> I’m not willing to pay the apple tax any longer.

Problem here is that when you decide you no longer wish to pay the tax and want to exit the walled garden, you discover that there's a heap of functionality and convenience you'll have to let go, and add complexity and cost to your setup.

I actively avoided relying on iCloud even when it was the sane option, but many people that will feel like the walled garden is no longer suiting them will have to figure out ways to move files, emails, and (crucially) communication channels out of the ecosystem.

I think a large number of them will decide that it's not worth the hassle, and remain walled in. Which is the idea to begin with.

Sure, this is HN, and many will say "screw it, I'll Nextcloud my way out", but the genpop will remain within the gilded cage.

Other than blue bubbles, you aren't leaving behind much nowadays. Apple is now lagging in general usability vs competitors, Siri as one glaring example.

>you discover that there's a heap of functionality and convenience you'll have to let go, and add complexity and cost to your setup.

Which is?

Every time I got an Apple product, it felt like a step back. They were late to widgets, late to AI. Their security is historically poor.

>you discover that there's a heap of functionality and convenience you'll have to let go,

Cloud storage of pictures is not an issue as I do regular backups (we all should, we’re a false positive account termination away from crying otherwise).

What’s else is there? I’m not American so no iMessage, I struggle to find some other blocker.

> here's a heap of functionality and convenience you'll have to let go

That's a very outdated point of view. All mobile ecosystems have practical feature parity. Convenience - that's a tricky one. With Apple stuff, you only have convenience if you're one of the bubble people who has their entire family and close friends in the Apple ecosystem. The reality outside that is that for every 1 iOS person, there are ~2 non iOS people they need to collaborate with and share stuff. Convenience has left the room a long time ago.