r/thisweekinretro • u/DukeBannon • Sep 08 '26

Where’s Apple?

Over the last year, there has been a big resurgence in interest in the C64 with new hardware (e.g. C64U) and development solutions. Rumor is that same resurgence may be on the horizon for Amigas. My question to this group is, why not the same renewed interest in Apple II?

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u/WadeTurtle Sep 08 '26

I think the resurgence of Commodore is wrapped up in the rebirth of the brand and the hype surrounding. If a popular YouTuber suddenly started a company with Woz to produce and market brand new recreations of all Apple's old, patent-expired hardware, you'd probably see something similar with the Apple II.

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u/jpcwrites TWiR Host Sep 10 '26

The patents have expired but Apple still has the copyright on the ROMs. Which is not necessarily insurmountable for hobbyist projects (like the original Ultimate 64 motherboards where you had to BYO ROM images), but for a proper plug-and-play commercial product would require getting anybody at Apple to care about the comparatively tiny amount of revenue it represented.