Value is a very much reliant on both desirability and historical significance. I guarantee
most people who own an Apple 1 never use it, and it sits in a cabinet/shelf somewhere.
Transversely, I’m sure there’s very few Amiga 1200’s purely on display, with the vast
majority in collectors hands either tucked in a cupboard or actively used.
The Apple 1 is collectible purely because it was the first product Apple made. There’s
dozens of similar machines from the same time period, vcreated by startups looking to be
the next big thing, that just didn’t make it. Look at SWTPC, look at IMSAI, the COSMAC
ELF. Apple made it to the big time, and they didn’t, so many more people with too much
money would consider the Apple 1 to be a wise investment.
I’d still prefer the IMSAI 8080 or SWTPC 6800 though.
Josh
Sent from Mail for Windows
From: Christian Corti via cctalk
Sent: 03 August 2023 07:07
To: Murray McCullough via cctalk
Cc: Christian Corti
Subject: [cctalk] Re: Apple 1
On Wed, 2 Aug 2023, Murray McCullough wrote:
Classic computers have a value in our capitalist
society. Take the Apple-1:
Not necessarily. Something only gets a value if there is a demand or
market. As I repeatedly see old classic systems scrapped because nobody
wants them/has space to store them, there can't be such a high value. For
example, how do you tax a Mincal 523? We have the only one that survived.
I'd say, it's "priceless", you can't attribute a value to it,
because
there's neither a market nor a reference to compare with.
The only reason why the Apple 1 has a monetary value is because it has
become a pure investment object. Everything else is just worthless, except
perhaps the video shift registers ;-)
Christian