Historically this was not true, although it has been true in the U.S. since the 1970s. Historically it was understood that a lack of competition was itself harmful, regardless of whether the monopolist was benevolent or not.
In the case of technology, harm is more difficult to demonstrate. How do you quantify the harm done by the absence of new products or services launched? It's easy to say Company B undercut Company C until Company C went out of business after which Company B raised prices. It's harder to say Company A had such a strong position in the market that companies D-Q never got past step 1 before either shutting down or being acquired by one of companies A, B, or C. Harder to prove the absence is harmful, but there is still harm being done.
If nothing else, a company so large it engenders a fan base that will defend its every action is edging toward "too big to regulate" in a way that doesn't bode well.
For what it's worth, I'm not big on breaking up existing companies along arbitrary lines as much as I am on unwinding acquisitions. M&A activity is what I think is knee-capping technology, and Apple is less guilty of that than many others.
Apple builds a beautiful, big house with no locks. A very wealthy family moves in. They love their new house. Then some folks started snooping in to spy on the household or to steal from them. Some of those thieves decide to use their loot to create more houses for the community. This causes the community to flourish. Others keep the loot to themselves.
Apple realizes this house needed locks from the start, so they install them. The community is arguably negatively affected, as there is no longer a home to steal from. Does this make it wrong for Apple to install locks?
Early, unfettered access to users and user data created a sort of primordial soup for innovation. It's impossible to argue that it didn't increase company formation. However, many companies grew by trodding on ground they should have had no right to.
The core of the issue here is not user data, but the ability to interoperate with the phone OS. It's absolutely possible to do that without exposing sensitive data, by providing APIs and adopting open standards (for payments, notifications, message extensions, maps, etc etc). Case in point, it would have been technically impossible for Tile, or anyone else, to create a product as good as AirTags. That was not a matter of product vision or creativity, only of who has actual access to the phone hardware.
A better analogy would be that Apple does not allow you to bring third-party furniture into the house. You must buy theirs. And then the same for food, and eventually clothing, and water, and electricity... one day you bring this really cool TV into the house, just released, guess what's their next product offering that will slot in seamlessly with your furniture?
(I use all things Apple, but this power is starting to get me concerned)
Home+ has been in the top 50 for as long as I can remember and it's a $15 paid app.
This is actually is a cost, as it's used to justify their continued domination.
The harm done shouldn't be examined purely in the sphere of the consumer .. it should be extended to society. The cost of Apple's continued success, is the probably failure of other smaller ventures. They stifle, and they dwarf most other commercial entities.
In another comment I mentioned that any set of user-positive functionality is underlain with a far more strategically important business benefit.
The only reason they do good is to continue to grow. Let's not kid ourselves.
And if we're talking space analogies, I'd argue it's actually closer to a black hole ..
In this case, I can argue that Apple is protecting us from crappy companies. Tile sold its business to Life360. Life360 sells users' location data to anyone willing to pay for it. What's the fundamental cost to society of keeping companies like Tile around?
Maybe Life360 goes out of business. A bunch of engineers get hurt, some product people, marketers, accountants, administrators. 300 employees, laid off. That sucks, I agree. The effort of earning 27 million MAUs will be thrown down the toilet if they fail. That sucks. Now Life360 users must migrate to something that Apple offers. Is the product better? Yes. Does Apple have a fundamentally rivalrous relationship with its users? No. Does Apple sell users' data? No. I see no demonstration of consumer harm in this segment.
Let's take a real hard look at the people harmed by Apple's monopoly. These are other monopolists of their own vertical who are incensed that they can no longer enjoy monopolistic rents. Furthermore, that company may go out of business. The people being put out of business are likely engineers who would have no trouble finding another job. I do not have sympathy for technologists. I do have sympathy for the tens if not hundreds of millions of people in America who struggle to make a living. What's the effect to them if we break up Apple? Nothing. What's the effect if we don't break up Apple?
Apple at this point in their life has reached a point where its value proposition is more than just a luxury. They've created meaningful products creating meaningful changes in lives. Apple Watch has helped vulnerable folks (including me) get emergency services via fall detection, which leverages technologies and products made possible by Apple's "monopoly". Apple gives consumers the option to privately monitor their own home and premises through Homekit whereas other surveillance services brazenly monetize their services by selling data to law enforcement.
In the case of Homekit, what do consumers gain if Apple had to break out its home automation unit? They may have to pay more for that standalone service or else have their data monetized in other ways. Is that good for consumers? Heck no. What's paying for those services now? Apple's "monopolistic" profits.
I could go down the line with every one of Apples units and services. They've helped my family experience a level of richness that we've never enjoyed before.
For as much as pockets of the tech industry grandstands about "monopoly" because they don't like IAP rules, actual people don't care because they have benefitted greatly from what this "monopolistic" entity has contributed to their lives. You're going to have a tough time convincing me that this would all be possible had Apple not consolidated many parts of the industry.
> Yes, because there's a fundamental cost to society.
Insofar as my non-tech family and friends see it, this "cost" to society has been more like a dividend. When Apple starts acting maliciously, I'll drive everyone here to your local Attorney General's office.
Here's how I see Apple: Apple is Jupiter. It's the largest planet in the solar system. Is it terrifyingly large? Yes. Is it protecting me, Earth, from getting smashed by asteroids? Definitely. I like Jupiter.