Again, you are making your choice to use the App Store, but that shouldn’t dictate whether others have to use it. If they opened up letting developers sell directly or through other app stores, then people like you could continue to only trust Apple. It wouldn’t change anything for you.
Except we already have an excellent example in the form of Epic opting to release their fortnite game for android through their own third party installer and bypassing the google play store altogether.
On iOS, it’s very straightforward. It doesn’t matter how much you hate the App Store rules. You release your app through the App Store like everyone else.
On android, users who wanted to play fortnite couldn’t get it via the google play store. Instead, they had to install a third party installer which amongst other things, required them to consciously choose to compromise the security of their devices.
And because fortnite is no longer bound by android App Store rules, who knows what else they have done inside their app that users don’t know about.
So we have a very real situation of me being affected (negatively) by someone else’s arbitrary notions of choice and openness.
Third party app developers cannot be trusted to always take into consideration the best interest of their users. Which is why you need someone like Apple to keep them honest via a comprehensive framework of rules of regulations that no one should be allowed to skirt around.
If you want stuff like more app stores, android is that way. I am a (very satisfied) Apple customer precisely because I value what Apple does in helping safeguard my safety and security. And that extends to their App Store decisions.
We paid a lot of money for these computers, and we should be able to run whatever apps on them we want. This also would take care of the censorship issues. I don’t personally care about Alex Jones or white supremacist apps being pulled from the App Store, but it should bother us all that Apple has made a decision that their free speech isn’t allowed. What happens when they pull an app that you do care about, but Apple is making a political stand against it? They shouldn’t be required to host it on their App Store, but there should be a way to get the apps some other way.
I trust Apple to make the right call. This means that yes, even if they do end up pulling an app I do care about, I will accept it.
Plus, there’s always the browser. That the App Store doesn’t allow pornography doesn’t mean I can’t access those websites via safari or chrome, for instance.
It’s a package deal. You can’t expect to have only the pros without any of the cons.
I can’t even imagine how this would be received if Microsoft tried to pull this on Windows computers and decided to make decisions based on what apps their competitors make or what their political views are at the time.
We shouldn’t accept less, because it is Apple.
I am not.
To me, embracing the iOS App Store model, for all its flaws, is to accept more, not less.
More of what I want (better security and peace of mind), less of what I don’t want (bad actors, malware and spyware).
And like I said, there’s always android if you want what Apple does and will not offer.
