Exactly. Apple is responsible for a huge loss of freedom in the War On General Purpose Computing. This &quot;appification&quot; is <i>exactly</i> what Cory Doctorow was talking about in his famous essay[1]. We are already beginning to see some of the nastier effects that we warned about[2] with, for example, John Deere&#x27;s attempt to retain ownership[3].<p>Apologists will complain that you can turn of SIP (or jailbreak your phone) to regain control over your computer, but that isn&#x27;t possible for most people. Installing certain types of software went from &quot;run the installer&quot; to &quot;follow these complicated technical instructions&quot; (or worse).<p>What I find more worrying is how easily technical people are fooled into supporting this loss of freedom. Scream &quot;security&quot; and suddenly it&#x27;s ok for Apple to have root but not the supposed &quot;owner&quot; of the device? Of course, they know how to disable the restrictions or install a jailbreak, so these problems don&#x27;t apply to the technological priesthood - it&#x27;s normal people that have to live with the restrictions.<p>Well, this hubris will not last - once Apple can starts using the new Trusted Computing[4] features on new CPUs (such as SGX[5]), good luck regaining control.<p>It would be nice if more people actually bothered thinking about long-term consequences.<p>[1] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;boingboing.net&#x2F;2012&#x2F;01&#x2F;10&#x2F;lockdown.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;boingboing.net&#x2F;2012&#x2F;01&#x2F;10&#x2F;lockdown.html</a><p>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=nypRYpVKc5Y" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=nypRYpVKc5Y</a><p>[3] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.wired.com&#x2F;2015&#x2F;04&#x2F;dmca-ownership-john-deere&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.wired.com&#x2F;2015&#x2F;04&#x2F;dmca-ownership-john-deere&#x2F;</a><p>[4] one example: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;i.imgur.com&#x2F;rjbzWyB.jpg" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;i.imgur.com&#x2F;rjbzWyB.jpg</a><p>[5] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=10754170" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=10754170</a>