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> decreasing user control of OS X which started happening around the time it was renamed to mac OS

what were you able to control before that you can't anymore?

User interface (can't get examples from the top of my head right now but less and less was configurable), privacy settings (it used to be "set what you want to share" and now it's "learn what is shared") and... a keyboard before the 2016/2017 fiasco.

I was increasingly locked out of my computer. Apple is now MacBook's superuser and I'm just the user. Their hardware is too expensive for that.

> privacy settings (it used to be "set what you want to share" and now it's "learn what is shared")

What I like to do with this is have two versions of hosts file and two versions of /etc/pf.conf

In one setting, I use https://gitlab.com/intr0/AppleBlock/-/blob/master/AppleBlock... in the hosts file and block the whole 17.X.X.X ip range (Apple's range) in the pf.conf

The other setting doesn't have any of these blocks

Whenever I need some apple service (e.g. updates or apple developer stuff), I run a script to toggle the blocks

The benefit of this approach is you get apple services only when you need them

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25074959

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