Well, more accurately, Safari was born from KHTML. WebKit was Apple's massive retooling of it, and was widely acknowledged as superior to KHTML (someone correct me if I'm wrong) and in time replaced it. However, your point isn't necessarily invalidated, as iirc the changes were simply dumped in one large mass rather than as patches.
Additionally, OS X was created from NeXTSTEP, which - again, if I recall correctly - was built on a licensed, proprietary UNIX, so claiming that using BSD for the underlying system in some way took something away or co-opted it, as opposed to made use of it as the license allowed, seems slightly inaccurate.
That said, while I am a big fan of Apple's APIs I am astoundingly opposed to the App Store's walled garden - I surprise even myself, a self-professed fan of many things Apple - with the complete and utter disdain with which I view the terms of the App Store. It really is a jail, and it's a huge problem for the company I work at. Other than the BS about how some of our content might offend sensibilities according to some nebulous standard of western values (disclosure: I work at a company that streams anime), the policies applied seem to do little else than stifle competition.
tangent:
With Siri, I see something bad as well. It seems that controlling the user experience of search - the user experience, the anointed services - leads down a path where it is not the search providers with the best results or presentation which win, but the one which Apple anoints with their approval. Apple seems to think that producing the device entitles them to applying rules which enable Apple to step in and compete with an advantage on things which are not their core competencies. I think this is dangerously close to anti-trust territory, in which a monopoly (not bad by itself) could be abused to foster anti-competitive acts.
You are right, I incorrectly conflated Webkit with KHTML. It is really KHTML that I had in mind.
I seem to recall that OS X ultimately picked up -- sigh, I'm getting old; was/is it the Open variant? -- BSD when Apple's own kernel efforts became too unwieldy. Yes, portions of the "higher" ecosystem are in more significant degree Apple -- and NeXT -- productions, but the root of it all, so to speak, became BSD. Unless I'm wrong -- corrections welcome.
How many of us remember, with the "walled garden", a few years ago a number of... "appeals" reaching Jobs personally, who not entirely infrequently intervened to override a bureaucratic decision made by the organization? That is a significant factor with this walled garden. Whatever else one thinks about him, Steve had really good taste in these matter. The walled garden worked as well as it did, in once sense, because ultimately it was Steve's garden.
With Steve's passing, that oversight passes to a fairly walled off organization. And we all know, or should know, how well organizations do with such decision making, over time. And have at least a nagging intuition about the coincidence of increased secrecy with increasingly bad decisions.
This is one aspect that, I think, bothers a lot of people about Steve's passing, whether consciously or sub-consciously. Steve developed an organization that worked very well for Steve and with Steve at the helm, the ultimate arbiter. With him gone, it's not at all clear that this direction -- and effectiveness -- can continue.
Additionally, OS X was created from NeXTSTEP, which - again, if I recall correctly - was built on a licensed, proprietary UNIX, so claiming that using BSD for the underlying system in some way took something away or co-opted it, as opposed to made use of it as the license allowed, seems slightly inaccurate.
That said, while I am a big fan of Apple's APIs I am astoundingly opposed to the App Store's walled garden - I surprise even myself, a self-professed fan of many things Apple - with the complete and utter disdain with which I view the terms of the App Store. It really is a jail, and it's a huge problem for the company I work at. Other than the BS about how some of our content might offend sensibilities according to some nebulous standard of western values (disclosure: I work at a company that streams anime), the policies applied seem to do little else than stifle competition.
tangent:
With Siri, I see something bad as well. It seems that controlling the user experience of search - the user experience, the anointed services - leads down a path where it is not the search providers with the best results or presentation which win, but the one which Apple anoints with their approval. Apple seems to think that producing the device entitles them to applying rules which enable Apple to step in and compete with an advantage on things which are not their core competencies. I think this is dangerously close to anti-trust territory, in which a monopoly (not bad by itself) could be abused to foster anti-competitive acts.
/tangent