I think Google really made a strategic mistake by copying Apple on the payment restrictions. It kills me to see Apple and Google lumped together as "monopolies" when Google's policy is IMHO 100x less monopolistic than Apple's given you can sideload and use completely different app stores, and enable "developer mode" without paying a subscription fee just to run your own app on your own device. But the payment restrictions are definitely monopolistic-style abuse. Had they not have copied that, I don't think they'd be under this microscope and losing lawsuits and what not.
It does still blow my mind that Apple won their lawsuit from Epic, yet Google lost, when Google is far less restrictive. IANAL but from what I've understood it mainly came down to the fact that G execs put the stuff in writing whereas Apple did not, so with G there was some real damning evidence of the anti-competitive behavior. But ironically, the reason G execs were in the position of having to buy off people and make deals to stifle competition is because of their looser reins over the platform. If they'd been draconian and hyper-controlling from the start, refusing side-loading and similar like Apple does, they wouldn't have had to pay people off and make deals to crush competition as that competition couldn't have even gotten off the ground in the first place.
It does still blow my mind that Apple won their lawsuit from Epic, yet Google lost, when Google is far less restrictive. IANAL but from what I've understood it mainly came down to the fact that G execs put the stuff in writing whereas Apple did not, so with G there was some real damning evidence of the anti-competitive behavior. But ironically, the reason G execs were in the position of having to buy off people and make deals to stifle competition is because of their looser reins over the platform. If they'd been draconian and hyper-controlling from the start, refusing side-loading and similar like Apple does, they wouldn't have had to pay people off and make deals to crush competition as that competition couldn't have even gotten off the ground in the first place.