What puzzles me to no end is how many people were happy not only with having no control over their device (which is fine if they don't want it), but also other people not having control over their devices (which is totally not fine if they do want it).

It’s pretty simple. Side-loading can be exploited by social engineering.

Two very bad consequences for me if sideloading were easy:

1. There would be no safe product to recommend to my aging parents who would be vulnerable to social engineering.

2. A company with a popular produce like Facebook could go outside the store, which would normalize side-loading, thus rendering argument like ‘people who want safety can stick to the store’ moot.

The arguments about not wanting to control what other people do are moot. If you want a platform with side-loading, buy android.

jeroenhd

Side loading is already possible. Yes, you can only do it for a few days at a time, but that's why there's an easy tool that will refresh the application for you.

I haven't heart of social engineering involving https://github.com/altstoreio/AltStore but maybe you know something I don't. Either way, installing apps onto iOS devices over the network exists today.