We should have seen it coming: as always, "As Apple Goes, So Goes the Industry." It's been mere days since Apple unleashed its latest breakthrough innovation to the world of high tech-- namely, computers that thumb their noses at Moore's Law and its various corollaries by actually increasing in price-- but other companies have taken note of Apple's infamous price hike and are already following suit. For those of you who are surprised at the quick turnaround time of this latest round of copycatting, remember, it might take six months or more to slap together a cheap and seamy approximation of a two-tone translucent iMac or even to glue some colored plastic to a notebook, but pricing policies are easy to reproduce in the blink of an eye.

And so, as faithful viewer Monasier informs us, NEC is first out of the gate with a round of follow-the-leader price increases; CNN/Money reports that the company "plans to raise the suggested retail prices for its PC systems," just like Steve cranked up the price of the iMac last week. And just like Apple, NEC claims that its price hike is mandated by "rising costs of key components such as memory and the increasingly popular flat-panel screens." In other words, NEC didn't bother to wait even a week before chiming in which what amounts to a shameless "me too."

Oh, wait; it's possible that NEC wasn't the first to jump on Apple's new price-hike bandwagon, just that it was first to announce it. Reportedly word leaked on Sunday that Fujitsu and IBM (at least in Japan, site of the Jobs announcement last Thursday; coincidence?) both plan to "raise their PC prices by 10 to 20 percent starting in April." Whoa, 10 to 20 percent? Even on the entry-level new iMac, an extra $100 only constitutes a roughly 7.5 percent increase; sounds like when the dust clears, Apple's price bumps might seem downright generous by comparison.

Says Roger Kay of IDC, "Apple led this charge on the upward side, and the other vendors are anxiously crowding in behind them." And who else numbers among these "other vendors"? Well, try not to be too shocked by this, here, but according to MacMinute, Dell's coming along for the ride, too-- though it's doing its best to hide it. The company still configures base systems with RAM levels "well below Microsoft's recommendation" but has "raised upgrade pricing for RAM," so that customers buying a build-to-order PC that's built to run Windows XP (as opposed to one that only limps it a little) effectively wind up paying a hidden price hike. Pretty sneaky, sis.

So there you have it, folks; apparently that whole "rising component costs" thing wasn't just a cheesy excuse for Steve to rustle up some extra gas money for his jet, because other manufacturers are feeling the pinch as well-- but only Apple had the guts to make the first move. Enjoy watching everyone else fall all over themselves to follow in Steve's footsteps now that Apple has taken the first step into the minefield. And meanwhile, if you're in the market for a new iMac and you didn't order one before the new prices went into effect, faithful viewer Jonathan Reitnauer points out that, for whatever reason, at broadcast time neither Outpost.com nor MacWarehouse had increased their prices yet. We're not saying that they'll honor what's posted, mind you, but we thought you might find it interesting...