Which is exactly what everyone wants to avoid.

Imagine if there were 10 inspection groups, but sometimes they get bought by corrupt investors who let standards slide while pocketing the extra profit, and consumers constantly have to stay on top of which food inspection groups are the current OK ones and which aren't, and restaurants can't afford to get inspected by all 10 so they only do 2 but then people who only trust another 2 won't go there at all even though the food's fine, meanwhile the most trustworthy group jacks up prices for restaurants like crazy because restaurants know they have no choice...

It would be a nightmare. There's a reason that literally no country does this, that food safety is virtually universally considered to be a basic function of modern government.

> Imagine... consumers constantly have to stay on top of which [regulators] are the current OK ones and which aren't...

A thriving market in marijuana has existed your entire life. It works exactly this way.

Countless examples. PC hardware. Vaping. Yelp.

It's fine. Which is lucky: who watches the watchers?

You want real-time feedback without perverse incentives. Only customers can provide it.

Apple would definitely need to make guidelines for stores. They would obviously be different than for apps, and deal with more meta aspects of the regulation (such as, fair examination of app submission, possibility for rejected apps to appeal, obligation for app owner to be identified, etc).

Much like a government can create quality standards and then outsource parts of its missions to private sector.

Why wouldn't Epic Games then come crying that those rules are unfair and burdensome too?

because apple app store would follow those same rules.

> Which is exactly what everyone wants to avoid.

Then don't use those other apps stores.

I think that people who care about all this stuff, can very easily just continue to use the Apple app store.

Okay, don’t use iOS. It’s very easy to just not engage with Apple entirely. Why do you even care? Money? Illusion of choice? The status quo should remain and you should find a different product to use with less restrictive rules.

> Why do you even care?

Well, because Apple's behavior is illegally anti-competitive, and it is possible for everyone to get what they want.

You can simply not install other app stores, and other people can get what they want, if Apple is forced to allow other people to install other app stores, because their illegal anti-competitive behavior is stopped.

You should not care, if other people install whatever they want, on the phone that they own.

Because you can simply choose to not use those app stores. Problem solved, and everyone wins.

> The status quo should remain

Actually, a better solution is for Apple's illegally anti-competitive behavior to be stopped, by allowing other people to install what they want on the iPhone if they choose to do so.

First of all, I don't want to have to download a different store every time a big app decides that they're too big for the App Store, a la that EA piece Origin, the Epic Store, the Curse Launcher - or whatever it's called this month - and the Ubisoft Store, all competing with Steam. I just want 1 and no more. That's the best user experience.

Second, I shouldn't have to remind you how well competing regulators worked for the financial sector

Basically, I think something needs doing, but this ain't it. Maybe Apple need their cut cut. They make enough damn money. You could take their cut down to 5% and they'd still be raking it in by the truckload

Funny reading this. it’s as if people installing games from steam on their laptop, and mac apps from the apple app store, then install adobe softwares from adobe installers are living an insufferable life.

They’re not. There are very easy ways to recognize a trustworthy store. We’re doing that every single day for things we actually ingest.

it’s not insufferable, it’s just not the ideal user experience