What an intentionally obtuse take.
What these people want isn't to make iPhone like Android — something which, by the way, is not really going to help much considering steps Google is taking to lock down its own store. What they want is Apple's software and hardware quality with the ability to use apps of their own choosing, just like everyone gets on macOS.
There's always a chorus extolling the harms people will face with an open app ecosystem, yet where are those supposed harms on macOS?
The problem is, how do you quantify the harms faced by users here? How do you quantify the harm of locking users into an ecosystem which doesn't even allow app upgrades, forcing developers who wish to make money into subscription models and predatory in-app purchases? Yes, these are things that began largely with Apple's ecosystem. They've done some work to mitigate this, but still never addressed the underlying deficiency.
How do you quantify the harms caused by locking developers into a model where Apple gets 30% of their profits? Something which, somehow, was never necessary on macOS.
That's the difficulty here. And yet so many are so quick to offer their hot take in support of a locked down ecosystem and what amounts to thinly veiled subscription-based hardware, with little other than Apple's clearly self-serving arguments as support.
Seriously. If opening up iOS software installation to third parties is such a problem, where is that problem causing harm to macOS users? Or, for that matter, Android users — while they still have the option? Seems to me that all the Android malware we hear about either comes via the Play store or in the form of manufacturer-installed bloat/adware.
