> As consumers we're better off because of that choice.
Consumers are not an undifferentiated mass. There are people who would have been better off with Flash support. Certainly at the time there were -- it was a hardship back when there were still many Flash sites.
And customers don't need Apple for this. If you dislike Flash enough to endure the hardship of not having access to Flash sites when they're still popular, don't install it. If many other people feel the same, Flash will go away. If hardly anyone feels the same then it's Apple doing it for their own benefit and against the will of most of their customers.
The way to settle this is to allow multiple app stores. If customers really want only the Apple one, that's what they'll choose. If that's not what they want and they're only after the operating system or the hardware, how can you claim that Apple is doing what the customers want?
Apple's trade-offs, their sensibilities, took us from phones that looked and worked like BlackBerry, and Moto Q, to phones that look and work like the iPhone. They set a new high bar. The iPhone had better capabilities and superior user experience. So yes, Apple has improved the general smart phone experience for all consumers.
Apple achieves this sensibility by making choices on behalf of their customers that they feel leads to a superior user experience. They don't present the user with pedantic choices. Instead they allow users to select only choices that they feel will lead to a great experience.
This is similar to other purveyors of premium and luxury goods. For example, a 5-star restaurant won't present you with (in their opinion) a shitty choice of meal. Tesla won't sell you a car with steering wheel--only a yolk. LV won't sell you a basic plastic purse. And BestBuy won't sell you just any old shit off of Alibaba.
Discerning consumers look to these companies to make these choices for them. To make the experience of owning those the products wonderful. And Apple's customers look to Apple to do the same thing with their phone.
Now, not all customers want or can afford these choices. So, there are competitors that see it differently.
If you really want flash, buy Android. Flash available from several publishers in the the Android app store.
Consumers are not an undifferentiated mass. There are people who would have been better off with Flash support. Certainly at the time there were -- it was a hardship back when there were still many Flash sites.
And customers don't need Apple for this. If you dislike Flash enough to endure the hardship of not having access to Flash sites when they're still popular, don't install it. If many other people feel the same, Flash will go away. If hardly anyone feels the same then it's Apple doing it for their own benefit and against the will of most of their customers.
The way to settle this is to allow multiple app stores. If customers really want only the Apple one, that's what they'll choose. If that's not what they want and they're only after the operating system or the hardware, how can you claim that Apple is doing what the customers want?