The only reason to buy an ARM processor is for its power efficiency. Otherwise it's all minor differences in performance that one CPU manufacturer or the other leads in some time or the other - we've seen this in the past with Intel vs AMD, and now it is between Apple vs AMD vs Intel. Today Apple may lead, tomorrow somebody else. (It is undeniable though that Apple engineers have done a fantastic job in bringing ARM…
But it compiles and links my code twice as fast as my previous 16" MacBook Pro with an i9.
Ok, but can you do similar things on Windows or Linux or xBSD on the M1? I can on my Intel Macs. If you sacrifice your computing freedom, you will be supporting the development of incompatible locked down black boxes, like the M1, and promoting the monoculture of the single OS that run on each of them. Imagine a future where only locked down devices are available from Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon, Nvidia etc. etc. all incompatible with each other. And due to the locked down black box nature of their devices, you have to buy a developer license for each device to program on it? Both developers and consumers can be better exploited with such devices.