It's not an exception. Binary distribution is the norm - Apple founded their business on that norm, found success in it, fostered it and continues to support it on MacOS. The App Store style of distribution is not a replacement for it, especially when the escape hatches for developers cost an annual fee and still has limitations. If it takes legislation to change that, so be it. This is not the future for computing that anyone wanted.
If there's a good reason iOS can't run third-party software, now's the time to fix it. Otherwise, Apple might have to find a new economic zone to invest in.
Apple themselves distributed software as a binary before they had an App Store. If there was some other "norm" to speak of, it didn't exist when the Apple IIc hit shelves.
Correct, it didn't exist back then, because just about the only software a consumer would ever be exposed to was some kind of desktop computer. The closed model got its early start in the nineties when it became increasingly common for consumer devices to include software in their design.
Among the earliest examples of this emerging new normal in its gestational phase would be game consoles from the 16-bit era onwards. It also included just about all pre-smart cellular phones (but for occasional a rather pointless Java support), nearly all printers, nearly all camcorders, and so on. There are probably between 5 and 50 internet connected "computers" in the typical home and the typical consumer has some semblance of software control on maybe three of them.
Game consoles defend their software ecosystem because they don't have hardware margins (unlike Apple). Apple could try to use the console manufacturer defense, but they'd have to abandon their biggest cash cow to make it work.
> nearly all printers, nearly all camcorders, and so on.
I'm really starting to think nobody here read the Digital Service Act. Unless your toaster or smart-refrigerator is a gatekeeper platform with the required number of users, it doesn't matter. Apple is rightfully being called out for anticompetitive conduct, regardless of how you feel about the morality of an App Store.
If App Stores are the future, we'll have to Think Different and implement them in better way. Apple has their work cut out for them, the preemptive apologism falls on deaf ears.
If there's a good reason iOS can't run third-party software, now's the time to fix it. Otherwise, Apple might have to find a new economic zone to invest in.