When has anything good ever come from a company having total control over some tech it invented? Investors getting a higher ROI?
The only concrete benefit to me I can think of is my AirPods working flawlessly with my iPhone, in contrast to every combination of wireless headphones and Android phones I owned. Apple is the only company I buy from based on that trade off; there is zero brand loyalty here and I’d drop em in a heartbeat if they stopped delivering on the promise of “it always works.”
Transistors, Unix, and personal computing took off when their creators lost control.
You may be a slave to Apple, but I already own viable open source alternatives to every one of their products with the exception of headphones (my Sony MDR-7506 is close enough as far as I'm concerned).
I invest all the maintenance savings into my ArchLinux daily driver (it used to be Gentoo but ain't no one got time for that). Replacing everything Apple with RaspberryPis and Samsung/PinePhones would take a couple of weekends, but that's a small price to pay for freedom.
My standard-Bluetooth headphones work pretty well with my iPhone. Apple USB chargers work just fine to charge anything else. It's not like everything Apple does is 100% proprietary to their ecosystem.
The only concrete benefit to me I can think of is my AirPods working flawlessly with my iPhone, in contrast to every combination of wireless headphones and Android phones I owned. Apple is the only company I buy from based on that trade off; there is zero brand loyalty here and I’d drop em in a heartbeat if they stopped delivering on the promise of “it always works.”
Transistors, Unix, and personal computing took off when their creators lost control.