Because they're not a monopoly on smartphones/tablets. Android is doing pretty well, by most accounts. Blackberry still isn't dead (though not for lack of RIM's

Because they're not a monopoly on smartphones/tablets. Android is doing pretty well, by most accounts. Blackberry still isn't dead (though not for lack of RIM's trying). The IE antitrust case against Microsoft was because they held a monopoly on desktop computers, and tried to use that to build a monopoly on Internet Browsers. Apple a monopoly on Apple devices, but that's fine. Saying that they have a "monopoly" here is like saying that Coke has a monopoly on the contents of Coke bottles, and they should be forced to fill some with Pepsi. Perhaps less glibly, that things like XBox should be forced to ship Mario, or that Microsoft must release Halo for the PS3. Just because we're used to anything with a CPU being "free for all developers to ship whatever they like onto" doesn't make it a right enforceable by law. If that's your preference, great - buy devices that support this. We do not want the government dictating policy in an area so young, and highly competitive. If, in a few years, the iPad has become the tablet computer with 99% of the marketshare, there might be an argument for an antitrust case against App Store policies. But that looks very unlikely to be the case.