Why? The device is built and sold in a particular configuration, among other things attempting to ensure the user doesn't do things with the device which the ma

Why? The device is built and sold in a particular configuration, among other things attempting to ensure the user doesn't do things with the device which the manufacturer didn't intend but will likely get blamed for. (Ex.: user, on recommendation of friend, "jailbreaks" an iPhone and installs new software which is buggy/slow, resulting in user telling others how crappy the iPhone is - even though the problem isn't Apple's fault, and Apple took measures to prevent such changes from happening.) The hardware & software have a symbiotic relationship. Each must function within certain developed parameters to ensure the other can function within its specified parameters. That's how Apple can use lighter-weight & cheaper hardware yet get greater performance: both hardware & software are tuned together for optimized performance. Android, like Windows, is suffering from having to support unknown hardware. You're demanding that, under police power of the state (note that: you're threatening to arrest people for this), Apple explicitly allow/support software which Apple has absolutely no control over yet will get grief for when it sucks. Relevant to the original point: a car manufacturer doesn't want users patching in home-brew software which changes/breaks safety features. While such could be done with hardware, they're increasingly trying to do things to prevent those changes too (model-specific parts, hindering others from making & using inferior components).