The real upside here isn’t directly accruing to Apple but rather to those in power to have a couple of centralised entities they can go to whenever they want to pull apps/content from circulation.

Damus being pulled in China is a perfect example and before that you might recall HKmap being pulled in 2019 and Apple releasing an iOS version last year limiting airdrop which protestors in Taiwan were using to spread messages; we in the West just like to pretend this doesn’t happen here.

But it does. When the Christchurch massacre happened my government here in Aus (not NZ, the separate country of Australia) leaned on the ISPs to block LiveLeak and 4chan - permanently. According to them that’s where the content was being shared despite the fact it was **live-streamed on Facebook** and seen there hundreds of thousands of times, far more than the sites that got the ban hammer. Zero repercussions for FB because they play ball with government, whereas those who don’t get banned.

Big tech is in bed with government. nostr:npub1sn0wdenkukak0d9dfczzeacvhkrgz92ak56egt7vdgzn8pv2wfqqhrjdv9 woke many of us up to that fact and whilst they’ve managed to be more subtle in the years since, we know those ties have only deepened.

Agree that they’ve picked the wrong group to oppose here because we have the protocols now and if anyone can jack them up these are the devs to do it, but when they’ve got the 900 pound gorilla on their side who writes the rules and controls the people enforcing them, and it aligns with their financial interests, well let’s just say it’s not surprising..