having said that, i think apple goes too far. they could make things safe for the average grandma while also allowing more latitude for tinkerers. they should allow you to hook up your phone to different backend services other than their own icloud. they should not be trying to take 30 percent from every transaction that happens in ios apps. they should allow you to buy music and movies from places other than their store that works just as seamlessly for the end user, with no friction. and so on.
android, on the other hand, goes too far in the other direction. google is so hands-off that they let device manufacturers get away with murder, at the expense of their users.
there is a happy place in the middle that somebody with deep pockets could occupy, if they wanted to.
I consider myself a nerd and I find it amazing that some of my fellow nerds learned absolutely nothing from IE and ActiveX: Users will always click Yes/OK/Install/Please_own_me. Providing an "Allow side-loading" checkbox guarantees these people will get completely and utterly owned. The latest free-to-play game will promise a "Chest of Gems" if they check the checkbox.
Some spyware purveyors and scummy ad networks are even now prompting iOS users to install mobile provisioning profiles and the users willingly tap through multiple prompts to install them despite the scary warnings! These users end up with MITM VPN profiles installed that redirect all traffic or get extra spam email accounts setup.
I enjoy having a gatekeeper that keeps most of the riff-raff out. I haven't always agreed with the decisions but I've never been secretly signed up for a premium SMS plan, had a coin miner installed, had my browsing history or contacts harvested, etc.