> Companies can generally make design decisions for their products as they see fit. Apple is no more obliged to provide the escape hatch you describe for the iPhone, than Zojirushi is obliged to let me to change the song that plays when I press the start button.

That's not true, if those "design decisions" are anti-competitive in nature then they are absolutely not allowed to do that, that's what the EU commission is fixing with the DMA and now the U.S. is suing Apple too.