It certainly wouldn't hurt TB's cause if Apple produced a bunch of TB peripherals to drive down the cost associated with the low adoption rate.
I think Apple
needs to start producing their own TB peripherals if they want TB to take off. Its not about driving down the cost (which wouldn't be Apple's style): its about driving up the value and widening the appeal.
The third parties have had a year, and come up with a couple of expensive external drives and some specialist video editing peripherals. Oh yes, there's the Seagate GoFlex adapter which lacks a Thunderbolt daisy chain connector and so is useless to anybody who uses a MacBook with an external monitor. The most interesting products are the TB-to-expresscard and TB-to-PCIe adapters - but then you still have to find a suitable card to plug in to do what you want.
This Lacie adapter probably falls into the "specialist" niche: it makes sense if (e.g.) you're a video editor with a bookcase full of eSATA drives containing valuable material, but not if you just want a way of adding a new external HD.
None of these are "good value" outside of the niches at which they are aimed. They're working on a deficit model - fixing problems for people migrating from Pros and expressCard-equipped MBPs - rather than capitalising on what TB could do for the rest of us.
What the makers don't seem to get is this: once you've produced a nice box, added the Thunderbolt-to-PCIe bridge, TB in and out sockets and the TB cable (if you don't include it in the price, the customer is going to mentally add $50 anyway) you have something which is
already going to have to retail for $100+ before you even add any functionality. Once you've paid the TB premium, why not cream it with every interface under the sun using cheap-as-chips PCIe-based controllers? I don't want to add lots of single-function boxes and pay for a new box, TB-to-PCIe bridge and $50 cable each time - and while you
can hook 6 boxes together that's going to get messy.
The most promising thing so far is the still-not-available Belkin hub:
http://www.theverge.com/2012/1/9/26...ress-dock-will-finally-go-on-sale-this-summer
So, that would be my monitor (via the TB daisychain), possible extra monitor (via HDMI, if that works) network, Firewire drives, USB mouse, keyboard etc. hooked up to my laptop with one cable - cool.... but... $300 for a bit of Belkin silver plastic? No USB3? No eSATA (why connect new hard drives via a "middle man" interface like USB or Firewire? With eSATA to connect fast HDs, lack of USB3 becomes much less of an issue)...
However, if Apple took that concept, wrapped it up in a classy bit of Jonny Ive milled Aluminium (actually, a Mac Mini case might do) added eSATA (reducing the need for USB3) and, maybe, build in a MagSafe PSU, then I'd be begging them to take my $300.
I'd buy a TB display in a shot if I didn't have pre-Thunderbolt devices that I'd want to use with my main monitor.