Contrary to the OP's claims AFAICT most third-party clients/apps for successful services are usually well supported. A much easier way for a first party to kil

Contrary to the OP's claims AFAICT most third-party clients/apps for successful services are usually well supported. A much easier way for a first party to kill third parties that may be hurting their businesses is buying them out and/or incorporating their functionality into the first party apps. If users are choosing third party apps it's usually because (a) they are breaking some pretty obvious rules, like copyright and/or not displaying ads, in which case they will be in a constant struggle to survive, (b) they are providing functionality the first party does not or cannot provide, in which case it's still beneficial for the first party since the third party app is helping them keep the users.