I'd go one step further and say that some of this is even a design flaw in the platform. Depending on developers to check a system setting to see if they should

I'd go one step further and say that some of this is even a design flaw in the platform. Depending on developers to check a system setting to see if they should make updates is absolutely backwards. The OS should provide an API that allows an app to request an update, but is denied if the user's settings don't allow it.