Although I’m more concerned about the lifetime cost of ownership, devices that can be fixed and upgraded also last longer before needing to be recycled. (A doubled life, means the environmental impact is halved.)

Nor does Apple help users with their ‘more is much more’ pricing scheme. One reason I didn’t buy the new MacBook Air is because the now-enlarged 4 Gig of memory still isn’t likely to be adequate for whatever follows Snow Leopard. If Apple isn’t going to make memory upgradable, then it has an obligation to users to make their more-memory option affordable. It doesn’t.

In the end, I suspect Apple’s creative and manufacturing design teams are simply growing lazy. It’s easy when designing a product to focus on a few features (i.e. thinness) to the exclusion of others (i.e. repair and upgrade). But narrowly focused design is always bad design. Good designers are able to hit multiple goals.

One reason I’m staying with my aging white MacBook is that it’s design was done right. The RAM and hard drive can be replaced in about five minutes. That’s how I was able to upgrade it to an SSD a few months back. I don’t see that sort of brilliant design in Apple’s current laptops.

In the case of the MacBook Air, for instance, there’s too much emphasis on lightness and thinness over battery life and upgradability. Apple products are starting to take on the odd appearance of a body builder who strengthens the right side of his body while leaving the left untouched.

Apple’s corporate marketing and subversive political lobbying is arguably the most effective in history, if that’s what this means.

Apple being Apple, I suspect that’s what’s happening. They like to push the technology.

With Apple making devices which are starting to become throw away commodities, being able to recycle these products is even more important.