I think you've spent too many of those 42-years indoors.

Our society indeed has a problem with accepting half-assed work. In my experience, employees and managers alike just want to be able to say something is done regardless of whether or not it really is. Few seem to show concern for doing a good job, and those who do are ridiculed for it.

Macs don't come with Blu-Ray drives, and some of the newer models don't have optical drives at all. Apple may be trying to kill off removable media. They've done it before. Remember the shock of the first iMac? "How can any computer function without a floppy drive?!!" Yet today floppy drives are nowhere to be seen. Apple has shown a willingness to declare certain technologies as dead or dying long before the rest of the industry. Given what they're trying to do with iCloud, it wouldn't surprise me if optical drives continued to disappear from their product line.

This is getting old and tired. Not everyone finds "walled gardens" to be a problem. If you do, you're free to use something else.

Apple's patching of the vulnerability only means they acknowledge its existence and feel it's worth correcting. Nobody is disputing that. It's not even the first vulnerability for Macs nor the first to be patched. It is, however, the first to my knowledge to have such a widespread infection. THAT is what I would like to see corroborated.

As with any other claimed discovery, I'd like to see independent corroboration. I'm not saying it doesn't exist, just that I personally haven't seen it. Everything I've read credits Dr.Web as the source. Has nobody else confirmed their findings?

I guess I'm not understanding how using a "controlled" platform hinders me.

Giving the one and only copy to another party is risks losing it. Basic life lesson.

Seems like it's always the App Store which gets all the credit for being bad for society. Why don't we ever hear about the PlayStation Store, or the Xbox Marketplace, or the Wii's Shop Channel? These also sell screened, platform-specific software, some of which you cannot get any other way. Oh, but they're just games, right?

Simple. They are not you. They have different priorities and they value different things. What is important to you is not necessarily as important to others.