the degree to which innovation in even the slightest of edgy spaces has been curtailed due to apple is really underappreciated, I think. If you're making an app, you have to get approval from apple for any chance at success; they're like a defacto government
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That's why libertarianism doesn't work. Monopolies/giant companies just end up as the government but with no democratic accountability
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if we actually had a free market there would likely be more competition to choose from instead of apple
Wouldn't government action be required to create a free market in apps?
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Why wouldn't a free market just mean that Apple would leverage their billions of dollars to just buy out competition or bribe other stores to refuse to do service with their competitors? Who would give a loan to someone who's plan was to fight against a trillion dollar company?
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A free market would not protect you from network effects. Quite the opposite, it's regulations that prevent Apple from making the walls of its walled garden even higher.
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No there wouldn't. The "free market" naturally tends towards monopolies because once companies reach a certain size the advantage they have from economies of scale/network effects keeps competitors out of the market. That's why the laissez faire Gilded Age had so many monopolies.
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How would this actual free market be different than what we have today?
The market that apple works in isn't exactly the most regulated market in the world in the first place.
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You mean like Samsung, Nokia, Sony, LG, HTC, Motorola, Google Vivo ... ?
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You're missing the point.
Unbridled capitalism has no check for hegemony itself.
You suggesting a truly free market is just that, an oversight of the way in which power naturally coagulates to preserve and expand itself.
You have an answer for hegemony?
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Definitely nah. So many aspects of life that matters doesn't have inherent incentives for good, fair markets to naturally emerge. Monopolies in name or in effective practice are "natural" outcomes with hands off approaches.