Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

Installing any app I want outside the Play Store was the primary reason I decided to go with Android, despite most of the people I know using iPhones. If I can't do this anymore, I may as well switch and be able to use iMessage and FaceTime with them.

You can still install apps outside the play store, but the developer does need to verify their signing information. Effectively this means that any app you install must have a paper trail to the originating developer, even if its not on the app store. On one hand, I can see the need for this to track down virus creators, but on the other, it provides Google transparency and control over side loaded app. It IS a concerning move, but currently this is far from 'killing' non-appstore apps for most of the market.

Yeah... no. This is normal with desktop computers. Let's stop handholding people. If I trust the source, I trust the domain... I want to be able to install app from its source.

Googles/Apples argument would have been much stronger if their stores managed to not allow scams/malware/bad apps to their store but this is not the case. They want to have the full control without having the full responsibility. It's just powergrab.

And you are completely ignoring viruses, ransomware, keyloggers, the 50 toolbars etc that has been the staple of Windows and before that DOS for over 40 years.

Scam apps are rife in the iOS App Store. But what they can’t do easily install viruses that affect anything out of its sandbox, keyloggers, etc

The toolbars don’t just magically appear there. They are the product of a technically illiterate user.

Yes because technically literate users shouldn’t have trusted mainstream companies to not install bundle ware back in the Day? They shouldn’t have trusted Zoom not to install a web server on Macs surreptitiously that caused a vulnerability? They shouldn’t have searched Google for printer drivers not knowing that it was a fake printer driver? They shouldn’t have trusted Facebook when they installed VPN software that tracked all of their traffic from any app?

Is that really your answer? To make the phone ecosystem as fraught as Windows PCs for the average user? How is they worked out for PC users since the 80s?

Technically illiterate users should leave the default security settings enabled.

In the modern day, I actually think this mostly works? Are you aware of instances where normies installed Windows malware because they purposefully disabled Windows Defender?

Everyone always talks about the "Dancing Bunnies Problem" but I'm not convinced it's actually a thing.