[afloatboat]

Not a direct answer to your question, but somewhat related. When the iPhone was first released (or a year later when the App Store was released) we did have more competition than we do today.

Windows Mobile, Symbian OS, BlackBerry OS (and to some extent Maemo) all had the opportunity to compete with iOS and Android but were either too slow to transition to market demands or did not get a lot of traction to start with.

While not officially a monopoly in my book, I think it's safe to state that we're now down to iOS and Android for 99% of the market with KaiOS Ubuntu Touch (Tizen?) picking up some of the more niche or cheap devices.