I agree with you that iOS is just as not acceptable, and don't plan to switch to it myself.

Yeah but the situation used to be you don't need to jump through flaming hoops on android and you do need to jump through flaming hoops on ios for installing. Now it's you have to jump through X flaming hoops on android and X+Y on ios for installing. If I'm not going to jump through flaming hoops then I'm not installing so it doesn't matter what Y is in the equation and I'm not taking into account installing when comparing those devices, which mean ios might be a better proposition.

Alternatively if the difficulty of moving from 0->X is not negligible but moving from X->X+Y is then I may still be installing but I'm not considering the Y in the comparison then either. i.e. If I have to show my id to google once and apple twice it's the initial showing that is the turn off, or if it's the action of getting my credit card out in the 1st place rather than the cost difference that concerns me.