Sounds like the "evil" MS of the late 90s/early 2000s.

When I see a company resorting to such artificial and globally-detrimental methods in a sorry attempt to retain/lock customers, I feel like it's an implicit admission that they've lost much of their mind-share, their "higher" vision, their "capital of relevance" so to speak.

It's basically a tantrum disconnected from a higher coherent vision, like "if I can't have it, then nobody gets it!" and goes on to break the thing in question.

Such negativity.

Jobs' Apple was aggressive and ruthless, but not negative, it really sought to add value to their customers life; it was indeed much more loyal to, and respectful of, said customers (and I suspect much less to its partners). Above all it was damn substantial in its own way, towards its own path: you don't lock X because you can and that's the best you could come up with, you lock X because it makes sense from a business perspective without alienating the user. You may have disliked many of their decisions, the matter of the fact is that in the long run they made sense from a deeper perspective.

Cook's Apple is nothing like that, it's like "hipsters meet hedge funds" philosophy of profit/design, more shady/disingenuous ways of enticing customer pride/lock. Even their marketing can be misguiding nowadays, and while not lying, it's way passed a red line that Jobs never crossed: yes you may sell a lot with a clever marketing twist (not lies per se, but a message that feels as much once you've realized there was intent behind your misunderstanding or misplaced expectations); but in the long run, it hurts your very ability to sell anew, i.e. you traded trust for profit and may end up deserving none.

Such a flawed approach to adding value to the world, making the sector worse off, overall, the more it's entangled in the artificially closed Apple ecosystem. No wonder people have woken up and many are actively trying to escape Apple's garden now, but that's only the 1% of the savviest --most consumers keep buying the latest Macs, often for reasons like customer service (consciously) and social status biases (unconsciously).

If I may use a pop reference, Apple used to be a Vulcan company, now they're closer to a Ferengi clone.

This isn't just an abstract rant, it's a high-level account of all the very real and practical reasons that drove me off the Apple wagon during the past 4 years or so, why I stopped spending $2K/year on their products (did that for a decade) and why I don't recommend Macs/iOS anymore to most of my contacts (and right there is at least 10x my spending, also gone to MS, Google, Dell, Samsung, HTC, ASUS, etc.)

I know this all may sound harsh and a bit hyperbolic, but it's basically my way of saying it's little things like these that show, or rather raises questions, how/whether a company lost its way. About UI/UX on Apple products for instance, or software quality in general, or the hardware philosophy of sleek/hot/not powerful Macs, the first signs were already there by 2013: the current situation isn't surprising if you were deep into the Apple ecosystem and paying attention to such aspects, in painful detail I agree. Right at the same moment MS changed and became Nadella's opened, software-first, partner-friendly company, and even if not obvious at all some years ago, their current situation isn't surprising either looking at how details, little events here and there in the MS ecosystem, painted a very clear picture towards that vision.

If I were invested in Apple right now, as a consumer or investor, I wouldn't trust their ability to remain "above" or "equal to" MS/Google by 2020, in terms of OS/software/services. Not saying they won't, but there's momentum to reverse there, it's currently downhill (and much faster than I had anticipated, Windows 10 or Android really are on par nowadays, if not actually better on many such "details"). The question is whether Apple under several CEOs will prove to be an IBM or a Microsoft: can this 20th century company effectively embrace new paradigms? Can they move past their previous decisions, which may have made sense at the time, but would eventually grow to become obsolete or even flawed as computing and behaviors evolve in time? How is their internal culture conducive to such change, how much does it impede meaningful design and innovation currently?