It is almost impressive how fundamentally you miss the point of so much going on here

not really. you just are including bits that are fundamentally not connected to the existence of the store. All the security features/UX tooling existed long before the store did and is part of the hardware pricing.

The platform isn’t just the store, it starts with the phone and the OS.

Sure, and the users are paying for that when they bought the hardware. nothing forces apple to build their own OS everything they need can be supported in userspace via linux for example. Its apples choice to develop and maintain the OS no one is forcing them to build their own hardware. There are plenty of examples of hardware developed by third parties that dont require exorbitant price gouging and compete on the market.

Apple has also cultivated a user base that has money and a willingness to spend on the platform.

This is entirely irrelevant to apples behavior with regard to application distribution and the services being provided.

Again, since you keep thinking all of this is so easy, make your own phone, attract your own users, etc.

Already been done multiple times, and plenty of alternatives exist and I also support such devices by avoiding apple native apis. in fact the app store is the only one I cant avoid because of apples policies this case is exactly about and which android already lost the case on and its an identical situation. SCOTUS literally disagreed with you already on this situation.

Its the active hostile and monopolistic behavior of apple regarding third party distribution that is at issue here. not them providing services that developers would actually use (and charging for market competitive rates for).

Writing this out has distracted me enough to burn my pancakes. Moving on. Goodbye.

poor pancakes. =(