Mac OS X in particular is the product that saved Apple: it prevented Apple’s whole Ponzi scheme from collapsing.

Yeah. Put a few drinks into even the most ardent Apple supporter and he’ll admit that he promoted the virtues of the Power Macintosh 8110AV with the same desperate, hollow vim as that uncle of yours with a garage full of water filters. Apple had become a pyramid scam. We’d sunk so much of our enthusiasm and hopes into the Mac OS and gotten so little return from it that the only way to keep ourselves afloat was to do whatever we had to in order to bring in another wave of suckers.

“Aha, but what about the iMac?” you protest. “That was Steve Jobs’ first personal product after he came back to Apple. That was released in 1998!”

Oh, you poor, poor bastard. The original iMac was a water filter in a fresh, new Bondi Blue housing. Nothing had really changed. The awesome cosmetic redesign re-energized us all and allowed Apple to stall for time. They’d given us enough renewed hope that we didn’t make that phone call to the Better Business Bureau, like we promised our spouses we were going to.