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> if Philips would have evolved to be the "European iPhone" company

They've certainly nailed the evil and user-hostile bit of being an iPhone company. From just 2 weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37667266 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37594377

Hue is spun out of Philips and is only using the Philips trademark. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signify_N.V.

(Last time I checked, iPhone doesn't _require_ an iCloud account to work, although it still needs to "phone home" to be activated on setup.)