From what I always understood, the argument for the App Store was to ensure the hardware remained stable. While it's easy to say, "it's mine, I can do what I want," when that device is a persons life line to emergency services in the even something happens to them, that is not a responsibility a company should take lightly. I like to think Apple takes that seriously and acts in accordance with that responsibly. They've said as much publicly, but of course one can choose to believe them or not.

Even if someone wants to ignore this concept, where is the line drawn? Should a hardware manufacturer, or OS vendor, be allowed to make a product that blocks malware on their systems (like Windows Defender)? Windows was seen as a poor product because of all the adware that infected it in the early 2000s. That issue has largely been resolved, thanks to efforts from Microsoft. Should they not be allowed to solve the biggest issue that plagued the public perception of their product?

I realize I'm move the goalpost slightly, from hardware to OS vendor, but ultimately, it isn't Apple's hardware that's creating these controls, it's iOS, the operating system. And in the case of Google, it's clearly an OS vendor issue, as Android is installed on a wide variety of hardware from many different OEMs.