...
I think this is somewhat unfair to Apple. After all, the *ONLY* reason why Apple is pickish about these things is because they feel the heat from the Biggest of all Brothers on this planet: the totalitarian united states of america federal government. Otherwise they wouldn't bother.
The United States Government is not forcing Apple to do anything here. The only recent action of the United States Government with respect to Apple was to use the courts to force Apple to jailbreak an iPhone as part of an anti-terrorism investigation. This is highly commendable on the part of the United States Government since the owner of the said iPhone was voluntarialy co-operating with FBI investigation. The case became moot when the FBI found someone else who could crack the Apple DRM, that Apple was using to frustrate the anti-terrorism investigation.
When it comes to violence on the part of the United States Government the passage of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in 1998 by the United States Congress stands out as the one act of violence by the United States Government in the last 25 years. It is further reinforced by the actions of US Trade Representative in promoting DRM around the world. Yes this is far worse then all the actions of United States military, the CIA, NSA etc combined during the same period. To understand this one only needs to consider that the number deaths due to smoking worldwide in the 20th century were actually higher than the deaths caused by World War I and World War II combined. A critical component in these smoking deaths was that the tobacco industry went out of its way to hide and obfuscate the data on the relationship between smoking and premature death. Data that they claimed was their proprietary information. Protecting the "intellectual property" of multinational corporations can be a crime worse than war if one measures this crime by the number of deaths it can cause. This is just one industry. Multiply this by the crimes committed by large multinational corporations in areas as diverse as manufacturing to pharmaceuticals and one gets the real picture here. The vast majority of corporate crimes are crimes of deceit and fraud, and withholding information because it is proprietary is a critical component of such crimes. Furthermore most violence attributed to governments worldwide is actually done at the behest of multinational corporate interests. Every time a government drops a bomb one must ask the question which multinational corporate interests asked the government to drop said bomb. There is where the real fault for the violence, death and misery the bomb causes actually lies.
There is real hope here in that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act is currently being challenged in the United States Supreme Court, thanks to the efforts of among others the Electronic Frontier Foundation. So there is hope that this particular form of corporate violence many end soon.
https://www.eff.org/press/releases/eff-lawsuit-takes-dmca-section-1201-research-and-technology-restrictions-violateThat said, Apple doesn't come and raid your house if you install something on a computer.
Unfortunatetly this is incorrect. Installing something on a computer or a smart phone, tablet etc., can lead to a police raid on one home thanks to the lobbying effots of companies such as Apple. The MPAA is among the worst villains here, so is Microsoft.
The only thing they do is to sell products that can only use their store, and to decide themselves what they want to put in their store or not. That is their good right. The problem with Apple stuff is not that Apple can decide what they put in their own store (nothing sounds more normal than that). The problem is that i-things only work with Apple store stuff. It is a closed system.
The fundamental issue here is that Apple uses DRM to prevent the "owners" of iDevices from installing software from sources other than their own store. This is called tied selling and is in fact illegal in many jurisdictions in many other areas. The consequence of this first wrong is that Apple looses it rights as to what they list or not list in their own store, and is in fact always in the wrong regardless of whether they list something or not on their store.
If you buy an intel computer, you can put linux on it, and you're free. But even windows allows you to install just any software you like.
Again there are some very serious misconceptions here. In the case of Intel computers and Microsoft this used to be the case say 20 years ago, but it is no longer the case, in particular since the advent of UEFI bios. These computers can be locked down even worse than most mobile devices including iDevices. Microsoft has mandated that they be sold with the UEFI bios locked. Those with Windows 8.x and Intel/AMD compatible processors Microsoft required that the UEFI bios be unlock-able by the end user. In the Windows 10 case the noose was tightened further with the mandate that they be sold with the UEFI bios locked, but the requirement that the UEFI bios be unlock-able by the end user removed. With Windows ARM devices (Windows surface) the Microsoft Mandate is that UEFI bios be not unlock-able by the end user, creating a situation that is actually worse than with Apple. When it comes installing software on Windows, Microsoft is moving towards a closed platform with their Windows store and Windows Universal, and has added language to their EULA allowing Microsoft to remove any software it so desires from end user computers running Microsoft Windows 10. On the other hand it has modified the Windows kernel in Windows 10 64bit to run the GNU tool chain on top of Windows. So we literally have both extremes on one computer.
Android too. So if you intend to use your device the way YOU intend to use it, and not the way Apple is telling you to use it, you shouldn't buy Apple stuff. On the other hand, if you want to stick to the Apple experience as Apple decides it, then by all means, buy i-stuff. This is why I said that probably, most Apple customers are not interested in crypto. If you're interested in crypto, you're not going to lock yourself up in a closed system.
It is true that even android devices are more tied to Google, than intel machines are linked to, say, microsoft, because most android devices are so different. There's no non-tweaked standard install of an Android derivative that just works on most devices, like gnu/linux runs "out of the box" on most different intel machines.
But at least, with some work, you can get a version of, say, Cyanogenmod on your android device, and you're free.
The issue with Android is the manufacturers and telcos and not Google. The vast majority of Android devices are sold with locked boot loaders and no root access. This is required for the DRM in these devices to do its dastardly deeds. In some cases they are also locked to the Google play store like iDevices. The impact of this is that a lot of software cannot be run on these devices without rooting. The secret to freedom in Android is to 1) Unlock the Boot loader 2) Root the device and 3) as in any mobile device remove the carrier lock. Rooting an Android device will of course break the DRM. and can lead to "a police raid on one's home" as in the Apple case. Once these three steps are accomplished then one is free and how one chooses to exercise one's freedom such as by installing a different ROM becomes one's own business.
As for Apple customers not been interested in Crypto this again is not true. What happens with Apple customers is that they are for the most part deceived by Apple on these issues. Here is an example of what can happen when a Apple customer figures out they were had. This is from 2014 when Apple was still censoring Bitcoin.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuQZTAJ2KLkOn a final note. When breaking DRM there can be a significant risk of legal liability, so it is very important to carefully examine the anti circumvention of DRM laws in one's jurisdiction for exemptions that can be used to avoid legal liability and seek professional legal advice, where appropriate.