Apple: losing innocence to IBM's bite? (Apple Computer UK Ltd. and International Business Machines Corp. forge alliance)

Apple: losing innocence to IBM's bite?

Will Apple lose its reputation for innovatory independence as it enters the mainstream forged by IBM, asks Mat Toor Eight years ago Apple signed up film director Ridley Scott to produce a commercial that for many defined Apple in relation to IBM.

The year was 1984 and the commercial turned "Big Blue" into "Big Brother". IBM was painted as proprietorial, rigid, and faceless. Apple and its new Macintosh product was the shaft of sunlight amid the gloom. It was freedom.

Through the rest of the 80s Apple stoked up the analogy. Its marketing implied that the Macintosh -- with its ease of use and its flexibility -- was the tool geared more towards the individual than the corporate beast.

It had a renegade ethos and made money while remaining outside the IBM-originated Disc Operating System (MS-DOS) standard that accounted for 90% of the personal computer industry.

But last week Apple turned its back on its heritage. In a global press …