The Mac App Store gives a hint at what would happen if there was any choice. The amount of software actually
available for the Mac is far, far greater than what’s listed in the store. Furthermore, while some quality and notable apps are still in the Mac App Store,
many well-known apps are not there. The number of lousy apps is also extremely high every time I go to search or just look at the front page, to the point where Apple does itself no favors by even drawing attention to most of the apps on that store (and it gives the impression that “most” Mac software must be like this).
If they simply listed all major Mac apps, e.g. linking to their web sites or download links or whatever, they would hugely increase the value of the Mac platform and bring enough direct benefit to developers to be worth some kind of fee (and of course Apple gets $99/year anyway). Instead, they tried to port the same clueless, greedy, review-burdened scheme to that store, layering completely unnecessary requirements on top (like poorly-thought-out sandboxing). And since developers had a choice, they mostly said No.
If they simply listed all major Mac apps, e.g. linking to their web sites or download links or whatever, they would hugely increase the value of the Mac platform and bring enough direct benefit to developers to be worth some kind of fee (and of course Apple gets $99/year anyway). Instead, they tried to port the same clueless, greedy, review-burdened scheme to that store, layering completely unnecessary requirements on top (like poorly-thought-out sandboxing). And since developers had a choice, they mostly said No.