I strongly disagree with the OS remark, a device is nothing when not operating, device and operations should be free to be designed built and sold together for best customer experience and safety with no regulatory waterline falsely limiting progress by discriminating between behaviors/logic implemented in memory, firmware, or silicon.
First sale means I’m free to break my device, fine, but cannot mean it must be left more breakable.
While I don't like the Apple tax, I really don't like the idea that forcing Apple to open up its App Store is the right solution.
I wish we could start with these ideas first:
- pricing transparency: force the UI to show exactly how much of every transaction goes to Apple. We already do this with many other taxes, so I don't see it as an intrusion.
- first sale doctrine fully applied: force Apple to allow users to install any OS they want on an iPhone. Prohibit locking, etc. But if you choose to use Apple's OS, then you have to accept their policies. This same policy should apply to game consoles and other hardware. (And this does contradict slightly my above point about app signing, but I'd argue that letting people use hardware unfettered is different than letting them use your software unfettered. But it's an admittedly weak and flawed compromise.)