The thing I love about my parents getting Apple products is that they can just go to the Apple Store and have someone help them. An app wasn't launching on their phone, they went to the Apple Store, the person figured out that they hadn't updated their apps in a long time, did that, made sure it worked, and turned on auto-updates (after asking if that would be good for them). Perfect, I didn't even know they had a problem until I heard the story about it being fixed.

I've had relatives go to other tech support places and usually it means they pay money for someone to upsell them on something else or tell them they need a new machine. Apple is fine supporting my parents who don't want a new iPhone. Yea, eventually it's out of support, but it's a long enough time.

I also love that the Apple ecosystem tends towards "you should be willing to pay money for something" rather than "let's see how we can scam money out of someone unwilling to part with their money." If you're techie, you know the difference between real stuff and fake stuff. When non-techies get a pop-up on their Windows laptop telling them that their anti-virus subscription is running out (that came pre-installed) and that they'll be vulnerable to all sorts of bad things if they don't pay $50, they get nervous and call me. Then I have to figure out (over the phone) how to uninstall the crap and get Microsoft Defender working.

Even Windows 11 is just becoming a pile of ads and other junk.

With streaming TV boxes, Roku ends up installing apps they don't know how to uninstall because if you press the play button while the TV is off, it installs whatever app they're promoting on the screen saver. Fire TV and Android TV are a mess of ads and it's hard to know what content you have access to and what you don't. I'm just so sick of relatives asking me "How did this app get on my Roku? How do I get it off?" and things like "How do I only see the shows I have access to? Why is it showing me Showtime when it tells me I have to pay when I click on it? I think dad might have subscribed to things because he didn't know what he was doing. How do I cancel that? No I don't know what he might have subscribed to."

Sure, you can say that Apple TV comes with the Apple TV app pre-installed, but it isn't constantly pushing things on you. Sure, Apple would like an iCloud subscription, but if my parents end up giving Apple $1/mo, I'm fine with that. The level of difference is simply astonishing. It's like having a store email you once "hey, we have new pants" compared to the stores that email you twice a day "HEY!!!! HAVE YOU HEARD ABOUT NEW PANTS!!!!" You can say "they're both doing it", but there's a huge difference.

Apple isn't perfect, but I feel comfortable with non-techie people in my life having Apple products. They can get support when they need it at the Apple Store, Apple is happy with the money they've paid for the product, and I can put their technical needs out of my mind. They love it too. They get unlimited free access to helpful employees who fix their stuff faster than I can get to it. Yea, if you're techie you know how things work and what to look for and you can make decisions for yourself. When relatives buy non-Apple stuff, they're making a decision that I'm going to fix things for them.