The talks between Apple Computer Inc and IBM Corp are at such a high level that only a handful of people have any idea what’s going on, so that Electronic News and the Financial Times were unable to get enough even to run a story yesterday – but the New York Times did manage to progress the item a little, running a top-of-the-front page report that top Apple executives were visiting Armonk yesterday to discuss a deal that at minimum would involve Apple using the RS/6000 RISC in its future high-end machine, and IBM licensing and perhaps helping to develop Pink, the portable object-oriented version of the Macintosh operating system promised by John Sculley (CI No 1,636); that is expected to take two years to finish; those that believe IBM really is proposing an agreed merger with Apple suggest that what is coming out now is simply a testing of the water and a softening up of Apple employees against the inevitable blow that merging with a company they perceive as the enemy would bring, adding that if Apple were to license rights to its crucial forthcoming operating sofftware, it might just as well sell out to IBM.
