Comment by dcrazy

Apple cultivars are interesting because they are often developed by governments motivated to promote the existence of a healthy farming industry, not by private monopoly rights. Case in point, the Cripps Pink (aka Pink Lady) was developed by the Western Australia Department of Agriculture, and the Cosmic Crisp was developed by Washington State University.

(Honeycrisp is another fantastically successful government-funded cultivar, this time by the University of Minnesota. But it apparently led to the spontaneous breeding of the SugarBee, which is privately owned.)