slurpy

tht said:

Hard to see how this passes constitutional muster, but judges are people too with their own set of motivated reasoning, so who knows.

On the "be careful what you wish for" department, all these developers asking governments to force Apple's platforms to be like MS Windows or Android, I think what is likely to happen is that they make less money. An iOS user spends about 2x to 3x more on apps than an Android user, and probably even more than that than a Windows user. Hence, why all the complaints are over Apple's App Store, even though Apple has minority share worldwide, with a sprinkling of some countries where they are over 50%. Hardly any whining about the Google Play Store.

The App Store buys trust. That's what the 15/30% buys developers. Trust. Users are more freely willing to spend money when there has been a modicum of filtering and checking for apps along with easy ways to get refunds and to unsubscribe. Same thing with Amazon's Marketplace.

If there is sideloading and alternate application stores, all we would see is Balkanization, less quality apps and less spending on apps. There will be a Facebook App Store, Amazon App Store, Microsoft App Store, developers who will rely solely on sideloading. All this would mean is the middle to lower class of app developers will lose. The rich get richer, everyone else gets poorer. Indie development will only be harder. Not only that, apps will cost more because they won't be competing in a unified marketplace anymore. Exclusivity to a particular App Store protects them from competition.

Users won't buy or spend as much money on apps because it is just going to be harder, not as safe, and it is all but inevitable to have pirated apps, malware apps and ransomware apps. Once users see that, the wallets stay closed.

But, long way to go here, as it hard to see how this passes constitutional muster, let alone actual legislation passing.