The problem is the principle of the thing. I shouldn’t have to pay to develop an app to run on my own device. I can see an argument for locking features like test flight and distribution behind the paywall, but I should be able to run an app that I develop by myself onto a device that I own with no restrictions.

Why haven’t you switched to Android which provides the feature you want? It’s a problem you can easily resolve, without making any one else change.

Because it should be a basic consumer right. It should be beyond market forces.

Sure and it's great if you're currently engaged in some political or legal action about it but until that succeed you can use Android or even a non android linux phone distribution.

Apple doesn’t have a monopoly. You can vote with your wallet by buying an Android phone from one of several manufacturers of your choosing that has the feature to install whatever you want. Again why should Apple and their users that are content with the current walled garden status quo have to change when you already have a viable option to get what you want?

It's not about a monopoly, although that's certainly one of the possible arguments.

What I meant in my comment above was that it should be a basic consumer right for all devices that can run code. TVs, cars, game consoles, IoT systems, everything down to the most trivial chip.

$99/yr is infinitely more expensive than $0.

Again, the raw materials have been paid for (my time, my hardware). Windows, Android and Linux have managed to keep the lights on without charging a bullshit fee for the privilege of deigning to let me run a lowly app on their exalted platforms.

Windows and Linux are desktop OSes and should be compared to macOS, which does allow you to run your own software without paying the fee.

I will concede that Android does allow you to install apps for free and if that is a feature that is really important to you, you should switch to that platform. iOS has always been this way, there wasn’t a bait and switch, and many people (myself being one of them) consider the higher barrier to entry to be a feature of iOS, not a bug.

Somehow people have accepted that mobile platforms are much less free than desktop or web platforms. This different treatment is completely artificial and its main purpose is maximizing profit for the platform owners.

Just because iOS has always been this way should not stop people from criticizing these limitations.