> Why does everything need to become like Android?
It's not like Android. It's like computers before iPhone.
> Why can’t Apple and its users do their own thing?
Because if I want my startup to succeed, I have to have an iPhone app.
Apple makes this hostile to everyone that isn't them. You need design approval to push updates, you can't deploy when you want. You have to pay the 30% tax and use Apple payment rails. You have to support Apple sign-in, which means you can never form a customer relationship. (It's fine for Apple to have that relationship, but not anyone else.)
Taking advantage of the rise of the internet, Apple has used their incredible market position to elbow their way into every aspect of business. If you want to reach "their" customers, you have to play by the arbitrary rules they set. Rules that defend their market position and extract tax.
> What’s with this Borg mentality HN has when it comes to Apple?
What’s with this Borg mentality HN has when it comes to Apple fans?
> Assimilate or perish.
Assimilate or perish, the Apple fans tell other businesses and entrepreneurs.
> I genuinely think it’s deep seated envy, frankly.
It's anger that we're being abused by a gorilla-sized mobster and that nothing has been done to protect us.
It's anger that the open computing and world wide web of the 90s and 2000s has been grifted and coopted by Google and Apple. That computing has been redefined as something proprietary. They've taken advantage of open source and open Internet, and leveraged that to capture and control the market. Software freedoms that enabled their rise are now dying because of these companies. They're making it harder for us to succeed and taking more of the pie for themselves. They got theirs, and now they're putting it under lock and key.
Call it envy all you want. It's not fair for computing to be owned by the incumbents.
Would you still have this opinion if history had been different and Microsoft's Windows Phone had taken the place of the iPhone? Would you be happy with the Windows Store, Microsoft's 30% fee, Microsoft's design guidelines, etc?
Replace everything Apple you own with Microsoft, couple it with the same proprietary stance, and tell me you'd be happy.
Take that thought process one step further and disregard the company altogether. It doesn't matter who is doing these things. Apple is immaterial. The behavior is bad and it shouldn't be allowed.
This is why the DOJ hammered Microsoft -- rightly so -- and will do the same to Apple.