No, in the US phone market they do not have anything like Microsoft’s share of the PC market.

And if you don’t feel Apple gives you sufficient ownership, why not just buy something else?

It’s a boring question to keep asking, but nobody actually seems to want to answer it.

Can you name two viable alternatives to iOS? I can't.

I can buy something else. In fact I did. The problem is that if you are making a product which will be consumed from a phone you have to support iPhone users and do everything Apple wants you to do.

To solidify this point, the majority of phones in the US run on iOS. iOS has 52.4% of the mobile operating system market on phones[1].

If you're selling an app, it's even more important to support iOS users because the App Store is responsible for three times as much revenue as the Play Store[2].

[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/266572/market-share-held...

[2] https://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2020/01/in-2019...

Yeah, 52% means that Android is nearly matched marketshare wise. The mobile situation is nothing like Windows’s share when Microsoft was sued for antitrust violations: the desktop market share of windows is still like 70%, 20 years ago it was like 97%.

From the US government[1]:

> Courts do not require a literal monopoly before applying rules for single firm conduct; that term is used as shorthand for a firm with significant and durable market power — that is, the long term ability to raise price or exclude competitors. That is how that term is used here: a "monopolist" is a firm with significant and durable market power.

[1] https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/competition-guidance/guide-a...

> Courts do not require a literal monopoly before applying rules for single firm conduct; that term is used as shorthand for a firm with significant and durable market power — that is, the long term ability to raise price or exclude competitors. That is how that term is used here: a "monopolist" is a firm with significant and durable market power.

You quoted selectively. It goes on:

> Courts look at the firm's market share, but typically do not find monopoly power if the firm (or a group of firms acting in concert) has less than 50 percent of the sales of a particular product or service within a certain geographic area. Some courts have required much higher percentages. In addition, that leading position must be sustainable over time: if competitive forces or the entry of new firms could discipline the conduct of the leading firm, courts are unlikely to find that the firm has lasting market power

It is clear that A) Apple is not a monopoly and B) the market is very competitive

But Appoogle together clearly form a duopoly that does have monopoly power over the market. And they both charge 30% to App devs for the privilege of selling Apps on their respective platforms: coincidence or price collusion? Well it certainly looks like collusion from where I'm sitting.

(Yes, yes: Apple has just cut the rate for small devs. The big sellers still have to pay 30% though.)

Apple has cut the rate for 98% of sellers.

This isn’t a problem, it’s just reality. An app dev needs to support the platforms. You are still free to use something else.

Not sure if you're trolling, but that's not a rational option for most.

I've described elsewhere in thread why switching is not an option for me; Apple has slowly trapped me in their ecosystem of Apple TV, Apple Watch, Macbook, Homepod, my BMW which will only talk to an iOS device, iMessage, HomeKit

They don't provide any external APIs to interact with these products so other platforms/systems could make such a switch less painful.

There's something profoundly silly about this.

I feel your pain: Apple slowly lured you into spending thousands of dollars on high-quality products which work smoothly together, and then they went and changed the EULA on you and now you can't install non-App Store software on it!

Only that didn't happen, of course: the rules have always been the rules, you just don't like them.

Which is fine, actually, complain all you want. But the victim act is hilarious. "My luxury car will only talk to an iPhone! I should sue!"

I personally switched to Apple products because they more or less Just Worked and they prevented me from fiddling with them: the big issue with Android phones for me was that, since I would always root and mod them, they’d always fail at inopportune times: by making this sort of tinkering not an option, Apple phones are just more reliable for me (and, sure, this is partly my fault but, from my perspective, the locked-down status of iDevices is a feature that lets me treat them like appliances)

He didn’t say his luxury car will only talk to an iPhone. BMWs will of course connect to any Bluetooth phone.

He said only an iPhone will properly display album art on the screen of his luxury car as he drives.

I’m certainly not trolling.

You’re not trapped. Over time switch to another provider. Or all at once.

They sell you a service and device with terms. If you don’t like it, get out of that ecosystem.

Certainly don’t use the power of the federal government. Do you like monopolies? Because that’s how you get monopolies.

"They sell you heroin if you don't like it - quit"

A lot of people (e.g. libertarians) would agree with that statement.