China has a large ecosystem of app stores. Does anyone know why? Government intervention? Can we replicate that in America?

The Google Play store is banned there, so there's no obvious "default" choice. Other than whatever your phone manufacturer preloads, which will probably be its own store, not necessarily a good store.

What are the alternative app stores available to Chinese iOS users?

It would be nice to have an App Store in China that didn't ban VPN apps.

There is wechat which is a 'superapp' that works almost like an OS with its own repository within the app.

To be clear, most of the alternative app stores here are so bad you’d never want them near your phone. They do things like slip spyware into apks and ask for broad permissions for extra stuff an App Store should never do, like “help you back up your text messages.” (This was in 2014 anyway, haven’t touched an android since)

Choice is good, but there’s something to be said for a locked-down ecosystem protecting consumers from bad actors. Not sure how to split the difference. I run linux on PC but have an iPhone because it needs to just work.

That sounds like yet another walled garden. Am I understanding correctly?

to be honest, why would we even need a app store. We don't need app stores for windows operating systems. Why should we require it for android phones?

I assume that Google Play is a big source of Android revenue for Google, and a major reason for them to keep developing it.

It's even simpler than that: Allowing others to dictate the terms of interacting with users would be very bad for Googles bottom line. What happens to Google Maps dominance without knowing who's going where (for new/closed shops) and how fast (for traffic information)? What about Chrome pushing users to install on desktop, Photos being built-in, and basically every other Google property being the built-in default? Android reports so much information it means Google will, IMO, always and forever have an edge over every other advertising company.

A large part of why iOS has a perception of quality is their handling of the app store.

For a frankly shocking length of time, basic actions like installing a well-rated flashlight app from the Play Store result in your lockscreen being replaced with ads.

Apple on the other hand was pretty ruthless about rejections.

Technically AOSP ("bare Android") has no reliance on an app store, but having someone vetting apps and providing ancillary services through it (Google Play Services) is so valuable that manufacturers are willing to give up a lot of control.

So that granny hasn't 5 toolbars on Internet Explorer and a couple of RAM compression tools and registry cleaners.

Love Windows store and S mode.

What we need is to have an app store as a public service. Why on hell would you want a for-profit company to decide what companies are allowed to exist?