any competition on price, which frees you up to have a much higher per sale profit margin. THAT is what I said. That is what you’re avoiding dealing with by lying about what I said. Don’t lie about what I said.

I am not lying. You are obfuscating the issues by trying to define non-existent economic markets to argue your points. That's false to fact and evidence.

With your "name 3" challenge, you, AGAIN, want to limit the personal computer market in which Apple Macs compete to ONLY MACS. That is not the case. There is no such thing as a Mac market. Apple Mac is merely a brand and model name of a personal computer. Your strawman argument and challenge is absurd because you it's based on the false premise that there is a separate, distinct open market called the Mac Market. There is not—and the courts have ruled there isn't. No market is defined by brand. You could just as easily challenge someone to name 3 companies selling Mercedes for less than Mercedes... and be just as wrong. Or how about a challenge to find 3 companies that sell IBM brand Mainframe computers for less than IBM. You can dance around and shout as much as you want that Apple has no competition on price, but you are still WRONG. Let's fix your challenge:

"Name 3 companies that sell Macs personal computers for less than Apple?"

There, that's now correct and not begging the question.

So here is the answer to the correct question: Dell, HP, Toshiba.

Psystar, like you wanted to artificially define a "Mac OS X Market" that was separate from the products produced by the maker of Mac OS X which Apple was operating in as an illegal monopoly. Federal Judge Alsup tossed that theory out as absurd and frivolous, denying it entirely, ruling that no company can be an illegal monopoly in their own product line. He further ruled that there was no such thing as the "Mac OS X computer market" that Psystar claimed existed that they were free to compete in. Psystar then tried to maintain that Apple was operating as an illegal monopoly in the "$1000 and over Personal Computer Market" as though mere price could define a market. Judge Alsup tossed that absurd theory out on its ear as well. These claims have been judged and found wanting and are now res judicata. What is now at issue in the 9th Circuit Courtroom of Judge Alsop is Psystar's novel contention that Apple is abusing its copyright rights in deciding how its product, Mac OS X, is distributed. That's a real hard thing for Psystar to prove because it is one of the copyright owner's specified rights as enumerated in the Copyright laws.

Apple Macs do not have to compete against somebody else's Macs... because Macs are THEIR products. Apple Macs are competing against ALL personal computers... and in particular they are competing against all personal computers in the mid and upper value segments, which are not discrete markets.

[discostu]

On the price level Macs do only compete with Macs. They compete with PCs on CONTENT, but once the person has decided they want a Mac they’re buying from Apple at Apple’s prices with no ability to get a better deal from somebody else. Which means Apple faces no price competition, which means they get to have higher profit margins.

I don’t even understand why you’re arguing this. YOU are the one that mentioned their higher per sale profit margin. And anybody who’s even read the World Book bio on Adam Smith knows the primary market force that allows a company to have a higher per sale profit margin is lack of downward price pressure from competition. It’s not a bad thing, it’s not a hit on Apple, it’s a simple market reality.