> Sorry but you're completely off base, this isn't an Android vs iOS debate but a megacorporations vs the citizens debate. I want the regulators to bust open Google, Apple, and every other tech monopoly you can think of.

Do you think walled gardens should be illegal? That is the only question that is necessary for me to be on-base. It seems like your answer is clearly yes just from the lede.

Again, this is very obviously not a misrepresentation of the position, it is a steelman - taking the idea to its logical conclusion.

I am happy to cite the rest of your post as supporting evidence:

> You're also falling into the trap of only considering the end-user choice, but completely disregarding the other half of the equation, i.e. businesses that NEED to reach people who happen to be using Apple devices. They don't get a choice other than ceasing to exist, which obviously stifles competition and innovation. This is a problem which EU wants to fix. From the DMA:

> In other words, the EU won't allow Apple (and other gatekeepers) to hold the rest of the industry hostage.

This is pretty obviously in favor outlawing the walled-garden model - there's already a gate and that's not enough. It's not walled if there's a section knocked out of the wall, at that point it's just a folly. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folly

Again, this is about the right of companies like Sony and Microsoft to exist within their own current business models - Epic has conspicuously avoided answering the question of how apple's walled garden is really different from any of the others. And the answer is that it is not, this is a thrust against that whole business model, and MS and Sony are just allies of convenience.

The point is outlawing walled gardens, by which I mean cracking them open using legal means such that third-parties are allowed to set up their own platforms outside the app store system and processes. And people (such as yourself) clearly believe this is a social good. That's fine, don't hide from your position, you should own it.

Just don't have any misapprehensions about what Meta and Google want to crack it open for, and what they will do with it. They're not on your side here, they want to crack it open so they can use network effect to bypass the app-review process. We're degrading and discontinuing our website for mobile users, either give our app full permissions or else you don't get to use facebook. You want to talk to your friends, don't you?

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/facebook-and-google-...

Similarly, if consoles are cracked open, you will likely see console players' experiences degrade due to hackers/etc. Cracking open iMessage and bypassing device attestation will result in massive increases of spam for most users. These things do have consequences, they aren't just a knob labeled "freedom" that developers are just refusing to turn. And that is something that is continuously denied by the "open at all costs" faction - there are real downsides to having completely open systems, just like you can see from email/SMTP. Gatekeeping is actually good sometimes.

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Intellectually everyone understands and agrees with the idea that systems are always a tradeoff between security and freedom. With apologies to Robert Morris: the most secure system is the one where users are not allowed to log in, and certainly not allowed to run anything, let alone run something that isn't approved by the sys-op. It is self-evidently riskier to have to defend a full compiler/code ABI than a limited, secured userland (this is literally the entire reason SELinux exists - because a limited and secured experience is safer and more secure). Similarly, everyone in the defense community understands that the idea of Adverse Information or leverage/blackmail exist, and can get people to take actions that are against their normal interests. But when the rubber meets the road everyone acts like sandboxing should obviously be infallible and network-effect cannot be used to pressure people into agreeing to subvert the permissions. https://www.webdevelopersnotes.com/ensure-security-dont-own-...

Analogous to the defense community, this is already a solved problem: the answer is a third-party authority which makes sure users don't get tempted. You'll go to jail and lose your clearance, so you better not. Except in this case it has to be the devs who are responsible, and Apple and Google's review processes are that certification authority. Nor can you outsource this - it doesn't work if I am allowed to start my own Clearance Authority to approve myself, obviously that doesn't accomplish the purpose. Similarly, letting developers start their own app stores and "review themselves" is blatantly missing the point. Apple and Google have to be the review authority even for third-party stores.

And that is what people want to outlaw, the walled-garden itself. People fundamentally disagree with the idea that it should be legal to build a system without those escape-valves, because systems should be open. And that's fine but it's not self-evidently a better social balance. There are always consequences - "self-certified" security clearance is a misnomer and a joke, it's literally an "evil bit" level oversimplification and mockery of security processes. It's literally a "not-evil" bit, I signed that it's not evil, what more do you want?

There literally already are multiple such escape valves built into the system for small-time users to have freedoms on their own devices without enabling big abuses by commercial operators, and it's never enough. You can run whatever you want on a self-signed cert, or buy a developer license to get longer timeframes. Not good enough. But that's the last stop before you open up a big enough security hole for Facebook to drive a truck through. Which has been the point all along, and they've literally already been nabbed doing it before.

(In the bigger picture though it speaks to how much copyleft has actually won. People literally mentally operate in terms of open-by-default now and actually get angry and suspicious over things like "why are you not letting me run CUDA or imessage on my device". And the answer is "because that's a proprietary system they paid to build and/or operate themselves", obviously everyone wants free stuff but it's a little baffling on a startup incubator internet forum that people are so openly hostile to business-models that don't exactly align with a single "approved" formula. And that's the core of the problem: they want to outlaw anything that's not that formula, "because everything should be open". But that's the email model, and email is way worse than iMessage precisely because of the lack of gatekeeping.)

Again, dress it up however you like, but that's the core of the issue. You think the android business model is the only allowable one and any walled-garden alternatives should be outlawed, and that it's a social good to do so. That is not a misrepresentation and it's frankly a little tedious and disrespectful for you to pretend that it is. I'm not framing it the way you want it to be framed, but I haven't represented you as supporting anything you don't actually support either. That's actually mildly intellectually disrespectful to throw around false accusations so casually.

Have the courage to own your own position. And try to understand that people can see your points differently without it being intellectual dishonesty - it's called a disagreement, not misrepresentation.

The real disagreement is, as is usually the case, a values disagreement. Freedom vs quality-of-experience. Apple is a great experience, but it's limited and constrained. And I think that's fine in a phone, I have PCs for tinkering. You'd rather be able to flash anything. I see consequences in that that will reduce my quality-of-experience. And there are very good reasons to believe this - SELinux exists for a reason.

But the underlying problem is - I am comfortable to let you have your own experience, while the reciprocal is not true. You are not ok with letting me have my experience, you think it should be taken away legislatively. That's not a misrepresentation - you should own it.