I assume you think that would change, else why have other app stores. That's what I don't want. I want as close to 100% of the software for iOS as possible to have to follow the rules. That's part of why I chose iOS.
The same would still be true of all the apps in the App Store. There would just be other stores. You wouldn't have to use them. Other people could.
The issue here is that many people want the hardware or the OS without the App Store. If you give it to them, "people who only use the Apple App Store" will be a smaller number of people and Apple will have less leverage.
That's the point of prohibiting anti-competitive practices. Apple does a lot of things with that leverage that are bad. Like prohibiting apps that compete with theirs (e.g. browser engines), and imposing political censorship in authoritarian countries, and extracting 30% from captive developers.
You presumably want Apple to have the leverage because then they can use it against e.g. Facebook. If everybody on iOS thinks like you then you win -- everybody only uses the App Store even though other stores are available and Apple still has all the same leverage.
But if most of the people disagree with you, right now you're holding them hostage. Forcing them to use only the App Store even though they don't want to, so that the world's largest corporation can have more leverage.
Scams are rampant in the App Store. Give an unlocked iPhone to a 5 year old and they'll spend $1000 before you know it. This is not something worth defending.
https://9to5mac.com/2021/02/12/developer-reveals-fake-app-st...
I get that people want to use Apple only software, in which case I'd understand why they don't want other software on the Apple Store, but how the hell is your experience worse if there is another store available on the phone? Just never use it?
It's like as if Microsoft locked down Windows and the only option you have available is to install things through the Windows Store and someone goes "yeah that's why I use windows man, I don't want anyone to be able to install Steam". Has anyone ever argued this? how did it become a thing
One day an app you like, or your life may even depend on, suddenly disappears because of some arbitrary, pointless rule is brought by that company, whose decisions are, I repeat, outside of democratic control.
It really isn’t that hard to understand: many Apple users value a certain set of design and simplicity criteria over other factors.
This alone makes me never touch Apple - and I have considered it (because I still use my 6yr old Windows Phone). My only phone consideration is a Pixel with GrapheneOS
It’s that we don’t want iOS to be like any other computer system - the simplicity and lack of choice is a feature, not a bug.
Apple could provide the option of unlocking the bootloader and providing some driver code for their peripherals so we could make our own system, but they don't and that fact suggests there's a more sinister objective to this game. They exist to make as much money through their app store as possible and will not give up any control.
The open PC market is doing really well these days. Like, there’s a huge silicon shortage.
“Apple has a monopoly on not shitty hardware”
I have to chuckle. It’s almost like we want Apple to become a utility that must by government fiat build this great hardware but we now are going to force their software to operate the way a committee wants.
I am for regulation when it benefits consumers broadly (though unintended consequences abound). But this feels like pandering to a niche: potential dealers and tech tinkerers that never wanted the PC to become a consumer product.
There is nothing sinister of about running a business with focus and vertical integration. Apple tried an OEM model once, it didn’t work well for them (in part because Microsoft and Intel had that model locked up).
By "quickly gaining a monopoly", do you mean they've somehow made it impossible for another multi-billion dollar company to do a decent job on designing and building a phone?
Why is it that people argue for changing Apple instead of just using other competing devices?
In moments of fear, hardship and crisis a decent percentage of people everywhere (30? maybe more) ask for the reassuring hand of a dictator.
