> Given Apple's general money-grubbing ways (see: the App Store), this is somewhat surprising.

Far be it from me to give Apple credit for altruism or openness, but this narrative isn't quite true. When the iPhone launched, Jobs and the execs at Apple envisioned that web apps would be the way the iPhone functionality could be extended. There was even a relatively straightforward way for web apps to be cached and saved on the Home Screen. The desire for compatability with open standards was even reflected in Jobs' open letter explaining why Flash would not be put in the iPhone.[0]

Public outcry for the native APIs along with prodding from other Apple execs led to the App Store becoming a thing.

[0] https://web.archive.org/web/20100501010616/https://www.apple...