And I'd wager that some iOS games are released without the developer ever touching XCode: https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/UnityCloudBuildiOS.html

To me, the idea that an OS is mostly finished is completely bananas. There's so much room for improvement and hardly any of that potential was tapped into in what's starting to feel like a decade.

And if Apple had invested into a successor for Cocoa, there might be a larger gap between native apps and (Electron) web apps, leading to some lock-in. Instead most new stuff is not native and for good reasons (and I do dislike the way they don't adhere to Mac conventions, but still).

I think ultimately the problem is Tim Cook. He's too attached to Apple's stock price. I think that's the one metric that he believes rates his performance. But inertia is a bitch. Like in politics, the effects might hit hard only once he's out and it could be too late to fix by then.

If I think about how much this impacts the economy overall (i.e. make millions of knowledge workers a little bit less efficient) then I can only hope that I'll see more sophisticated organizational structures in my lifetime that prevent such erosion.

It took longer than expected. I even intended to buy put options, but someone I trust told me otherwise and to invest in equity instead, which I did, because I know that most buy decisions are not made rationally.

But it looks like the time has come now? On the other hand, I have been off by several years before. People are crazier than you think, especially when it comes to status and association with brands and self-confirmation of past decisions. They might well put up with Apples moves for a few more years.