throwaway22056

Ugh, that's one of the things I really hate about it (and hated about Messenger and that Google app thing on Android).

Yes, one of the newer things EU is wrong about.

The EU strongly disagreed about many things that it later admitted were wrong (or just quietly changed its stance on), for example nuclear energy policy or biofuel additives. It also kind of does its own thing without really consulting the general population. Practically nobody even knows what's happening there in my country.

It's what they did, the law is approved and will come into effect soon. A store is just an app like any other apps - e.g. your browser. If you can download an app from the web, you can download a store, and the store can download other apps.

The problem is that app vendors will no longer be forced to use it. That seriously hurts my sense of security as a user of the platform - the very thing why I chose it.

iCloud Mail is a service that allows your user agent to connect and send messages to other email servers.

iMessage is a service that allows your phone to connect and send messages to other iMessage users.

Use email if that's what you need. Nobody forces you to use iMessage/Telegram/WhatsApp/...

What device functions exactly? I don't see many differences in the UX and functionalities of WhatsApp or Telegram.

Which is great, I much prefer Apple Pay and their overview of all subscriptions etc and them actually enforcing what changes I make there, as opposed to the situation on Android where I was charged by custom payment gateway implementations after cancelling the subscription many times and Google just told me to take it up with the app vendor who never responded.

Is there any case in your world where a company just provides a free convenient service to its customers, or is it always an ulterior motive?

Yes, and you if sideload a store app from a website (a random one, or Facebook, MS, etc), Apple is out of control in that case. They could ban the altstore from their own App Store, but not from the web.

My problem is exactly with these "safe stores from well known companies". Apple helps me. EpicStore and MetaStore helps them sidestep the anti-tracking and anti-spam rules of App Store.

Yes, the EU. It forces Apple to allow sideloading - that means installing apps with no restrictions, from any sources such as any random website. A store is just an app, thus there will be no way for Apple to force alternative stores to anything.

There doesn't even need to be a person that could be held responsible, or they could be easily masked behind anonymity of the web or layers of white horses / phished identities.

So what did you say? You actually want access to others' inboxes? I don't understand what that means. That's usually password protected and considered private data.

I don't know, it doesn't to me. To me it sounds like they provide a convenient free service like many other free services (Telegram, WhatsApp, ...), but limit it to their actual customers so it stays limited in scope and they don't need to start selling data and ad space like others do to support it.

No, they didn't. There might be something about interoperability of the service with other services, but they definitely didn't do what you claim.

Well yep, that's how it is. You don't get iCloud email account without an Apple device.

You don't. You get no-fee access to iMessage with your Apple devices (phones, tablets, laptops, desktops). Why is that relevant though? Why should Apple be forced to support apps on their competitor's platform?