Horace Dediu, on some remarkable business achievements of the Mac over time:

• The product is in its 32nd year of market presence. A longevity that in unmatched by any other PC maker.

• Apple reached a top five position in the ranking of PC vendors. This was achieved for the first time only this year, far along in the evolution of the market.

• With about $23 billion in revenues per year, Apple places among the top four PC vendors in terms of revenue.

• With an estimated $5.5 billion in operating margin Apple is the most profitable PC vendor, capturing over 60% of the available PC hardware profits.

• The product has retained an average selling price of over $1200 for at least a decade. At the same time the average pricing of Personal Computers has more than halved.

Then, following some charts to lay out his thesis, Dediu gets to the heart of the matter:

Mobile has been foreseeable as a disruption to computing a decade ago–at least to some of us.

And so what do you with the Mac?

To answer this we have to ask what exactly is the purpose of the Mac in the age of the Mobile device?

And:

The same way keyboard shortcuts are hard to learn but pay off with productivity, touchbar interactions are fiddly but will pay off with a two-handed interaction model. They are not something you “get” right away. They require practice and persistence for a delayed payoff. But, again, that effort is what professionals are accustomed to investing.

This is a leap forward and a big deal. For 32 years the UX model of the Mac has been two-handed typing with one handed gesturing. Now we have the option of two-handed indirect manipulation: one hand on the touchbar and one hand on the touchpad. Imagine you’ve been playing guitar with one hand for years and then someone lets you use your left hand. Holy cow.

This is a great read. Be sure to look at that third chart, the one that contrasts Mac, Windows, and iPhone sales.