That's what I'm saying, one company took the stance that they want to be a regulator, while the other took the stance that they want minimal regulation. People prefer the regulated environment.

Everyone wants the benefit of regulations (people can't do the thing thing I don't like) but many don't want to pay the cost of regulations (I can't do the things those other people don't like).

It's not like regulation though, it's more like extra service benefits the customers just like credit card (chargeback/insurance/extended warranty etc). There are many credit cards out there and ppl have the choices to have credit card chargeback or not. Or they could choose to use some other payment options. Google could add extra feature when ppl subscribe through play store, and keep app side loading at the same time. It's not either-or situation

I'm usually fine with regulation (and what it costs) that benefit the consumers but I'm not fine with apple (or any private company) being the arbitrator.

Apple is only beholden to it's shareholder and I have 0 influence on their behavior.

Not directed at you, but I don't get how people can complain about unaccountable politicians and then turn towards even less accountable boards of directors instead.

I agree in theory that a company should not be the arbiter, but the reality is that the company is less dysfunctional than the government and less beholden to political powers.

If we had a government that would regulate away dark patterns and generally do things in the interest of us, that would be great. We don't have that.

I think I have more influence over apple than I have over the us government. I think apple works on behalf of me more than the us government does. I've made that calculation differently than you, so we've come to different conclusions.