2 vendors, Microsoft and Apple, have almost 100% of desktop OS market share, so no, that's not a particularly free market.
> Please realize that the lack of agency is the principal component of the price you pay for the polish and cleanliness in the walled garden. There is no known other way to run it.
This is completely false, because Apple has radically changed how they've operated the Mac in the past 20 years. That's my complaint. Apple keeps getting worse and worse, year after year. I was quite satisfied with the Mac years ago.
In the past, the Mac was more open. Believe it or not, there was a time when code signing didn't exist, and you could modify your system however you pleased.
Along these lines, I really loved Apple hardware at the times of Apple II, and Apple software at the times of HyperCard.
By that time, and through 1990s, Apple was very niche, much like desktop Linux today. It did not have viruses because nobody cared to seriously write them. Apple were catering for some specific professional circles, power users who were ready to pay quite a premium for the machine.
Since the iPhone revolution, Apple is about the mass consumer, with much more non-geek mindset, buying at much more affordable prices. They lock down their ecosystem both for users' security (because non-IT people have hard time understanding computer security), and to extract more money via App Store-only software installation in the future.
Againx the problem with freedom is its cost, and you have fewer chances finding pockets of it where the majority is. Fringe groups have more chances to value and protect it, like OSS movement, or early Apple / Amiga / all the way to Altair customer base.
> In the past, the Mac was more open. Believe it or not, there was a time when code signing didn't exist, and you could modify your system however you pleased.
This seems inevitable as computers become more accessible to less technical userbases. Foot-guns are fine(ish) when your user group is composed of specialists, but companies have incentive to minimize support requests.
> This seems inevitable as computers become more accessible to less technical userbases.
The only change is cost. Computers are more accessible because they're cheaper. My dad managed to figure out VisiCalc for himself back in the day, and he wasn't "technical", he was just in sales.
IMO there's an unfortunate tendency nowadays to infantilize users.
How can we say simultaneously that "computers are the future" and also accept a situation where the majority of people are just assumed to be technically incompetent and incapable of learning?
> companies have incentive to minimize support requests.
In my experience, for example supporting my mom, there's no difference in the volume of support requests. The only difference is that you can actually fix problems that occur on the Mac, whereas if someone experiences a problem on iOS, they're basically doomed.
> How can we say simultaneously that "computers are the future" and also accept a situation where the majority of people are just assumed to be technically incompetent and incapable of learning?
This succinctly captures the issue, though. Users don't want to read the manual, they want to use the appliance. They don't want to learn the idiosyncrasies of the device, they want to accomplish the task they had in mind.
As someone who always reads the manual, I agree with you on principle but the reality is, fewer people care how things work and just want to get stuff done.
I'm not sure how this is relevant? Almost every product of every kind comes with a manual or instructions, which buyers are free to read or ignore, possibly with dangerous consequences for the latter. You can stick a metal pot in a microwave. You can pop open a pill bottle and swallow. That's just a fact of life in a free society.
Going back to your minimization of support requests comment, if your mom is unable to delete a file (like when SIP is enabled) she won't make a superfluous support request as she was prevented from making the error. As computers continue to be used as appliances, we should expect similar controls over the device to be deployed to minimize the harm a user can cause. This in turn leads to loss of agency by the specialist.
Most people can understand the failure modes associated with microwaving metal and such (or if not, it can be a relatively cheap or expensive lesson). But that underscores the commoditization I was pointing at. The dangers of general computing devices can't be captured in simple aphorisms like "don't leave it on with a vessel that lacks contents" for a stove or "don't put metal inside" for a microwave. The warnings that accompany a computer would comprise encyclopedic volumes to encapsulate all the things that could go wrong, like "don't install software from someone you don't know on a computer through which you access your banking." There are so many instance like that it's unbelievable. Few other devices are so interconnected to so many aspects of our lives. The general nature simply lacks the guardrails and controls of a special-purpose appliance.
Put another way, can you imagine the reduction in request volume from your mother if she had a special device for reading the news, and another for banking, and another for shopping? This is the rationale. I don't agree with it but convenience seems to trump everything else.
2 vendors, Microsoft and Apple, have almost 100% of desktop OS market share, so no, that's not a particularly free market.
> Please realize that the lack of agency is the principal component of the price you pay for the polish and cleanliness in the walled garden. There is no known other way to run it.
This is completely false, because Apple has radically changed how they've operated the Mac in the past 20 years. That's my complaint. Apple keeps getting worse and worse, year after year. I was quite satisfied with the Mac years ago.
In the past, the Mac was more open. Believe it or not, there was a time when code signing didn't exist, and you could modify your system however you pleased.