No, that isn't the point either. The point is happy users, and there will always be some unhappy users because they wanted to do something that isn't supported or actively barred.

Throwing in words like 'right' and 'unjust' helps in movements and call to action etc, but in this context it's about someone turning on their device, doing some work, and turning it off again.

Since I can't reply to the replies, I'll reply to myself:

All of those points are fine, but they are points separate from a user using a device.

If you want it for environmental reasons, say that. If you want it for freedom, say that. Both are valid reasons but don't have anything to do with someone using their machine, unless that 'usage' mains doing stuff with the insides. And before someone jumps in to tell that that is the main activity: great, but most people buy those machines to do work that doesn't entail opening it up.

I am not allowed to use a browser I want on iOS. Do you count this as “using their machine”? The reason is the lack of freedom to do what I want with the software.

Not sure what that has to do with hardware but I'll bite: users don't care. They don't know what a browser is, what a client is, or an URL or URI or address bar. They want a device that when they turn it on and type in 'tictoc dance dog' it shows them something that resembles what they had in mind. Doesn't matter if it runs WebKit or Gecko or if someone thought it'd be cool to emulate a trident-based engine on iOS on ARM in a custom browser.

Freedom 'to do what you want' has not had much to do with what works in the world of selling to the masses when it comes to user experience (and yes that is ironic).

Regarding 'using' and 'their' and 'machine': I meant an activity based scenario which is what most people see themselves doing. They mostly have no concept of ownership, actions or device semantics. The reason is simple: it's not needed to be a user and it's not needed to get the same results as other people in your group have. And for a lot of people all that matters is doing the same as the rest of the local group.

Edit number 3: you can apparently select your default protocol handler in iOS 14. I bet there are some double digit Google users that want that for Chrome, and a few sub-1% users that want FireFox. But that's still not freedom because they all use the same renderer and JS engine. On the other hand: it's unlikely that people care about that, and the people that do are not likely to run iOS at all. Luckily, you don't have to use iOS. Or a phone. So some aspects of freedom are unchanged.

> users don't care. They don't know what a browser is, what a client is, or an URL or URI or address bar.

All true but irrelevant. The problem is that artificial lack of choice prevents competition and innovation. Microsoft from the 90s is here again. And users don’t care, again.

I do not count another UI as a new browser. It should be different under the hood.

> I do not count another UI as a new browser. It should be different under the hood.

Can you imagine any general user ever repeating that? I can't. As those users woud say: nobody cares.

I personally would care, but I'm not the main marketed target for Apple. I also care more about getting stuff done than what engine my browser uses.

It doesn't matter if a general user would know about this stuff. The point is that they are being hurt by lack of competition and don't even know it. Even if they wanted to stick with Safari on iOS, that version of Safari would likely be better and have more features if it were forced to experience some competition.

This is why healthy competition and anti-trust actually matters. It's not because your average user cares about the details, it's because they're being impacted even when they don't know it.

This subthread has a fairly trivial example of this, but when you get into right-to-repair it becomes even more important. Your average consumer could be spending a lot less money to have a much better experience. The fact that they don't know about that is part of the problem; lack of knowledge doesn't make the issue irrelevant.

And we don't even need to get into the environmental arguments around reducing waste to consider this aspect of the issue.

> Not sure what that has to do with hardware but I'll bite: users don't care

Sure, if you keep a population ignorant, they won't care about the pettiness of their lives, as they don't know about freedom.

Those "happy" users are just ignorant users who don't know what to do with their money. Their happiness wouldn't be any lesser if Apple would provide ways to fix their laptops.

You should watch Louis Rossmann who is doing repairs, how purposefully Apple makes any repairs hard.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uYUB8DZH2M&t=2649s

What you are saying is the same thing. “Unhappy users” are unhappy because of lack of the freedoms I mentioned. One has to fight for them.

Considering the environmental damages that this causes it should indeed be a right.