Disclosure: I love Apple products and all my devices are Apple.

This is absolutely monopolistic shenanigans.

Complaints about monopolistic behavior in the smartphone market from Apple are always met on HN with “Apple doesn’t have a monopoly in the global market” - who cares? Apple is from California, the Bay Area is famously self involved, Apple has a majority stake in the US and certainly in California.

But regardless - trying to rebut the argument “this looks like monopolistic bullying” with “but they aren’t a monopoly” isn’t a good argument. Debate why it doesn’t seem like monopolistic behavior, the debate about whether Apple is a monopoly is whataboutism.