I think that gave them much stronger standing and claimed damages.

It's a weaker argument if they voluntarily removed themselves from the AppStore.

Apple could have trotted out some 'We typically work well with developers in Epic's situation, but they never approached us so there was nothing we could do' excuse.

By forcing Apple to take an action, it concretely showed that Apple does in fact remove access if companies tried to forward users to alternate payment methods.

This idea that Epic had to breach to sue is part of a well crafted PR campaign by Epic.

People who did fight for civil rights were also punished with the force of law for their civil disobedience. The laws were unjust, but they still had consequences for those who lived under them, otherwise they wouldn’t have had to fight. Epic is also facing the consequences of their actions, but it’s only really important to them that they win. Everybody else invested in this fight (within the EU) will probably be able to get anything they want but Fortnite from some other app marketplace.

Epic wants better terms for everyone, not just their app.

They lost, but good news for all the not-Epics out there because there's other companies who stand to benefit from the recent Court and Commission-induced changes Apple made to their policies. It just won't be Epic specifically.

Here's the thing when you have a highly asymmetric power relationship, whether it be with a government or a business or any other large organization. You can point out how bad their policies are, and never break a rule, and people will just sort of sadly nod their head in agreement and go back to doing what they do. Or, you can force them to show just how ugly their rules/laws are on in real life -- not just theoretically. The latter actually gets things done, which is why I made the relation between the two things.

Or put more simply: show, don't tell.

Apple's App Store policies are, in my opinion as both an iPhone user and a developer, bad for everyone but Apple. So no, it's not important just for Epic that they win, it's important for the broader community of developers and users. Apple clearly is punishing Epic for fighting them and securing some victories, and personally I don't think we should tolerate that sort of behavior from Apple.

These are devices so essential to modern functioning that the regulators need to come and tell both Apple and Google that unlimited web installs are user rights.

Epic is right. Apple and Google are monopolies over an entire class of computing, and it's a 100% artificial racket.

This might be what you want but without new legislation, because the DMA ain’t saying what you want, regulators are not within their rights to impose this requirement.

Just because you can ask your users to build a nuclear fission reactor, doesn't mean that they can or will.

F-droid gets ~3M MAU, with a 70% bounce rate. It's pitiful.

This is a pathetic case for mobile rights and freedom. Practically nobody knows how to make use of this model.

Installing software should be first class, not buried in the settings. It shouldn't have scare walls, either.

Google knows exactly what they're doing with the "freedom" they're letting end users have. 0.1% of users even know about or can leverage it.

The truth is the vast majority of users do not care about sideloading apks. Apple knows this. Google knows this.

However, it is important that it is allowed without any major hurdle (a warning dialog that you need to click OK on is not a major hurdle for me once you consider that many malicious actors will use this sideloading for nefarious purposes).

Google allows it and you are free to use it without major hurdles. Yes, most users don't care to, and that's fine.

You can't really say that since it isn't a common deployment strategy. If web installs of APKs were normal and had no road blocks, then the practice would be commonplace.

The users care about software. There is only one blessed path to get it.