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Comment by Cider9986 | Hacker News Reader

The App Store as the only way to install apps is the worst part about iOS and why I'll never use it again.

I'm always helping friends with piracy and I have to tell them they can't conveniently use a native app because it isn't listed on the App Store.

And then there's the removal of ICE apps.

It's too much control. On iOS, if the government banned Signal, Apple could enforce it. On GrapheneOS, you can use whatever app from anywhere no matter what.

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Once Android developer verification rolls out globally, Alphabet Inc. in Mountain View and the US sanctions and export controls list will become the sole arbitrer of accepted software publishers. Only minority platforms like GrapheneOS, Mac OS X, Win32, Linux remain as free general computing operating systems.

If a government entity would work like this, all heck would break loose.

Trying to contrast this to the EU's attempts to force only gatekeepers (those companies so large that there is no alternative to dealing with them) to open up systems, even at the cost of damaging e.g. apple's valiant and welcome attempts to protect the privacy of its customers, highlights to me that the EU is completely correct in doing so.

Government entities in the USA already work like this. That's how all this came about.

Yes, the posted story has so many layers of wrongness in it — it's hard to pick just one.

None of it would be a problem without the App store in its current form though.

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