It’s a well-known and painful fact that Apple elected to drop FireWire from the new aluminum MacBook announced Oct. 14. While many have suggested that Apple was just being fashionable or out of touch with customers, something else altogether is happening. While there are lots of ways to characterize Apple’s decision — the decline of FW400, space/cost on the motherboard and external connectors, corporate arrogance — I see the move as a tendency by Apple to firmly but gently dictate its product profile in the market.
